From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Mar 28 16:46:57 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8D666106566C for ; Mon, 28 Mar 2011 16:46:57 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from kometen@gmail.com) Received: from mail-qw0-f54.google.com (mail-qw0-f54.google.com [209.85.216.54]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 47DC68FC14 for ; Mon, 28 Mar 2011 16:46:56 +0000 (UTC) Received: by qwc9 with SMTP id 9so2334261qwc.13 for ; Mon, 28 Mar 2011 09:46:56 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date :message-id:subject:from:to:content-type; bh=pwSgtQD7R3zctQPXY3yCU5JjZ9Owwb8BuqBmbXtCfBs=; b=cbGfN5/GAejDLzlPjrElFxmgNvtOsL9gKcv8Ygu2dDQuljWr8XKmLkVlrycIs+qpK2 zyXZ32mU78BU5lQSZkdzohkQs7d+8D8+LWu4SdrhnouCuHTo9xvRvj1BXFjNAUtarvBM fXNp5v7xQAtfnquZqT3mMwcUwaEF5W+RU8y9c= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date:message-id:subject:from:to :content-type; b=J5/RAeJAm+YOtqIXP/uGBJSSocSjSxCkn3MhfmJi6GcYylLW0rSPLSji/wmLzsTx+D S4+3Oaxs0vbLaz/D5XbNuBHXQ8KEzCCoRBFdXgIz3FZ+SrC0PW160aXucH4BelMIL10k Z2/Bwiv2nI/XZYmDaOBkbRQ50QWxySeqAVVi8= MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.229.214.204 with SMTP id hb12mr3374835qcb.261.1301330816444; Mon, 28 Mar 2011 09:46:56 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.229.91.144 with HTTP; Mon, 28 Mar 2011 09:46:56 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <20110328164113.70512us1tv7w5gcg@webmail.leidinger.net> References: <20110328164113.70512us1tv7w5gcg@webmail.leidinger.net> Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2011 18:46:56 +0200 Message-ID: From: Claus Guttesen To: Alexander Leidinger , FreeBSD Stable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Cc: Subject: Re: zfs, nfs and zil 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: Mon, 28 Mar 2011 16:46:57 -0000 >> I'm mounting the FreeBSD-server from a couple of vmware esxi 4.1 >> servers using nfs, but when there is alot of i/o the server becomes >> unresponsive, easily triggered by installing ie. ms-sql. The server >> itself is up but is not reachable from the network. When I take the >> nic down and up again connection to the network is reestablished >> (ip-wise). >> >> A friend of mine has suggested that I disable the zil. The page >> http://wiki.freebsd.org/ZFSTuningGuide says 'Disabling ZIL is not >> recommended where data consistency is required (such as database >> servers) but will not result in file system corruption.' >> >> Has anyone tried to disable zil and achieved better performance and >> still maintain a consistent filesystem? > > The ZIL is not linked to NIC down/up events. It is a completely different > topic. I suggest to find the real problem instead of doing some random > tuning (which is not tuning in this case but foot-shooting). I'm aware of that, but the only way the problem shows up is when a windows machine performs an installation or a windows update (and has alot of updates in the pipeline). When traffic (i/o) is low to moderate it justs goes along without any issues. And if the same virtual windows-installation is on an iscsi-partition (mounted by the vmware-server) I can't reproduce the problem. So if disabling the zil did make a difference I would install a dedicated zil-ssd-device. And if that did alleviate my problem the issue could be related to windows performing alot of small reads and writes. Hence why I wanted to disable the zil. > FYI: disabling the ZIL is someting to do if you are desperate, do not care > about production incidents, and everything else (if the ZIL is the problem > -- which most probably it isn't by reading your message -- a (maybe write > optimized) SSD as a log device could be a solution) does not solve the > issue. Thank you for your input. I will get a ssd-drive. -- regards Claus When lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester is the soonest winner. Shakespeare twitter.com/kometen