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Re: 4k sector ?

fondy
Tutor

4k sector ?

Hi, I am new to readynas.

I just bought an Ultra 4. At same time I bought 4 Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s, (SATA 3.0), 64MB Cache, 5900RPM, 3.5".

I installed the new discs in the new Ultra. The Ultra is using Readiator 4.2.19

I took a performance test with drag and drop a 3 gb file from and to the Ultra,and got 66 mb/s read and 31mb/s write.

Tried several times with different files at 1gb, 2gb and 3gb, and the write was the same, 29-32 mb/s

I am using Netgear GS716Tv2 as switch between the Ultra and the PC and Jumbo is on both at the Nic at the PC and at the Ultra, the switch is using 9216 at the ports.

I read this forum, and saw that low write til the Readynas could be that the disk sectors was 512bytes instead of 4K.

Under I have the partion.log. Am I using 4K sectors ?

Regards Paal

The partion.log:


***** partition output for sda *****

Disk /dev/sda: 3907029168 sectors, 1.8 TiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 3AC0628E-FAC3-40CF-BD2F-47CA398F55CB
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 3907029134
Partitions will be aligned on 64-sector boundaries
Total free space is 4092 sectors (2.0 MiB)

Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 64 8388671 4.0 GiB FD00
2 8388672 9437247 512.0 MiB FD00
3 9437248 3907025072 1.8 TiB FD00

Disk /dev/sda: 243201 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track
Units = cylinders of 8257536 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0

Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 0+ 242251- 242252- 1953514583+ ee EFI GPT
/dev/sda2 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sda3 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sda4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty




***** partition output for sdb *****

Disk /dev/sdb: 3907029168 sectors, 1.8 TiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 90CE1EC8-F613-4B37-8987-9A5DF796BF9D
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 3907029134
Partitions will be aligned on 64-sector boundaries
Total free space is 4092 sectors (2.0 MiB)

Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 64 8388671 4.0 GiB FD00
2 8388672 9437247 512.0 MiB FD00
3 9437248 3907025072 1.8 TiB FD00

Disk /dev/sdb: 243201 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track
Units = cylinders of 8257536 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0

Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 0+ 242251- 242252- 1953514583+ ee EFI GPT
/dev/sdb2 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sdb3 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sdb4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty




***** partition output for sdc *****

Disk /dev/sdc: 3907029168 sectors, 1.8 TiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): EBACBCC1-0CAB-4532-A27A-3713C343721D
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 3907029134
Partitions will be aligned on 64-sector boundaries
Total free space is 4092 sectors (2.0 MiB)

Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 64 8388671 4.0 GiB FD00
2 8388672 9437247 512.0 MiB FD00
3 9437248 3907025072 1.8 TiB FD00

Disk /dev/sdc: 243201 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track
Units = cylinders of 8257536 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0

Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System
/dev/sdc1 0+ 242251- 242252- 1953514583+ ee EFI GPT
/dev/sdc2 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sdc3 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sdc4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty




***** partition output for sdd *****

Disk /dev/sdd: 3907029168 sectors, 1.8 TiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 5FB8E81B-D308-4440-9A8E-6D8BEC3D94E0
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 3907029134
Partitions will be aligned on 64-sector boundaries
Total free space is 4092 sectors (2.0 MiB)

Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 64 8388671 4.0 GiB FD00
2 8388672 9437247 512.0 MiB FD00
3 9437248 3907025072 1.8 TiB FD00

Disk /dev/sdd: 243201 cylinders, 255 heads, 63 sectors/track
Units = cylinders of 8257536 bytes, blocks of 1024 bytes, counting from 0

Device Boot Start End #cyls #blocks Id System
/dev/sdd1 0+ 242251- 242252- 1953514583+ ee EFI GPT
/dev/sdd2 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sdd3 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
/dev/sdd4 0 - 0 0 0 Empty
Message 1 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

After som more investigation I see that the start sectors is:

1 64
2 8388672
3 9437248

and if the start sectors can be divided with 8, than it is 4K

1 64 / 8 = 8
2 8388672 / 8 = 1048584
3 9437248 / 8 = 1179656

Is that correct ?

regards paal
Message 2 of 28
mdgm-ntgr
NETGEAR Employee Retired

Re: 4k sector ?

Yes you have 4k sector partition alignment.
Message 3 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Thanks a lot mdgm, that was good.

regards
Message 4 of 28
mdgm-ntgr
NETGEAR Employee Retired

Re: 4k sector ?

The Ultra has always shipped with firmware that formats the drives with 4k sector partition alignment so only arrays migrated from older ReadyNAS (e.g. NVX/Pro) would possibly not have 4k sector partition alignment.

As for your performance issues how does disabling Jumbo Frames on all devices affect performance?

Are the NIC drivers up to date?
Message 5 of 28
PapaBear1
Guide

Re: 4k sector ?

Read and write speeds on any ReadyNAS will vary depending on the drives used at each end, the operating systems used and the file structure. When copying files from my NVX to an external USB drive, I can sit and watch the file copy rates fluctuate depending only on the type of file. It seems the slowest when it hits my e-mail folder. Late in 2010, I did not tests using my then new ReadyNAS NVX equipped with 4x1TB Seagate ST31000528AS drives (it currently only has two of those plus 2xHitachi HDS5C3030ALA630 3TB drives). Because my PC at the time was a triple boot (Win7 HP 64bit, Win Vista HP 32bit 2/SP2, and XP Pro with SP3). The fastest of all three was the Win7 64bit which came as no surprise. I used two different drives in the PC, a Seagate ST3250806AS which happened to be the XP system drive (all three OS's were on separate drives, and boot drive selected by the BIOS menu) and a Samsung HD203WI 2TB drive connected to one of my eSATA ports on the PC. The PC and NVX were both connected to a Netgear GS108 switch, and the test file was a 3GB .wmv video file.

Writing to the NVX from the Seagate 250GB drive, 51MB/s. Writing to the NVX from the Samsung 2TB drive was 47MB/s.
Writing from the NVX to the Seagate 250GB drive, 71MB/s. Writing from the NVX to the Samsung 2TB drive was 99MB/s. Since this last exceeded the published specs, I ran it twice with the same result.

Using Bonnie, an x-86 addon to test performance, with the 4xST1000528AS it gave me 110MB/s with 2xST1000528AS and 2xHDS5C3030ALA630 it gave me 108MB/s. Note that this will only test the internal speeds.

The slowest write speeds to my NVX were recorded with XP Pro SP3, also not much of a surprise. Writing to the NVX from the ST3250806AS to the NVX was 36MB/s.

Don't know if this helps or not. You could also try a direct connection to ensure your switch is not slowing things down any.
Message 6 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Hi

thanks for your reply mdgm and PapaBear

I will check the Nic driver on the test PC and if update I will ran a new test.

I have testet the performance between the the Windows 7 32 bit PC and the Ultra, when it was connecting the gs716t switch and also connected the same PC directly to the Ultra.

The PC have 2GB ram, the nic is Intel 82567LM-3 Gigabit, the disk is ST91600412AS ATA

I used drag&drop and iometer (256kb), the file was 3GB :

Drag&drop connecting via the switch I got 75 mb/s read and 32 mb/s write
Iometer when connecting to the switch I got 64 mb/s read and 59 mb/s write

Drag&drop connected the PC directly to Ultra I got 61mb/s read and 31 mb/s write
Iometer connected the PC directly to Ultra I got 74 mb/s read and 81 mb/s write

regards
Message 7 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Have checked the drivers for the Nic and disk and both is up to date.

Forgot to mention that I use new Cat6 cable, both Ultra Nic is connected til the switch and has to static Ip adress
Message 8 of 28
StephenB
Guru

Re: 4k sector ?

Your switch collects network stats, do you see any issues there?

Note it will show you packet counts of various sizes (for instance "Packets Received > 1522 Octets"). You might check before and after each test, and confirm that jumbo frames are consistently used.
Message 9 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Thanks StephenB

when checking port statistics on the port that the Ultra is connected to on gs716t I got this:

Total Packets received without Errors: 238552331
Packets received with Errors: 0
Broadcast Packets received: 9887
Packets transmitted without Errors: 355471250
Transmit Packet Errors: 110816019

Maybe I have to disable jumbo as mgdm said and run a new test.

Write from PC to Ultra is slow but read from Ultra to PC is ok.

It is therefore strange that errors on the switch port is a lot of transmit errors and receive error is zero
Message 10 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

When tested with Jumbo Frames off on the PC nic and Ultra, the port is set to 1518, the Transmit Packet Errors on the switchport is now zero.

But read and write is almost the same, no better performance

I connected the PC directly to the Ultra, Jumbo Frames is off in both. No better performance, 62.5 mb/s read and 30 mb/s write
Message 11 of 28
StephenB
Guru

Re: 4k sector ?

Ok. But if you get millions of transmission errors with jumbo frames on, then you are better off turning them off for now.

What PC are you using to test with? Laptops (without SSDs) often have relatively slow disk performance.

BTW, transmit statistics are from the switch's point of view - the switch is transmitting them, the NAS is receiving them (i.e. they are relevant stats for writing to the NAS from the PC). Keep an eye on them - the errors might not be related to jumbo frames.
Message 12 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Hi StephenB

I use a HP 8000 Ultra slim
Windows 7 32 bit
2 gb ram
Nic is Intel 82567LM-3 Gigabit
disk is ST91600412AS ATA

It is strange that when I am connecting the PC directly to the Ultra and not through the switch, I dont get a better performance.
Message 13 of 28
TeknoJnky
Hero

Re: 4k sector ?

fondy wrote:
I just bought an Ultra 4. At same time I bought 4 Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s, (SATA 3.0), 64MB Cache, 5900RPM, 3.5"



these drives are not very performance oriented, that is very likely why the write speed is relatively slow.

for best write speeds you want higher performance drives, ie 7200 rpm, not green, etc.
Message 14 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Hi TeknoJnky

Thanks for your reply

maybe it is the Seagate Barracuda discs that is the limit here with 5900rpm and low performance write from PC's to it?

I wondered of it because I have no better performance when I connected the PC directed to the Ultra

Considered to take a backup of the Ultra and resetting to factory defaults, and then test the performance
Message 15 of 28
StephenB
Guru

Re: 4k sector ?

TeknoJnky wrote:
fondy wrote:
I just bought an Ultra 4. At same time I bought 4 Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s, (SATA 3.0), 64MB Cache, 5900RPM, 3.5"



these drives are not very performance oriented, that is very likely why the write speed is relatively slow.

for best write speeds you want higher performance drives, ie 7200 rpm, not green, etc.
Usually green drives lower the ReadyNAS speed by about 10%. He is seeing more than that. Though the PC is also a budget-class green machine - designed for small size and environmentally friendly construction, and not for performance. The desktop drive may be also be limiting the speed.

Though it might be worth playing with the ethernet adapter settings for transmit.
Ethernet flow control should be turned on.

Some of the other stuff could be experimented with, and sometimes it can help. Note the current settings first though.

Maybe try
    Interrupt Moderation Rate = off
    Adaptive Inter-Frame Spacing = disabled
    IPv4 Checksum Offload = disabled
    Large Send Offload (IPv4)= disabled
    TCP Checksum Offload (IPv4) = disabled
    UDP Checksum Offload (IPv4) = disabled
Message 16 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Thanks StephenB

Yes, agree that that the PC is not the best for a test of this.

Will try the other parameters you have mentions above

What it is important to me is that the Ultra is 100%, and that I can change PC and other and better equipment to improve the performance

ragards
Message 17 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

and now maybe that the

Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s, (SATA 3.0), 64MB Cache, 5900RPM, 3.5

is not the best discs for performance ?
Message 18 of 28
StephenB
Guru

Re: 4k sector ?

fondy wrote:
and now maybe that the

Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s, (SATA 3.0), 64MB Cache, 5900RPM, 3.5

is not the best discs for performance ?
Green disks will be somewhat slower than performance or enterprise drives. On the plus side, they should also run cooler and of course they are more energy efficient. As they seem to be working reliably, I would personally keep using them for now. The easiest way to monitor the disk health is to use the email alerts - you will get an email whenever the key SMART statistics degrade.

Your goal of confirming that the ultra is 100% seems like the right one. Keeping an eye on the logs and the network stats is one aspect. BTW, if you don't have a UPS for your ultra, I would strongly recommend that you get one. Also, you should implement a backup strategy for your data. Even RAID arrays will fail sometimes.

Let us know if tweaking the network settings makes any difference.
Message 19 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Thanks a lot StephenB

I have a APC Back-UPS BR 800 which the Ultra is connected to, and on the status and health in Frontview I see that the Ultra has found the ups.

The next step is a backup strategi.

🙂

Thanks again StephenB
Message 20 of 28
PapaBear1
Guide

Re: 4k sector ?

I don't think it the drives in the NAS, I think it is more to do with the Seagate ST9160412AS and Windows 7 32bit. The ST9 tells me that it is a notebook drive which is confirmed by the fact that you are using an HP 8000 Ultra Slim "desktop". I use quotation marks, because in reality the super small desktops are in reality more akin to a laptop without the built in keyboard and display. The use the super small components of a laptop (hence the 2.5" drive instead of the 3.5" drives used in larger desktops) in a case only slightly larger than a desktop and have the same problems that laptops do - heat dissapation. Whereas in a medium desktop case you can have at least 1 120mm fan (many have 3 or more), and a CPU fan that can move a lot of air, the cases on the laptops and ultra slims restrict the air movement and fan size. To compensate, they slow the entire process down inside to generate less heat.

Your memory, while adequate, is not very robust either. Once Vista came out and was in the market place a while, even though Intel stated that it would run in 1GB, most PC's started being produced with a minimum of 4GB. While the NAS has only 1GB, it is running a slimmed down customized version of Linux, not the large Windows OS with all the heavy graphics that take up some of your memory (Intel 4500 integrated graphics chip). The 32 bit OS will not be as fast as the 64 bit OS either.

The fact that a direct connection did not increase your throughput is actually good, as it tells us that nothing in the network is slowing down the transfer speed. Which is good.

Your desktop is a good capable business oriented machine, but is not overly fast, but then business oriented machines rarely are. They are aimed more at functionality and long term dependability (I still have an HP D530 CMT that is now 9 years old and still functions perfectly well, just with XP Pro and is not a speed demon either).

While you are certainly welcome to try a factory default, do not be surprised if the speed afterward is not improved. Do be sure to back up all data before hand as that will wipe all the data from your NAS drives.
Message 21 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Hi PapaBear, thanks for your reply.

Yes I agree with the HP ultra slim PC. I will install 2 gb ram in the PC so I get 4 gb which win 7 32 bits can use and do another test.

I will also install another more robust PC to morrow and do a test.

Yes, it is good that the network is not the problem, but I dont understand why I get so much errors on the Ultra port on the switch when I use Jumbo Frames. In my network I also have two gs108t switches which is gigabit and jumbo is on, I have a total of 4 desktop PC with gigabit nic where jumbo is on. I also have a linksys e3000 router with dd-wrt, but I use this only for wlan desktops, plus some other media equipment.

Maybe I have to turn off Jumbo in my home network.

regards
Message 22 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Jumbo Frames turned off at the switches and all other equipment, using 1518 mtu all over. Zero errors on the switch ports now 🙂
Message 23 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

Hi

here is a drawing of my home network, see 'Fondy Home Multimedia Network' 😉

http://www.readynas.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=22802&p=350459#p350459
Message 24 of 28
fondy
Tutor

Re: 4k sector ?

I am embarrassed 🙂

Thought I had enabled the "Disable full data journaling" in Frontview, but no. I have an UPS and can therefore disable full data journaling.

After doing that I now get 51 mb/s write and 79 mb/s read when doing drag & drop.

Iometer says 69 mb/s read and 84 mb/s write

I have also disabled jumbo frames on switches and other equipment, and no errors at the switchports.

Dont think there is much to do now with performance.

Testet this with the same desktop HP Ultra slim PC
Message 25 of 28
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