Oracle Exalogic [EOL] Reviews

The most valuable feature of the product is the infinity band solution, but only if you have all of the components – Applications, Middleware, Database – running in the same cloud or in the same box.

The technology has a good I/O response rate that permits very high data processing between the frontend and backend layers.

We used it a lot for BI Operations, for JMS, and other business operations that need a very fast response for webservices and the result was satisfactory. On comparison with other solutions, VM for example, we saw a 70% performance improvement.

The storage system needs to be improved. Perhaps the newer version (X4) is better but on X3, we had many storage issues.

I used it for three years.

I had an issue with the GFS of the storage.

I did not encounter any scalability issues.

Technical support is an issue for Oracle, not only for Exalogic products; it needs to improve. We didn't see good response from support, not as far as the response time, but about its effectiveness. We had a lot of boring situations, so the level of technical support was very bad.

We started using our applications over VMware solutions (vSphere). We were having some I/O constraints that forced us to research other solutions.

Initial setup was not totally straightforward, but not complex either. We did the 2 Box setup in about three weeks, including all Oracle Fusion Middleware products.
I guess the most complex part was the partition setup, some network definitions, etc.

It’s very difficult to define pricing and licensing. Nonetheless, if you want a mid-range solution (you don't have much space on your datacenter, etc.), and you want to group technologies, such as network devices, storage systems, etc., and software licenses too of course, well, it can be a good choice.

Before choosing this product, we also evaluated IBM blades and other similar architecture. We started to bring back some environments to para-virtualized hosts, some with full virtualization, others only using the blade hosts, or IBM LPARs, etc.

Well, first check if your requirements are aligned with the solution. For example, if your solution will need to connect or consume external resources (webservices, B2B, SAP, etc.) that are not in the same cloud. If this is the case, then it probably is not a good idea to choose this solution.

The product is best used to create private clouds for middleware based on the Oracle stack and on Oracle Enterprise applications that use the WebLogic platform.This is simply the best-performing platform for this particular use case. However, the product is not appropriate for other technology stacks. Even though it might in some cases be able to run them, the results will not be as optimal. For example, Oracle E-Business Suite version 12.13 is not based on WebLogic, but on OC4J; hence, the advantages of running it on Exalogic are not as significant as the benefits with E-Business Suite 12.2, which is WebLogic based.

Also, virtual machines in Exalogic need to be based on special templates that allow VM access to the native InfiniBand protocol, something which is not available in all the other virtualization solutions that use InfiniBand as a backbone but do not expose it to the VMs.

As mentioned, we do not internally use this product, but we have implemented it for our clients. When combined with other engineered systems such as Exadata, we have seen from 20% to 60% better performance overall with certain operations showing much, much improved execution times.

Currently the management functions of Exalogic are not as smooth as one would desire. Basically, it is designed with one objective in mind and that is performance. Because of this, the user interface might not be as user friendly as one would expect.

Also, one of the shortcomings of the current product is that it does not allow the internal ZFS to be expanded with multiple storage trays. This would be a very useful capability and it would also enable active-active failover at the storage layer.

We have implemented this solution for several of our customers starting from 2013. We have used multiple versions of this product in both bare metal and virtualized setups.

On the whole, once we understood how things worked, we were able to use the product well; initial versions of the software had problems with dynamic scaling of resources. It was difficult to adjust the memory and CPU resources of the virtual machines; however, this has been addressed in the current software releases.

The customer service and technical support we have received has been very good. We have had a chance to interact with the Oracle Exalogic A-team on occasion and they have been very generous of their time.

The initial setup is a little complex as there are a lot of moving parts that have to be filled in a spreadsheet at the outset; because there can be many different virtual IP addresses that must not clash with any others in the DC, even if the sub nets will never be routed out of the Exalogic rack (because if you create an IP over IB subnet, then any external system in the same subnet will automatically become unreachable). It takes a lot of preplanning to get things just right.

As we are ourselves qualified for implementation, it was a combination of the vendor team (Oracle) and our in-house team that did the installations. My advice to anyone who is implementing it for the first time would be to seriously think about engaging an SI, as there are a lot of gotchas that the default Oracle OCS team is not going to be walking you through during the actual five days or so of installation.

At the clients where the systems have been installed, the system pays for itself within two years and by utilizing COD and Oracle VM-based licensing, they were able to restrict software license costs to make this a very compelling proposition.

We evaluated multiple solutions for different clients. However, as mentioned, this is the one that provides the best possible performance.

As mentioned, this is the best platform for WebLogic. I strongly recommend coupling this with Exadata, as there are multiplied benefits with this approach. The solution is not for everyone, though smaller companies can go for an IaaS op-ex model now, but the real target audience is organizations who want the best possible performance from the Oracle stack.

InfiniBand (internal Exalogic network) minimizes any network outages. Exalogic has a very speedy and stable connection to Exadata (DB server) via InfiniBand. This feature is vital for products such as Oracle Fusion SOA Suite that heavily depend on DB speed and stability.

Scalability: We can easily and out of the box upgrade any domain.

• Standard approach for monitoring and troubleshooting
• Less time spent on troubleshooting, as there is almost no fallout of lost messages
• Number of non-completed requests decreased significantly due to the stable internal network

I would like to be able to dynamically size the virtual servers. Today, this requires a full reboot.

I have been using it for three years.

Not anymore. Several months ago, we had some stability issues but, following patches delivered by Oracle, the machines are very stable.

Technical support is 7/10.

We used to work with VMware farms. Due to network issues and resource starvation under heavy load, we were exposed to significant support from operational teams for the non-completed and lost transactions.

As far as my colleague and I recall, no other option was considered, because Oracle “gave us an offer, we couldn’t refuse”. J

The box required design that was done mostly by Oracle; it was complex, and the implementation of the first machine took about four months with extended Oracle support.

License costs depend on your business relationship with Oracle.

The product is good but complex, and requires extensive internal knowledge to build it up and support.

It's vendor-managed, preconfigured, and engineered. It's important mainly for reducing time and complexity in the setup and first delivery of IT environments.

It's improved the delivery of virtual machines and setting them up with WebLogic (Application Server).

Live Migration of the vServers will be a plus, as well as a more robust EMOC/EL control behavior.

We started using it in 2013, so for about four years.

We had no issues with the deployment.

We faced, a few times, problems with the stability of the platform due to storage issues.

We have had no issues scaling it as needed.

The overall rating is sufficient, but we expected a little bit better. And for our level of complexity, we'd like a more responsive attitude from the Oracle Support.

We moved our WebLogic Servers from a Linux standard infrastructure to the Exalogic Platform in order to have a single "family" environment.

The initial setup was fine, and it was performed according to our prerequisites.

We proceeded in two ways. First, the initial setup was provided by the vendor team. After that, we managed the platform on our own, and designed the best vDC configuration.

It can be a good choice if you like to avoid labour in setting up the storage, network and computing. After this, you need to be prepared to rely on your team or the vendor support team because you’re going to face small but frequent issues.

We use Oracle Database with the real application clusters and the Exalogic is the most matching real application cluster. We are now using the Oracle X3, X4, and X5 in our production environment. From the X3-2, the Exalogic started applying the very first technologies for cache writing, and so I believe Exalogic is the most stable rear echelon type database, especially for financial systems.

There are many benefits of Exalogic, but I believe the most important point is production stability. There's almost no down-time. It's very important, especially for financial services because 24/7, nonstop services are required.

The current Exalogic X5-2 is enough for financial systems. Exadata's current speed is almost enough but sometimes much slower than the older mainframe systems, so some performance improvements would be helpful.

Very stable.

Yes. It scales well.

We needed to migrate by hand all of the MSS SCSI servers and all the database servers. Unfortunately, Oracle and GoldenGate don't support all the systems, so we decided to migrate by hand.

Oracle Engineered Systems are the best solution for Oracle and non-Oracle applications: hardware and software are combined together to ensure high availability and maximum performance. Oracle Exadata contains all the advantages of standard Oracle Database, but on top of that there are exclusive features such as IORM (IO Resource Manager) and HCC (Hybrid Columnar Compression). IORM (in combination with Database Resource Manager (DBRM)) permits you to isolate I/O requests to avoid I/O saturation. HCC provides different levels of compression to reduce space allocation and to decrease I/O.

Oracle Exadata and Oracle Exalogic are standard-based. Customers can easily migrate their existing applications based on Oracle Database and Oracle WebLogic: they can take advantages of Engineered Systems with minimal effort during the migration process. Customers can benefit from high performance without modifying Java or SQL code and they can decide to use specific features after migrating to Exadata/Exalogic. Also, Engineered Systems can be used to consolidate complex environments: for example, our customer was able to decommission about 20 blades, using a single 1/8 Exalogic x4-2. Finally, Exadata and Exalogic simplifies patching/upgrading process, unifying firmware upgrades, ILOM upgrades, OS patching, Database/WebLogic upgrade/patching in one "single-vendor" activity.

EMOC (Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center) is not very user-friendly, the user interface could be improved.

We installed the first Exalogic in 2013.

It provides a standard procedure to scale the number of compute/storage nodes.

6/10

There was no solution in place previously.

Using Exadata and Exalogic, you can get the best performance optimizing the number of CPUs, saving costs on software licensing. Also, if you consolidate your environment using Engineered Systems, you can save money on hardware (storage/compute capacity).

No other options were looked at.

As best practice, before starting the installation you should have a look at the Oracle Documentation. Oracle provides a "Getting Started Guide" to get up-to-date checklists to verify requirements (for example IP addresses, name syntax, etc.) and to be sure your infrastructure is ready for the installation. Also, we recommend to install Oracle Enterprise Manager as a monitoring solution: it is fully integrated with Oracle Exadata and Oracle Exalogic, you can monitor hardware (compute nodes, switches, ILKOM etc.) and software (operating system, Database, WebLogic, business applications etc.).

The virtualized app servers for enterprise systems supporting all HR functions is valuable.

We get better performance and utilization of resources since it was implemented. It's helped to reduce the batch cycle from over 40 hours to about eight.

It's very expensive. Oracle Platinum Services (patching) is terrible, and we haven't had a patching exercise occur without significant problems and often impact to production operations.

We began the implementation the fall of 2012 and completed in September of 2013. It has been in place since then with expansion and upgrades along the way.

Significant issues with deployment of OTD (Oracle Traffic Director).

Stability for the most part has been good with some production impact which resulted from patching and version control. The product needs a better support model.

Level 1 and Level 2 I would give 6/10. Level 3 I would give 9/10. The problem was the time it took to reach the appropriate level of support to solve the problem.

Prior to the Exa platform we ran on M5000.

This was a complex implementation. Implementation of Grid, RAC, and especially OTD was a nightmare. However, once solved, it has performed well and remained stable. This was not an issue with the solution itself but more related to the technical understanding of the network design coupled with the technical knowledge required for setup of OTD. We ultimately received level three support from the Oracle product team that solved the problem. The level 3 product team was excellent.

I led the vendor team team that managed the implementation. We also engaged ACS and OCS (Oracle Consulting Service) to assist with the implementation.

Selection of Exa was after a Proof of Concept comparison with VCE, IBM, and HP. Exa had superior performance results with a significant higher cost.

I would suggest that you do not underestimate the work involved and if working with OCS closely manage the deliverables and hours.

• Oracle application/middleware performance optimization
• Virtualization with bare metal performance

Exalogic has provided us and our customers with high performance Oracle Weblogic, eBusiness Suite applications and concurrent manager platform. Even with running in a virtualized configuration, the performance seen has been better than running on non-Exalogic physical environments. The ability to connect Exalogic to Exadata via Infiniband has also optimized performance between application and database improving application performance. This is particularly true for chatty weblogic applications or eBS large concurrent manager jobs like those related to advanced supply chain planning.

The administration of the VMs is cumbersome and lacks features that are taken for granted in other virtualization platforms – many administrative and availability features, even available in traditional OVM, are not available on Exalogic. This includes not having the ability to increase VM resources while the VM is online, or even being able to change CPU and memory sizes for a VM without recreating and cloning it. There is also no live migration feature available.

I've been using it for two and a half years.

There have been no issues with the deployment.

We've had no issues with the performance.

It's been able to scale for our needs.

The support on the Exalogic is much better than other, non-engineered Oracle environments. Exalogic comes included with Oracle Platinum Services – a higher level of Oracle technical support – providing Oracle access to the system and allowing for faster responsiveness and resolution to issues.

The initial setup has to be performed by Oracle or a certified partner. Stating that, the initial install and setup is straightforward and is completed in a few days.

As an Oracle certified partner, we implemented in-house. My advice is to utilize Oracle certified Partners, to do the implementation or utilize Oracle ACS. We have also had experiences with network conflicts in past Exalogic implementations. And much of the network configuration can not be changed without a re-install. My advice is to ensure the network addresses and information given in the Exalogic Configurator worksheet, filled out before install, is accurate and does not conflict with other addresses in the corporate network.

We compared commodity server based environments – but they were unable to match the performance of Exalogic.

Exalogic is an environment built for performance for Oracle middleware and application workloads. If you are looking for the best performance for such environments, at the expense of some ease of administration, then this environment is for you.

OVM and the InfiniBand readiness ([IBO] TCP port settings) of the VM’s in this OVM version for Exalogic are the most valuable features.

We were able to decommission more then 20 blade servers, all of which are now running on Exalogic.

There is still room for improvement, especially in regards to Oracle support.

Also, the SDP InfiniBand protocol needs to be usable in VM’s and patches for OVM installed for delivery.

We had no issues deploying it.

OTD (Oracle Traffic Director) is failover architecture and is not as robust as advertised. Additionally, SSO and several other features sometimes went down.

We have had no issues scaling it.

6/10

6/10

We previously used version X3-4 and upgraded to the current version.

It is an environment which runs partly via bare metal and partly via hypervisor technology, and this type of installation cannot be simple. It is also an engineered system, which means that there are a lot of tweaks that enhance it a lot, but they aren't easy. There's a rather high entry point for just setting it up.

We used both vendor and in-house teams for the implementation. First, we implemented OMCS and then, after several months, the rest of the DTAP environment. This was also the case with the functional servers (individual VM’s).

It was a little bit of a black box for me. It costs millions for the hardware and software licenses. However, the overall system runs five times faster than it did on IBM hardware.

It is a great solution for an application server.

The virtualization, especially vUser creation, is the most valuable feature for us.

Flexibility on server creation and deployment are much easier on this machine.

Reporting and bug fixes should be applied for this product on-time.

We are the end customer and are managing Exalogic for our customer, and it's been in place for one-and-a-half years.

We had no issues with the deployment.

We have had issues with the stability as the product failed on its promise for replication of all the components. There was a zpool failure which was exceptionally problematic.

We have had no issues scaling it.

7/10

7/10

This is being used in a customer's environment, and I am unsure if they used something previously.

The initial configuration was performed by Oracle before handing over the machine to us.

The first implementation was done by Oracle, and later on we did all the new implementations.

The ROI is good, but I would suggest only a high-end customer should go for this as Platinum support is a must.

This is being used in a customer's environment, and I am unsure if they evaluated anything else.

Certainly buy Platinum support as you will need Oracle's help every now and then.