Report Retrieval Times in BPCv7 SP3 using SQL 2008

Question

General Information: We are a two server environment, one WEB and one SQL, using SQL 2008. We are using BPC v7 SP3. In our devlopment environment, we have selected a handful of reports to use as a benchmark against our production version of Outlooksoft version 4.
Problem: The benchmark reports are taking longer to retrieve in BPC v7 then they are in Outlooksoft version 4 SP9. We have stripped out the dimension formulas, unchecked the INAPP for each dimension property, reset the compatability level in SQL, and removed all data from the facttables in BPC version 7. The initial pull of the report seems to take almost 3 times as long in BPC v7 than in Outlooksoft version 4. Subsequent pulls, changing the date, take less than 15 seconds for the same report.
We are at a stand still trying to figure out why we are experiencing such lengthy retrieval times in the initial pull of a report in BPC version 7.
Additional Info: In our development environment of BPC v7, we currently have only 4 users set up to test. Our Outlooksoft version 4 has a total of 186 users. I don't know the maximium concurrent users we may have at one time.
Question: We are wondering if any other users are experiencing the same issue when they try and retrieve data from a report in BPC version 7? Please share your insight to this problem.

Answer 1

Hi Irene,
It is a big diference of design between 4.x and 7.x.
Into 4.x when you pull data into a report actually you are using PTS from client and you already have the connection and everything from client direct to OLAP server.
In 7.x all the request are going first to application server and the application server is the one taking the data from OLAP and after that data is sent to client.
So first time when you are doing refresh of report into application server it is necessary to create instances for all COM+ components necessary connection etc...and in that case the reports is taking longer.
When you are doing other refresh with the same reports or with other the time for refresh is much faster because already the COM+ instances were created and in this case the reports should be faster than v 4.x
So I suggest to try the follow test.
after login with BPC client just open first a small reports which you know is not taking too long.
After that open your big report. It should retrieve data faster than 4.x or almost the same time.
Also make sure you have all the settings done from Tunning Guide for BPC 5.x ( these settings can be applied also for 7.X)
to be sure that your 7.0 environment is working properly. This tunning guide can be found into bpx/sdn HTG section.
I hope this will help.
Regards
Sorin Radulescu