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AEBS: Bad Packets Unrecovered TCP Retransmits NV and NV+
Bad Packets Unrecovered TCP Retransmits TCP Retransmits w ReadyNAS NV NV+ and Airport Extreme Base Station 5th Generation
I got an Airport Extreme Base Station (AEBS), 5th generation this past November to bring my entire network up to gigE standards and extend my wireless range a bit. I have really liked the AEBS 5th Gen overall since I got it 3 months ago. It was easy to setup and update and things have been noticeably faster. I can also easily take my netbook, laptop, and iPad out to my shop some 80 feet away from my AEBS and still surf rather well wirelessly too. I couldn't do this even with my previous D-Link wireless-n setup.
In December I picked up an old ReadyNAS NV+ to go along with my old ReadyNAS NV. When I finally started to setup the new network for my business in February, I noticed in the logs that I was getting a large numbers of bad packets, TCP retransmits, and unrecovered TCP retransmits. Previously, I had never had errors of any sort with any older network setups using linksys, dlink and netgear routers during the last 6 years.
Eventually cables, switches, and routers can go bad which results in the errors I have been getting so I went through the "Troubleshoot My Performance Problem/Check for Network Errors" section of the link below to try and figure out what was causing my problem.
(http://www.readynas.com/?p=310#Troubleshoot)
My Initial Setup:
Airport Extreme Base Station (AEBS):
- 1 incoming Cat5e from Motorola Surfboard 6120,
- 2 Cat5e connections to my wifes work network with her business computer and VOIP phone.
- 1 Cat 5e interconnecting the AEBS to my wired network on the HP Procurve Switch.
The AEBS manages addresses via DHCP on my wired network for all of my devices on the
HP Procurve 14008G Switch:
- 1 to NV
- 1 NV+
- 1 MacMini 2010
- 1 MacMini 2005
- 1 networked Epson R-3000 printer
1. Simple things first. Since I have always made all my own Cat 5e cable I figured I'd better get some better(?) cabling strait away. I went ordered new Cat 6 and Cat 6a cables to connect the NV, NV+, and my main Mac to the switch and connect the switch to the AEBS. The errors kept coming.
2. Then I separately connected each NAS unit directly to my computer by setting up the static IP on my computer first. Once I reconnected each ReadyNAS with the computer directly they defaulted to a static IP. Neither NAS had errors.
(http://sphardy.com/web/readynas/how-to-direct-connect-to-your-readynas/)
3. Errors were coming from either a bad Procurve 1400 switch or a bad AEBS. I hooked everything directly to my Airport Extreme and got lots of errors.
4. I decided to check the switch also. I altered each ReadyNAS's default static IP to one of my choosing individually. Then I hooked both ReadyNAS units to my HP Procurve 1400 switch. I hooked the switch directly to my computer and got no errors from either NAS. I continue to get no errors the next day.
5. When I first ran my tests I had Jumbo Frames turned Off. Currently, Jumbo Frames are On and there are still no errors and seems to be no slowness either.
Conclusion:
The Airport Extreme is the bottleneck causing the errors in my network.
Perhaps there is something I can alter which will rid me of the errors, but this type of error makes the AE seem to be pretty shoddy. A newer state-of-the-art router should not be bottlenecking my rather archaic slow network devices. Apparently, the 4th Gen AEBS's couldn't do Jumbo Frames, but this current model is supposed to, but I see no setting for changing the MTU.
Questions:
What could be causing the bottleneck?
Do I have a bad router?
How could I analyze this problem?
Has anyone else had similar issues and if so how were they resolved?
Current Setup:
All of my computers and NAS devices are hooked to my Procurve Switch each with its own Static IP.
The switch is working flawlessly with no Errors.
The network printer is now wireless and connected via the AEBS.
I am using wireless-n to connect to internet via the AEBS on my main machine.
I am sharing the internet connection with the other Mac Mini on the switch and any other machine I plug into the switch (not ideal).
Problem is:
I am not a systems administrator and don't really want to tinker with setting up Static IP's for the machines I hook and unhook to the switch.
I want the AEBS to manage addresses via DHCP so everything accessing my router will mindlessly be able to access all things on my network.
Can the AEBS be made to not produce errors or do I just have a lemon.
I got an Airport Extreme Base Station (AEBS), 5th generation this past November to bring my entire network up to gigE standards and extend my wireless range a bit. I have really liked the AEBS 5th Gen overall since I got it 3 months ago. It was easy to setup and update and things have been noticeably faster. I can also easily take my netbook, laptop, and iPad out to my shop some 80 feet away from my AEBS and still surf rather well wirelessly too. I couldn't do this even with my previous D-Link wireless-n setup.
In December I picked up an old ReadyNAS NV+ to go along with my old ReadyNAS NV. When I finally started to setup the new network for my business in February, I noticed in the logs that I was getting a large numbers of bad packets, TCP retransmits, and unrecovered TCP retransmits. Previously, I had never had errors of any sort with any older network setups using linksys, dlink and netgear routers during the last 6 years.
Eventually cables, switches, and routers can go bad which results in the errors I have been getting so I went through the "Troubleshoot My Performance Problem/Check for Network Errors" section of the link below to try and figure out what was causing my problem.
(http://www.readynas.com/?p=310#Troubleshoot)
My Initial Setup:
Airport Extreme Base Station (AEBS):
- 1 incoming Cat5e from Motorola Surfboard 6120,
- 2 Cat5e connections to my wifes work network with her business computer and VOIP phone.
- 1 Cat 5e interconnecting the AEBS to my wired network on the HP Procurve Switch.
The AEBS manages addresses via DHCP on my wired network for all of my devices on the
HP Procurve 14008G Switch:
- 1 to NV
- 1 NV+
- 1 MacMini 2010
- 1 MacMini 2005
- 1 networked Epson R-3000 printer
1. Simple things first. Since I have always made all my own Cat 5e cable I figured I'd better get some better(?) cabling strait away. I went ordered new Cat 6 and Cat 6a cables to connect the NV, NV+, and my main Mac to the switch and connect the switch to the AEBS. The errors kept coming.
2. Then I separately connected each NAS unit directly to my computer by setting up the static IP on my computer first. Once I reconnected each ReadyNAS with the computer directly they defaulted to a static IP. Neither NAS had errors.
(http://sphardy.com/web/readynas/how-to-direct-connect-to-your-readynas/)
3. Errors were coming from either a bad Procurve 1400 switch or a bad AEBS. I hooked everything directly to my Airport Extreme and got lots of errors.
4. I decided to check the switch also. I altered each ReadyNAS's default static IP to one of my choosing individually. Then I hooked both ReadyNAS units to my HP Procurve 1400 switch. I hooked the switch directly to my computer and got no errors from either NAS. I continue to get no errors the next day.
5. When I first ran my tests I had Jumbo Frames turned Off. Currently, Jumbo Frames are On and there are still no errors and seems to be no slowness either.
Conclusion:
The Airport Extreme is the bottleneck causing the errors in my network.
Perhaps there is something I can alter which will rid me of the errors, but this type of error makes the AE seem to be pretty shoddy. A newer state-of-the-art router should not be bottlenecking my rather archaic slow network devices. Apparently, the 4th Gen AEBS's couldn't do Jumbo Frames, but this current model is supposed to, but I see no setting for changing the MTU.
Questions:
What could be causing the bottleneck?
Do I have a bad router?
How could I analyze this problem?
Has anyone else had similar issues and if so how were they resolved?
Current Setup:
All of my computers and NAS devices are hooked to my Procurve Switch each with its own Static IP.
The switch is working flawlessly with no Errors.
The network printer is now wireless and connected via the AEBS.
I am using wireless-n to connect to internet via the AEBS on my main machine.
I am sharing the internet connection with the other Mac Mini on the switch and any other machine I plug into the switch (not ideal).
Problem is:
I am not a systems administrator and don't really want to tinker with setting up Static IP's for the machines I hook and unhook to the switch.
I want the AEBS to manage addresses via DHCP so everything accessing my router will mindlessly be able to access all things on my network.
Can the AEBS be made to not produce errors or do I just have a lemon.
18 Replies
Replies have been turned off for this discussion
- sounds like it could be the switch
- I contacted HP about the switch being an issue.
The tech said that it was likely to be some sort of a loop that was causing the switch to shut down, but since I am not an Network admin and the procurve 1400 8g switch is unmanaged they would ship me another switch. Yeah for the procurve lifetime warranty.
The tech said that if the problem persists then it would be a loop in the network.
What would a loop in the network mean and how would I go about finding such a thing? - A loop is a circular path, so it can only happen with devices that have multiple ethernet connections. For instance if you have two ethernet cables between the switch and the router.
- Ah... I asked the tech and he said as much, but then he seemed to think that the likely culprit is my NAS devices????
They don't seem to have the issue when direct connected to my Mac, but I would probably need to dump a bunch of stuff on them to max them out.
Last time when I tested them I dumped a 13 gig folder on each of them and didn't experience any errors, and I played some media files and dumped big files on them to see if I could cause a choke, but didn't have a problem.
Could there be a problem with the 2 NAS devices running on the same switch? I wouldn't think so since they both have separate static IP's
Anyhow HP is sending me a new switch except they didn't have any of the 1410 8G's on hand so they are shipping me an 1800 8G which is a managed switch.
Hopefully, this will do the trick and my error issues will be solved.
That is only possible if the NAS has two lan ports connected. (It would also need to be bridging between them.)paikinator@yahoo.com wrote: Ah... I asked the tech and he said as much, but then he seemed to think that the likely culprit is my NAS devices???? - I think my problem is finally solved. Not the AEBS. Bad HP Procurve 1400-8G switch.
I have been running for 6 days with no errors.
Originally I do believe I had some bad cables which were contributing to my Bad Packets. Once I got the Cables all straitened out, the bad packets went away.
But then I had TCP retransmit problems. Now with the new switch, I get no more TCP retransmit errors.
Hewlett-Packard shipped replacement unit for my switch for free under their Procurve Lifetime Warranty. Awesome!
They didn't have any of the 1400 series on hand and so they shipped me a Procurve 1800-8G that looks to have been used, but is working beautifully. It is the managed version of what I had and would likely help me diagnose my problems more easily if something were to crop up in the future.
Thanks for all of the help. - Drat... I was able to induce more TCP retransmit errors even with the new switch.
It has been pretty stable, but I went to import a large number of photos from a shoot and at the same time I started moving some other big files.
TCP retransmits happened. I got about 8, but none failed upon retransmission... Then I got another 8 with 7 errors.
I guess I am at a loss.
Cables are all new Cat6 or Cat 6a so no new bad packets. Switch is a replacement for the other one which seemed to produce consistent errors. The errors went away, but I was able to choke the switch and it hung and I had to reboot it.
So I am guessing that something must not be playing nicely with my NAS devices or my NAS devices have a problem of some sort.
What could be wrong and how would I test it?
If I tread lightly and don't do too much at the same time on either NAS they seem to not produce TCP retransmit errors.
Perhaps this is what I need to do is deal with the flaws in the system. I can't really afford to replace everything right now. Boo.
Anyhow any suggestions or tips from anyone would be great. I will try limping along for now.
I don't believe the TCP retransmits will affect my file integrity if I am correct.
Does anybody see a problem with living with the problem? I am getting tired of working on it all.
Will I risk losing data? Could this cause me significant headaches? - TCP retransmits will not hurt file integrity, so you can rest easy on that one. They will slow transfer speeds, but occasional retransmits are probably something you can live with.
You might look at the switch stats - keeping in mind that they generally report from the switch perspective (tx on the switch is rx on the NAS).
One possible cause is buffer overrun in the switch - since you were pushing a lot of data when you got the error. Look to see if 802.3x flow control is enabled on the switch. Also, if there are QOS settings, you can possibly prioritize traffic to/from the NAS.
Another possibility (generally rare these days) is that the switch thinks the link is half-duplex, but the NAS or PC thinks it is full duplex. If that is the case, you can usually manually override the setting on the switch.
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