aLeXv305 Posted September 4, 2008 Posted September 4, 2008 Hey everyone, I have a somewhat complex question to ask... I will be configuring a server soon. I need to know how I can get the most possible speed access to that server since it will be the only one due to a lack of space. The server has dual gigabit connections direct to a gigabit network hub. Currently I have four 250GB hard drives in there. According to my theory, a gigabit network connection should max out at around 120-128MB tops. Since I will have many folders shared on that server, I will split the files between the first two hard drives and use the second two as a mirror backup. Since 2 gigabits will reach 240-256MB of transfer, how will the computer respond to that and can it actually sustain such speeds? Thanks... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waco Posted September 4, 2008 Posted September 4, 2008 Do you have bonding enabled on those gigabit connections? I'd run RAID 1+0 (RAID 10) on your disks to increase throughput. On large files you should be able to pull roughly 120-140 MB/s from the drives. You'll need something significantly faster to saturate a dual gigabit connection. The CPU will have to be relatively quick as well if you want to keep throughput up (although most can't saturate a gigabit connection anyway). I think you'll likely see something around 90 MB/s on large files going to a single user. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy_Nate Posted September 4, 2008 Posted September 4, 2008 Do you have bonding enabled on those gigabit connections? I'd run RAID 1+0 (RAID 10) on your disks to increase throughput. On large files you should be able to pull roughly 120-140 MB/s from the drives. You'll need something significantly faster to saturate a dual gigabit connection. The CPU will have to be relatively quick as well if you want to keep throughput up (although most can't saturate a gigabit connection anyway). I think you'll likely see something around 90 MB/s on large files going to a single user. I concur. If SSD's don't drop much in price in the next year...I'm going with a RAID 10 array with 4 drives. You get the benefits of striping...and redundancy. If you really wanted to...you could throw them into RAID-0 for performance (both read and write) and hope you don't have any problems...or put them all in RAID-1 at the sacrifice of space (you'd have very good read performance, but similar to 1 HD write performance) and ridiculous amounts of security from data loss because of all the redundancy. Nested RAID configurations (such as 1+0) are sometimes very good compromises. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr_bowtie Posted September 4, 2008 Posted September 4, 2008 I agree.... The Hard Drive speed is going to be the limiting factor... My server is a NF3-250 with a 3400 2.4ghz single core...I cant really tell a difference from that and any other rig I have connected to the network...even the Q6700 rig to any other rig on the network seems as fast... although I am going to upgrade my server with a AM2 dual core and 750gb sata drives...right now I have IDE and I see good speeds...moving a 20gig file only takes 2minutes or less...took 6minutes on a 10/100 set up Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waco Posted September 5, 2008 Posted September 5, 2008 although I am going to upgrade my server with a AM2 dual core and 750gb sata drives...right now I have IDE and I see good speeds...moving a 20gig file only takes 2minutes or less...took 6minutes on a 10/100 set up 20 GB in 6 minutes is barely over wireless speeds. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ir_cow Posted September 5, 2008 Posted September 5, 2008 my raid5 hits over 300mb/s burst basically with a good raid card you just add each drive for a total speed (Ex: 75mb/s read for each so 75x4=300mb/s) depending on the drive read speed. also stripe size can effect speeds, i'v found 1mb to be nice a middle spot for large files and games. i thought about raid 10 but thats way to much overhead. it would be slower than raid0 just because of the amount of I/Os. which makes Raid5 a better choice. also keeping close to sustained 200mb/s of that network card. (you are using one right and not onboard?) you should be able to move 12gb a minute. if you want to play around with ideas grab HD Tune Pro and mess with "File Benchmark" you can pick the size of the "file" you want to move and it will do stripes for each and show read and write speeds. 512kb and 1mb seems to usually be the fastest. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr_bowtie Posted September 6, 2008 Posted September 6, 2008 20 GB in 6 minutes is barely over wireless speeds. yep but thats what it was with a 10/100 router... I put the gigabit switch in and hooked all rigs to that and the network flies now...not sure of the speeds at the current momemt as the onboard LAN went weird...so i am getting a gigabit card to replace it... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ir_cow Posted September 6, 2008 Posted September 6, 2008 onboard NIC usually only get half the rated speeds from what i'v seen. the only NIC card that hits 100mb/s and above is intel chip ones. you have to look closely since many companys just slap the realtek chip on a PCB and call it a network card (which is the same chip as onboard run all by software). i was editing a 1080/30p video today and forgot i was using the server, it was faster than my scratch disk Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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