Extremely slow transfer rate over CIFS

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donniezazen

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Feb 28, 2012
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Hello,

I formatted a Western Digital External USB Hard Drive to UFS to permanently make it a NAS. I had copied the 500 GB data from it to my laptop and now I am transferring back to FreeNAS 7. I get 500KBps to 1000KBps. Transferring 500GB over this speed is taking forever and almost always get's interrupted. Am I doing something wrong. Is their a better way to transfer data over network?

Thanks.
 

krissprolls

Cadet
Joined
Mar 16, 2012
Messages
3
Same Problem

Hi,

I have exactly the same problems, very slow rate transfer with CIFS, only to write on the FREENAS 8.04.

I have a gigabit ethernet card, 2 sata 2 1TO Samsung disks and a old IDE 320gb disk.

The slow transfers are only when i copy files on my FREENAS 's sata disks, on my old ide, i can have 50 Mb/S data rate in writing and reading.

On my sata's disks i have 70 Mb/s data in reading, but only 1Mb/S in writing (sometimes 9).

Have you see a same situation ? Sata are less recognize by Freenas than IDE ? :)

(Sorry for my poor english, i'm a Froggy :) )
 

donniezazen

Cadet
Joined
Feb 28, 2012
Messages
7
It doesn't look like a lot can be done with old system and western digital external USB hard drive.

I have installed Arch and I am just going to copy my stuff from my system to UFS formatted external hard drive.

Thanks for replying.
 

krissprolls

Cadet
Joined
Mar 16, 2012
Messages
3
Same Problem

I have today formatted one of my sata's disk and reinitialize freenas to the factory default and....i have the same problem....my sata's disks dont want increase their rate (max 5mbps)...whereas my ide's disk work fine (65 mbps).

Any idea???
 

matlock

Contributor
Joined
Mar 2, 2012
Messages
114
Several factors could play a roll with your data transfer rates so I think anyone here would be hard pressed to tell you exactly whats 'wrong'...

Here are some things to consider- Your freenas box has a gigabit network card, but does your router support gigabit speeds?
Are you transferring files via ethernet? Or wireless? What are the supported / available wireless speeds? A/B/G/N? All of these factors could play a role in how fast you can transfer your data to the freenas.

good luck
-matlock
 

donniezazen

Cadet
Joined
Feb 28, 2012
Messages
7
I have an arguably old setup. I am just learning FreeNAS. Their is no Gigabit network card and I have a G router. I am not really sure if speed of less than 1000 KBps is what I could get on my current setup.
 

Laz

Cadet
Joined
Mar 30, 2012
Messages
2
Pulling my hair out

Hi All,

I am new to this forum, but not new to computing.

Installed FreeNas (8.0.4, x64) on a Core 2 duo (3 GHz) machine with 4GB RAM (Intel DG35EC MoBo, Gigabit Ethernet). FreeNAS is on a USB drive (8GB). Files are on two SATA drives (2 TB each). The network switch I am using is a 24 port Gigabit switch.

When I first installed FeeNAS, I had one CAT 5 cable (did not realize at that time) connecting my Win 7 to the network and the data (1.8 TB) were transferred at approximately 24 MB/s speeds. The transfer was probably limited by the USB 2.0 HD enclosure I had the data on (2 bay, 2 TB+1.5TB, JBOD configuration) over the network onto the FreeNAS drives. It toke about 11 hours, but the transfer was stable. At that time the upload speed was approrpiate.
Then I noticed the CAT 5 cable, replaced with a CAT5e and my Win 7 computer (Core2 Quad, 4GB RAM, x64 OS, SATA drives) connected at gigabit speeds.

FreeNAS is running CIFS. I am getting down (i.e. from FreeNAS to Win 7 box) speeds at 70 - 90 MB/s sustained. Uploading files is running at 56 - 128 KB/s. Yes, that is about 1000 fold lower.

I tried replacing the switch - no help
replaced the entire FreeNAS hardware (Athlon 64 2X, 2.5 GHz, 4 GB RAM), using the same SATA data drives - no change
Installed the x86 version of FreeNAS - same result: download runs fine, upload crawls
Tried copying files onto the data drives via USB (of course outside of FreeNAS) - the drives work fine, full USB 2.0 speeds are achieved.
Looked on-line and changed settings within FreeNAS CIFS - no help
Updated the NIC drivers on both of my Win7 systems and was able to upload files at abut 70 MB/s once, but the next time I tried, the upload tanked again, down to 56 - 128 KB/s.

What am I doing wrong? It is probably something obvious and I am not seeing it.

I am just baffled. The movies I have on the server (some 1080p) play without any issues on two different Win 7 machines and my WD TV player. Even simultaneous downloads run fine. Uploading files is another issue...

Please help.

Laz
 

Laz

Cadet
Joined
Mar 30, 2012
Messages
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Hair still in...

OK, I found the problem and wanted to share my mistake with all who are interested.

Originally I imported my NTFS drives with data on them. I did not want to copy ~ 3TB of data. Big mistake.
Once I imported the drives as ZFS volumes (the data were lost but I have back up, it was intentional) the transfer speed went up to about 30 MB/s upstream and the down speed remained at about 60 MB/s. This was acceptable and encouraging. This trial was done on an x86 FreeNAS install on the same Core 2 Duo 3GHz machine with 4 GB of RAM.
So, I upgraded FreeNAS to x64 and attempted the same. ZFS was not an option, I had only 4GB of RAM installed at that time. The FreeNAS documentation clearly states that ZFS on an x64 system needs at least 6GB. So I upgraded to 8GB RAM, installed ZFS on both 2TB drives and transferred the data over the network.

Now I am getting about 40 MB/s up and about 70 MB/s down. I tested the system by playing HD movies on two different computers and the WDTV player at the same time. Playback was smooth. Then I tested the playback on another computer connected via a wireless N network (reported connection speed of 300 Mb/s). While previously the HD playback was choppy, to say the least (DVD quality worked fine still), now even HD plays nicely.

My advice, don't take shortcuts. Set up the system as recommended and then transfer your data.

Laz
 

totobel

Dabbler
Joined
Dec 30, 2011
Messages
10
Well, I use ZFS with 512 of RAM and a shitty processor and I get 25Mb/sec
so the recommandations ...
 

b1ghen

Contributor
Joined
Oct 19, 2011
Messages
113
So, I upgraded FreeNAS to x64 and attempted the same. ZFS was not an option, I had only 4GB of RAM installed at that time. The FreeNAS documentation clearly states that ZFS on an x64 system needs at least 6GB. So I upgraded to 8GB RAM, installed ZFS on both 2TB drives and transferred the data over the network.

That is not completely accurate, I ran a RAIDZ2 on x64 with 4GB for the better part of a year, you don't "need" 6GB+ but it's recommended.
 

ProtoSD

MVP
Joined
Jul 1, 2011
Messages
3,348
That is not completely accurate, I ran a RAIDZ2 on x64 with 4GB for the better part of a year, you don't "need" 6GB+ but it's recommended.

Don't spoil the moral of his story! ;) Too many people prefer to discover the answer by pulling their hair out instead of listening to requirements, Laz deserves some credit for figuring it out and telling people they should pay attention instead of trying to get blood out of a stone....

With ZFS more is always better!
 

b1ghen

Contributor
Joined
Oct 19, 2011
Messages
113
Don't spoil the moral of his story! ;) Too many people prefer to discover the answer by pulling their hair out instead of listening to requirements, Laz deserves some credit for figuring it out and telling people they should pay attention instead of trying to get blood out of a stone....

With ZFS more is always better!

Agreed! In this case less is not more :)
 

eltoro

Dabbler
Joined
Mar 17, 2012
Messages
21
Since there are thousands of "I´ve got lousy CIFS performance" I ask my question in an existing one.

I have a FreeNAS 8.04 Release x64 with C2D 3GHz and 10GB RAM
Client is Win7 x64 with 8 GB RAM.

Using dd on server I have >150 MB/s read/write
Using iPerf I have almost 1000 Mbit rx/tx between freenas and the client

Using Robocopy and Crystal diskmark I have approx 65 MB/s from Freenas and 110 MB/s to FreeNAS.

Then monitoring transfer to FreeNAS the performance is stable according to network monitor in WIndows 7 but read performance is kind of bursty.

Is it realistic to have half performance FROM FreeNAS than TO?

Help is much appreciated...
 

berrywipe

Dabbler
Joined
Mar 11, 2012
Messages
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Can t help you but I think your read speed should be much higher.
With an old 2GHz Opteron and 3 GB Ram I have 60-70 MB/s reading and 30-40 MB writing to FreeNas (3x500GB raidz1).
Of course array size does matter, but your read speed shouldn't normally be less then your write speed....
 

BlastXng

Cadet
Joined
Apr 18, 2012
Messages
4
I am seeing some of the same issues and I have 2GB of RAM installed with a Athlon X64 and a single 2MB file took over 2 minutes to copy to the server.. The NIC I have is a Marvel PCIe Gig card and my network is rock solid. The same transfer to my OSX 10.4 server running on an old B&W G3 (with G4 400Mhz upgrade ZIF) too less than 20 seconds..

Ping times to the FreeNAS Server can be upwards of 500ms.. which is horrible..
 

BlastXng

Cadet
Joined
Apr 18, 2012
Messages
4
You might want to look at the settings in the following thread.

http://forums.freenas.org/showthread.php?6705-CIFS-traversal-very-slow

I have been using them for about over a week now and I think the problem seems to have gone away.

Interesting info, but the problem I am having isn't just isolated to CIFS.

After Re-installing FreeNAS 8.04 for the fourth time, I also ran some AFP tests.. These just as bad if not worse than CIFS.

After some testing I have found:
- The Marvel GiGE Driver is the only driver that will work to get my FN Server connected to my network
- The Driver for the NVIDIA NFORCE 2 Ethernet does allow any traffic at all.. in fact I'd call this a non-working driver.. *Note it does work in Linux or Windows 2008 Server.

Testing to copy 11MB from either a Windows 7 desktop, Linux Ubuntu or Max OSX 10.5 desktop takes over 30 minutes to complete.. This is on a network that when I perform that same file transfer from the same machines to either a Linux NAS (Same hardware as the FreeNAS Server different boot drive) or to my OSX 10.4 server running on an old B&W that copy if done in less than a minute.

I'm beginning to think that the Marvel Driver isn't the best.. ugh..
 

totobel

Dabbler
Joined
Dec 30, 2011
Messages
10
Well, I use ZFS with 512 of RAM and a shitty processor and I get 25Mb/sec
so the recommandations ...

omg, that was in 8.0.2
now, after upgrading to 8.0.4 i get 8Mb/sec ...
This freenas is just too random.
 

nrnoble

Cadet
Joined
Apr 10, 2012
Messages
4
On my system the WRITE transfer rate is usuable, under 5k per second. READ transfer rate is perfectly fine, I can stream Hi-def video (1920x1080) perfectly fine. I preloaded videos on the HDD before installing the drives.

Starting to look at other options to replace FreeNAS. FreeNAS is a cool idea, but I need better Write performance than what I am able to get.
 

unca_NAS

Explorer
Joined
Mar 25, 2012
Messages
87
Noobie here,

My HP 36 Microserver with Freenas 8.0.4 has become extremely slow with CIFS shares. I have gigabit switch and 6e cables. Some days ago CIFS write speed was some 80MB/sec, now i get 2-5 MB/sec transfering data Win7 x64 laptop <> freenas.

I have propably done something stupid with my settings, thats the only reason I can think of.


CIFS service settings are:

Aux: socket options = TCP_NODELAY IPTOS_LOWDELAY SO_KEEPALIVE SO_RCVBUF=2097152 SO_SNDBUF=2097152
# 65536 or 131072 seem to work ok for above values also, experiment
read raw = yes
write raw = yes
max xmit = 65536
getwd cache = yes

large RW = yes
sendfile2 = yes

No tunables.
All shares are excluded from laptops anti-virus software.

Any ideas where to start?
 
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