From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Fri May 25 17:01:22 2007 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id EB5B816A41F for ; Fri, 25 May 2007 17:01:22 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from olli@lurza.secnetix.de) Received: from lurza.secnetix.de (lurza.secnetix.de [83.120.8.8]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5946113C455 for ; Fri, 25 May 2007 17:01:22 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from olli@lurza.secnetix.de) Received: from lurza.secnetix.de (enmbcn@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by lurza.secnetix.de (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id l4PH1GZf093641; Fri, 25 May 2007 19:01:21 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from oliver.fromme@secnetix.de) Received: (from olli@localhost) by lurza.secnetix.de (8.13.4/8.13.1/Submit) id l4PH1Fme093640; Fri, 25 May 2007 19:01:15 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from olli) Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 19:01:15 +0200 (CEST) Message-Id: <200705251701.l4PH1Fme093640@lurza.secnetix.de> From: Oliver Fromme To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG, Stephen.Clark@seclark.us In-Reply-To: <4656F863.20302@seclark.us> X-Newsgroups: list.freebsd-stable User-Agent: tin/1.8.2-20060425 ("Shillay") (UNIX) (FreeBSD/4.11-STABLE (i386)) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-2.1.2 (lurza.secnetix.de [127.0.0.1]); Fri, 25 May 2007 19:01:21 +0200 (CEST) Cc: Subject: Re: network performance 6.1 stable vs 4.9 X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG, Stephen.Clark@seclark.us List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 25 May 2007 17:01:23 -0000 Stephen Clark wrote: > The appliance is basically a firewall/nat/vpn device. We started on 6.1 > last year and it has > taken us a while to get things tested, plus I don't like to use a brand > new release. If we go to > a later release it means we have to do complete regression testing, etc. > > We are basically using a GENERIC config for our kernel. We, meaning the > R&D team don't see any > performance issues in a controlled environment - 6.1 performs just as > well as 4.9. > > In subjective tests R&D has done using the following setup we see "no" > problem: > > freebsd+firefox <--100mbs lan---> 6.1 network appliance <----T1 > link----> internet > freebsd+firefox <--100mbs lan---> 4.9 network appliance <----T1 > link----> internet > > One of our testers has the same setup but is using winblows/ie in place of > freebsd+firefox and subjectively says the 6.1 system is slower than the > 4.9 system. I think I remember there were some problems with TCP window scaling earlier along the FreeBSD 6 branch, but I'm not sure exactly when that was. Maybe 6.1 is affected. The problem was that Windows uses an algorithm that interfered badly with FreeBSD's. While connections between FreeBSD machines didn't show any issues, the performance was suboptimal between FreeBSD and Windows. Therefore I recommend you update to 6.2-RELEASE or, even better, to RELENG_6 (6-stable). Best regards Oliver -- Oliver Fromme, secnetix GmbH & Co. KG, Marktplatz 29, 85567 Grafing b. M. Handelsregister: Registergericht Muenchen, HRA 74606, Geschäftsfuehrung: secnetix Verwaltungsgesellsch. mbH, Handelsregister: Registergericht Mün- chen, HRB 125758, Geschäftsführer: Maik Bachmann, Olaf Erb, Ralf Gebhart FreeBSD-Dienstleistungen, -Produkte und mehr: http://www.secnetix.de/bsd "If you think C++ is not overly complicated, just what is a protected abstract virtual base pure virtual private destructor, and when was the last time you needed one?" -- Tom Cargil, C++ Journal