Using IOmeter to measure disk performance

Q. How do I use IOmeter?

A. IOmeter is a great tool to access the performance of your storage. It is available from http://www.iometer.org/ and once downloaded place the two files, iometer.exe and dynamo.exe in a folder together.

1. Start iometer.exe
2. In the Topology section select the first Worker 1 for your computer
3. In the Disk Targets tab select the disk/volume you want to test. A blue disk is a physical drive, a yellow disk a volume and a yellow disk with a red line through it is a volume that has not yet been prepared for IOmeter use (it will do this for you automatically)
   
4. Select the Access Specifications tab to select the type of IOs you wish to use to test the disk. There are various options available or at the bottom you can select All in one and click the Add button
5. Select the Worker 1 and click the duplicate worker button so there are multiple instances of the worker (I will use up to 20 at times depending on the test I'm performing). Delete the Worker 2 by selecting the disconnect worker button.
6. Click the Save button to save your test configuration
7. Click the Green flag to start the test and it will prompt for a file to save the results to
8. It will first prepare the disk that needs testing and then will start the test. Select the computer name in the Topology and select the Results Display tab to see the progress of the testing. Change the Update Frequency to 2 seconds to see data. You can also click on of the buttons under the Results Display tab to see a speedometer showing just that result
   
9. Click the Stop All button to stop the testing