From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Sep 9 23:32:32 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: stable@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3DE1816A403; Sat, 9 Sep 2006 23:32:32 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from markir@paradise.net.nz) Received: from linda-2.paradise.net.nz (linda-2.paradise.net.nz [203.96.152.181]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B860343D46; Sat, 9 Sep 2006 23:32:31 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from markir@paradise.net.nz) Received: from smtp-2.paradise.net.nz (tclsnelb1-src-1.paradise.net.nz [203.96.152.172]) by linda-2.paradise.net.nz (Paradise.net.nz) with ESMTP id <0J5C00HGDMQ64H@linda-2.paradise.net.nz>; Sun, 10 Sep 2006 11:32:30 +1200 (NZST) Received: from [192.168.1.11] (218-101-29-47.dsl.clear.net.nz [218.101.29.47]) by smtp-2.paradise.net.nz (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1A16014ADD92; Sun, 10 Sep 2006 11:32:30 +1200 (NZST) Date: Sun, 10 Sep 2006 11:32:20 +1200 From: Mark Kirkwood In-reply-to: <079e01c6d417$3890fc40$b3db87d4@multiplay.co.uk> To: Steven Hartland Message-id: <45034F04.9010103@paradise.net.nz> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5.0.4 (X11/20060704) References: <44EC0B9B.5020705@withagen.nl> <003f01c6c68d$64688e60$b3db87d4@multiplay.co.uk> <20060907184316.GC56998@svcolo.com> <035701c6d2c3$eb574aa0$b3db87d4@multiplay.co.uk> <001001c6d327$25dc07c0$b3db87d4@multiplay.co.uk> <4502123D.705@paradise.net.nz> <079e01c6d417$3890fc40$b3db87d4@multiplay.co.uk> Cc: amd64@freebsd.org, Jo Rhett , stable@freebsd.org Subject: Re: suggestions for SATA RAID cards X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 09 Sep 2006 23:32:32 -0000 Steven Hartland wrote: > Mark Kirkwood wrote: >> >> If you are using RAID0|5, then something is slowing you down (possible >> clash between disk firmware and the Areca, or unfortunate choice of >> strip chunk size). > > Dont know which test I was remembering but just did a quicky: > OS: FreeBSD 6.1 > RAID: 5 on 5 * 400GB Seagate > Controller: HighPoint 1820a > CPU: Dual Opteron 244 > RAM: 2Gb > /usr/bin/time -h dd if=/dev/da0 of=/dev/null bs=1048576 count=10000 > 10000+0 records in > 10000+0 records out > 10485760000 bytes transferred in 44.887239 secs (233602250 bytes/sec) > 44.88s real 0.03s user 2.40s sys > > In comparison: > OS: FreeBSD 5.4 > RAID: 5 on 6 * 300GB Seagate > Controller: Areca 1120 > CPU: Dual Opteron 248 > RAM: 4Gb > /usr/bin/time -h dd if=/dev/da0 of=/dev/null bs=1048576 count=10000 > 10000+0 records in > 10000+0 records out > 10485760000 bytes transferred in 81.598938 secs (128503633 bytes/sec) > 1m21.60s real 0.00s user 2.69s sys > Hmmm - I've found that FreeBSD 6.1 is a considerably better performer than 5.4, so that is not helping the comparison above. Another thing to check is that both systems have the same vfs.read_max sysctl tunable, as that makes quite a difference on RAID systems! If you have the time to keep playing with these machines, it might be interesting to try block sizes other than 1M - could expose different behavior too! Cheers Mark