NETGEAR is aware of a growing number of phone and online scams. To learn how to stay safe click here.
Forum Discussion
Wireless Performance to ReadyNAS - at my wits' end...
I have been having problems with wireless access to my ReadyNASes for a few weeks now.
I think I can trace the problem back to replacement of my old router and access point with new stuff. The problems have started in earnest from then.
Wireless performance is a real dog. Typically I am only achieving transfer speeds of under 500kb per sec on Wireless transfers. This seems to be true for both of the PCs I am testing with. Gb files take hours to transfer.
Wired performance is adequate in that I have been seeing transfer rates of 7-13 MB per sec. While that means performance is not excruciatingly slow, it still is not good.
Particularly frustrating is the time it takes to load thumbnails on picture files. You're talking 10-15 seconds for each one to come through (on Wireless). On wired connection it's not great, but it's nothing like as bad.
The equipment:
ReadyNAS Duo - RAIDiator 4.1.12
ReadyNAS NV+ v2 - RAIDiator 5.3.8
Router Netgear WNDR4500v2
Access Point Netgear WNAP320
Switches are GS605 or GS608
Cat 5 cable connections
The PCs have, respectively, a wireless g card and a wireless n card. They are running Win7; one is 32 bit the other is 64.
The problem is equally bad on the Duo as the NV+. The speed on wireless is no better on the machine with the n card.
What have I tried?
- Trying to get a Wired connection to work first - see results above
- Turning off firewalls and anti-virus - minor improvement
- Disabling the Disk Write Cache - nothing noticeable
- Checking jumbo frames is off. I could confirm this on the Duo but the NV+ is rather more inpenetrable and I couldn't find anywhere to change this setting
- Disabling the 'Large Send Offset' in the Properties of the network adapter (only available in the Wired Network Card anyway)
- Messing with the MTUs. My router has a default of 1492, presumably because it's using PPPoE to the internet. The ReadyNAS boxes were initially 1500. I tried changing this down to 1492 on the Duo and this did help - thumbnails would load at one every second or so, so a lot faster. However I cannot find a way to change the MTU on the NV+ v2. Additionally I've played with the MTU on the PCs. I did a few tests to determine what 'should be the optimum' and by my calculation it should be 1500. I have tried 1492, 1460 and 1430. Same result with all - no better
What do I try next?
Richard
PS I've tried to go to the 'How to Optimise the ReadyNAS performance' page but at the moment it just returns a 404. So apologies if there are steps in that document that I need to take first.
I think I can trace the problem back to replacement of my old router and access point with new stuff. The problems have started in earnest from then.
Wireless performance is a real dog. Typically I am only achieving transfer speeds of under 500kb per sec on Wireless transfers. This seems to be true for both of the PCs I am testing with. Gb files take hours to transfer.
Wired performance is adequate in that I have been seeing transfer rates of 7-13 MB per sec. While that means performance is not excruciatingly slow, it still is not good.
Particularly frustrating is the time it takes to load thumbnails on picture files. You're talking 10-15 seconds for each one to come through (on Wireless). On wired connection it's not great, but it's nothing like as bad.
The equipment:
ReadyNAS Duo - RAIDiator 4.1.12
ReadyNAS NV+ v2 - RAIDiator 5.3.8
Router Netgear WNDR4500v2
Access Point Netgear WNAP320
Switches are GS605 or GS608
Cat 5 cable connections
The PCs have, respectively, a wireless g card and a wireless n card. They are running Win7; one is 32 bit the other is 64.
The problem is equally bad on the Duo as the NV+. The speed on wireless is no better on the machine with the n card.
What have I tried?
- Trying to get a Wired connection to work first - see results above
- Turning off firewalls and anti-virus - minor improvement
- Disabling the Disk Write Cache - nothing noticeable
- Checking jumbo frames is off. I could confirm this on the Duo but the NV+ is rather more inpenetrable and I couldn't find anywhere to change this setting
- Disabling the 'Large Send Offset' in the Properties of the network adapter (only available in the Wired Network Card anyway)
- Messing with the MTUs. My router has a default of 1492, presumably because it's using PPPoE to the internet. The ReadyNAS boxes were initially 1500. I tried changing this down to 1492 on the Duo and this did help - thumbnails would load at one every second or so, so a lot faster. However I cannot find a way to change the MTU on the NV+ v2. Additionally I've played with the MTU on the PCs. I did a few tests to determine what 'should be the optimum' and by my calculation it should be 1500. I have tried 1492, 1460 and 1430. Same result with all - no better
What do I try next?
Richard
PS I've tried to go to the 'How to Optimise the ReadyNAS performance' page but at the moment it just returns a 404. So apologies if there are steps in that document that I need to take first.
22 Replies
Replies have been turned off for this discussion
- http://kb.netgear.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/12242/~/how-to-optimize-the-readynas-performance
For the wireless issue, does this help?: http://home.bott.ca/webserver/?p=226 - I too have a Duo v1 and an NV+ v2 with same firmwares as you.
I understand you want to fix the wireless, but you need to look at the wired connections too as 7-13MB/s seems like 100mbs LAN. Although your kit supports gigabit? On a wired connection, I'm getting about 30MB/s, but others are getting much higher - see here.
I just copied 56 pictures, ~195MB, Win7 reports ~6MB/s and it took ~30 seconds. 195/30=6.5, so in fact windows was approx correct! Wireless connection was 802.11n @ 130Mb/s
Same files to my wired desktop took about 6 seconds and Win7 reported ~30MB/s. 195/6=32.5, so again about right for my setup. I know this should also be faster, but I've not spent time troubleshooting yet.
You could try a direct wired connection just to check the NAS performance. Then add each bit of kit back to the network until you find the culprit ;). - With the v1 write speeds that are around what you'd expect from 100Mbit are not unexpected.
- mgdm,
Thanks for coming back to me. The guide to performance optimisation confirmed the steps I've already tried seem to be the right ones to take.
I have had a go at the steps shown in the Bott's guide, which was about tinkering with MTU numbers. No joy.
One thing that does seem to be seen as a good idea is setting the ReadyNAS MTU to 1492 - this helps with the Duo. But I can't figure how you can change that setting on the NV+ v2. Any ideas, or an idiot's guide to doing it through SSH? I note from elsewhere that there is an issue here with getting the MTU value to stick even if you do change it - tends to switch back on re-boot or something. But do let me know if you have further thoughts.
aks, also thanks for your response. You're confirming what I expected - that I should be getting much better performance. As you suggest, I'll go to direct connect (I assume you mean direct connect via ethernet, do you?) and see what that buys me first.
R aks, also thanks for your response. You're confirming what I expected - that I should be getting much better performance. As you suggest, I'll go to direct connect (I assume you mean direct connect via ethernet, do you?) and see what that buys me first.
Yes, or at least PC wire ROUTER wire NAS, and check they negotiate at 1Gbps. If they negotiate 100Mbps, then you'll get ~10MB/s, which is what you are getting now.
Direct connect requires you to manually set the PCs IP address to 192.168.168.1 to talk direct to the NV+ v2 at \\192.168.168.168.
With a direct connection I read at the same speed on my main PC. On another wired PC I read at ~40MB/s, i.e. reading the exact same directory took <5 seconds (195/5=~39MB/s).
For me writing to the NV+ v2 peaks at about 20MB/s from both PCs wired (with antivirus disabled).- My recollection is that the v2 products don't support jumbo frames.
On the MTU sizing, the best way is to use ping. Start by setting the PC to use 1500.
If entering "ping NASIP -f -l 1472" in the command box of a windows PC works (with no fragmentation error), then the MTU is 1500. If you need to drop down to -l 1464, the MTU is 1492. (the rule is to add 28 to the -l parameter).
Once you know the real MTU, you should set the PC client to use it. There is no benefit to setting the MTU too high, and no benefit to setting it lower either (assuming no jumbo frames).
You might find the NAStester tool at http://www.808.dk/?code-csharp-nas-performance helpful in measuring performance - it is more consistent than doing directory reads. You need to map the NAS share to a PC drive letter to use it. - Stephen
Thanks for your input.
The MTU thing does have me a bit puzzled. I notice that my router has the MTU set at 1492, and I cannot raise it higher than that. My understanding is that because my ADSL connection is PPPoE there's a need for an 8 byte header, hence the router maxes at 1492.
The ReadyNAS Duo is set at 1492 also, as that seems to give the better performance. However it seems the NV+ is set at 1500, and it's not easy to change that. Would that potentially be the cause of some of the problem here? And if so, what can I do about it - 5.3.8 doesn't provide an obvious was to reset the MTU (unlike 4.1.12), and I'm a bit wary of messing with it via SSH.
Appreciate your thoughts and advice.
R - PPPoE does add an 8 byte header, though that is only used when you are connecting over your ISP internet connection.
Have you confirmed that
ping NASIP -f -l 1472
returns a fragmentation error?
It might not. When you are connected with switches, the packets often don't even reach the router. - Stephen
I checked to ping the two machines at 1472 and they both responded. 1473 gave the fragmentation warning.
Slightly surprised as the MTU was set at 1492 on the Duo. Actually, I tried to push it up to 1500 and it simply reverted back down to 1492 again - perhaps being tuned in some way by the router?
Anyway, seems both machines are acting at 1500 MTU.
Am now going to have a go at direct connect and work back from there.
R - I've done a bit of testing with the software Stephen kindly linked me to.
Speeds look better than I'd expected on the Wired side, though these are not reflected in the performance figures I see reported when I do drag-and-drop operations through Windows Explorer.
From my Desktop, with Gigabit Ethernet card, I get the following:
- To the NV+ I get Write @ 26.0 Mb, Read @ 17.0 Mb
- To the Duo (MTU set at 1500) I get Write@ 5.6Mb, Read @ 19.7Mb
- To the Duo (MTU set at 1492) I get Write@ 4.8 Mb, Read @ 17.3 Mb
From my Win7/64 laptop, with Gigabit Ethernet card, I get:
- To the NV+, Write@ 33.7Mb, Read@ 25.5 Mb
- To the Duo at 1500MTU, Write@ 6.5Mb, Read@ 22.1 Mb
- To the Duo at 1492MTU, Write@ 4.6Mb, Read@ 20.7Mb
From my Win7/64 laptop, with Wireless-N card, I get:
- To the NV+, Write@ 4.25Mb, Read @ 2.1Mb then slowing down until the test failed
- To the Duo at 1500MTU, Write@ 2.6Mb, Read @ 2.1 Mb then slowing down until the test failed
- To the Duo at 1492MTU, not tested
So to the NV+ I seem to get the slightly surprising result that Writes are faster than Reads. The network itself doesn't look wrong as the native speeds seem OK if not as good as some people report. That may be because there are a couple of switches in the way. Clearly, the Wireless-N performance is not good, and looks particularly bad on Reads.
The Duo seems to struggle across the board on Write performance, though Reads are at comparable speed to the NV+. Cutting the MTU down to 1492 makes things worse not better.
So it looks as though I have some challenges first on the Wired side - on the NV+ the Read speed looks a little slow, and on the Duo the Write speed looks sickly. Suggestions to address that at all?
The Wireless performance looks unimpressive on both sides considering this is meant to be N and I have a 5-bar signal. Any thoughts of what to do here?
Again thanks to any prepared to give up their time and help me with this. Appreciated.
Richard
NETGEAR Academy
Boost your skills with the Netgear Academy - Get trained, certified and stay ahead with the latest Netgear technology!
Join Us!
