Network speed issues involving USB 3.0 Gigabit adapter

[AgentMC]

Hello forum,

I'm new to FreeNAS and FreeBSD generally, so please forgive my obvious mistakes :)

So, a week ago, I have converted my old laptop (Core i3-2xxx; 16 GB DDR3; 2xTOSHIBA HDWL120) into a FreeNAS unit, and everything was fine until I understood the onboard NIC is 100Mb. I have bought an Amazon Basics USB 3.0 Gigabit NIC, and plugged in. FreeNAS perfectly recognized it and after some dances around, changing IPs etc, it is now using the same IP as the previous NIC, while the previous NIC is switched over to entirely different subnet to avoid "2 interfaces on the same net" problem. All works fine.

Except, the backup speed did not increase. My setup:
FreeNAS --(USB3.0)--> USB to ethernet (ASIX AX88179) --(CAT7 flat cable)--> Virginmedia cable router

I have conducted several speed tests, and they only confused me. I am bringing them here so maybe you can help me to understand where things are going wrong?
Below all is Megabits per second.

1. iperf freenas --> test laptop (2019, Windows), over WIFI = roughly 100 Mbps, +/-10. Top shows system usage is basically 1-2%.
   • Windows copy file observation renders roughly the same, freenas drive load is barely 10% (freenas monitoring).
2. iperf freenas --> test laptop, over Ethernet = roughly 390 Mbps, +/-10. System usage is 10%
3. file download (http://ipv4.download.thinkbroadband.com/1GB.zip) freenas = 16 Mbps (!).
4. file download (http://ipv4.download.thinkbroadband.com/1GB.zip) test laptop, over Wifi = 180 Mbps (my outgoing network is 240).
5. file download (http://ipv4.download.thinkbroadband.com/1GB.zip) test laptop, over Ethernet = 190 Mbps.

Would appreciate any ideas on what is going on with those numbers.

 

[AgentMC]

Another test: installed qBittorrent plugin. Downloading a file (same file for both systems):

• freenas --> up to 40 Mb;
• test laptop --> 56 to 80 Mb.

Despite those two being on the same network, the test laptop went ahead much faster and FreeNAS box wasn't able to catch up to it.

 

[MikeyG]

You are connecting through a router? Have you tried direct connection between FreeNAS and your laptop?

My experience with hardware and FreeNAS is that just because it loads and seems to work, doesn't mean it's going to work well. USB network adapters are probably not recommended for a fully functioning setup. For example if you search the forums you will see people trying to use Realtek adapters that might appear to work at first but have all kinds of problems.

 

[AgentMC]

Hi @mgittelman !

Have you tried direct connection between FreeNAS and your laptop?

Today I did an extensive test.
3 laptops participating: Win-1, Win-2 and FreeNAS. All tests done with iPerf 3 between Windows boxes and iPerf 2 between Win-FreeNAS.

1. (reference )Win1 built-in <--> Win2 built-in: about 800 Mbps any direction (i.e. regardless of who is server and who is client).
2. Win 1 + AXIS (USB 2.0) <--> Win2 built-in: about 400 Mbps any direction.
3. Win 1 + AXIS (USB 3.0) <--> Win2 built-in: about 700 Mbps any direction.
4. Win 1 + AXIS (USB 3.0) <--> FreeNAS built-in: 95 Mbps any direction (FreeNAS box has only 100 Mbps card).
5. Win 1 built-in (iperf -s) <-- FreeNAS + AXIS (according to dmesg, USB 3.0): about 400 Mbps. Corresponds to test #2 from the 1st message.
6. Win 1 built-in --> FreeNAS + AXIS (iperf -s): about 70 Mbps.

I tried several -w options, but it didn't change the overall picture.

With router back in the game, despite test 5, I only get about 120 Mbps on file copy from NAS. The 70-80 Mbps remains the limit while copying to NAS.

My experience with hardware and FreeNAS is that just because it loads and seems to work, doesn't mean it's going to work well. ... For example if you search the forums you will see people trying to use Realtek adapters that might appear to work at first but have all kinds of problems.

Thanks, I'll search for Realtek-related topics. Especially given dmesg says there is a RTL chip under the ASIX bus.
As for the first statement, I can accept so for things like ReactOS. But this is semi-commercial product based on widely acclaimed OS. If the OS supports the device, and the product does not say "Oh no it's Realtek, unsupported, panic!" — well, I would assume it must work without any problem.

 

[Heracles]

Hey AgentMC,

Did you check to see if your setup is not producing some CRC errors ? Also, did you confirmed at what speed and duplex each interface end up in ?

Also, know that laptop are designed for :
1-Low energy usage
2-Small size
3-Light weight
...
Performance is a very low priority for every laptop. They are also not meant to run 24/7 like FreeNAS is.

Did you checked the performance for your hard drive ? How full that hard drive is ? Did you enable compression or dedup ? What kind of load is on the CPU ?

Performance testing is extremely hard to achieve in an objective way. To do it on a laptop converted into a server is close to non-sense...

 

[AgentMC]

Hi Heracles,

Did you check to see if your setup is not producing some CRC errors ?

No, I did not. How do I do it on FreeNAS?

Also, did you confirmed at what speed and duplex each interface end up in ?

Yes, 1000baseTX full duplex. It wouldn't be possible to reach 400MBps on 100baseT, I guess.

Performance is a very low priority for every laptop.

We're talking seventy Megabits per second here, one way. No laptop setup should affect performance this way. I booted the same laptop to Ubuntu live, and easily got all 240 Mbps on the speedtest.org. I start to believe it's FreeBSD issue.

Did you checked the performance for your hard drive ? How full that hard drive is ? Did you enable compression or dedup ? What kind of load is on the CPU ?

So, during iPerf testing, the CPU usage with USB adapter never reached 5% (with built-in, BTW, it was up to 7%).
But your question is related to file copy I presume? If so, yes, I sure has monitored that. The drive usage was low and CPU usage was neglectable.
The both data drives are new and are filled at about 2%. The compression is enabled.
But again, that's 80-120 Mbps file operations we are talking about. Close to nothing.

 

[Heracles]

Yes, 1000baseTX full duplex. It wouldn't be possible to reach 400MBps on 100baseT, I guess.

Did you checked it when you where doing only 70 ?

Did you check to see if your setup is not producing some CRC errors ?

No, I did not. How do I do it on FreeNAS?

netstat -s

No laptop setup should affect performance this way.

When you push too high above a limit, that is the kind of side effect you may observe...

Did you checked your MTU ?

In all cases, the netstat command will return you a ton of data to review. There may be hints there.

Good luck chasing your bug,