Subpar performance on Intel SSR212MC2R

We have recently deployed iSCSI storage on Intel's SSR212MC2R platform. The configuration is as follows:

1. Intel SSR212MC2R (latest BIOS and RAID fw)
2. 1xE5310 Quad Core Xeon
3. 4GB FB-DIMM DRR2 RAM
2. 12x750GB Seagate HDD
3. Hardware RAID 5 with BBU (approx 8TB usable)
4. 2xGigabit connections with IO AT enabled (not teamed/bonded)
5. Open-E iSCSI-R3 (dated Nov 2007)
6. Linksys 8 port Gigabit switch with SNMP

The problem is I am only getting writespeeds of 5MB/sec. Customer expectation was closer to 90-100MB/sec.

I have tried using a crossover cable and connecting directly to clients with no luck.

Customer has an older Intel SSR212MA storage system and connecting through same setup we are getting a solid 70MB/sec xfers.

Any idea what could be causing the slow performance?

Any memory leaking? RAID issues? Is it read/write normally (if u test it with another softwate)?

I never test this intel, but I test it with different Intel's and supermicro and I got over 100MB/s

Have you checked your RAID controller configuration? You are more than likely set for write-back instead of write-through.

* Write-Back Cache: When the system writes to a memory location that is currently held in cache, it only writes the new information to the appropriate cache line. When the cache line is eventually needed for some other memory address, the changed data is "written back" to system memory. This type of cache provides better performance than a write-through cache, because it saves on (time-consuming) write cycles to memory.
* Write-Through Cache: When the system writes to a memory location that is currently held in cache, it writes the new information both to the appropriate cache line and the memory location itself at the same time. This type of caching provides worse performance than write-back, but is simpler to implement and has the advantage of internal consistency, because the cache is never out of sync with the memory the way it is with a write-back cache.

a good rule is:

if you have NVRAM with BBC use write-back, thats why you have a battery :)
if you dont, then its safer to use Write-Through (disable controller caching).

HTH,

Is the newest open-e version on it. They updated the Intel drivers, nearly every update. In one update the last month the performance increased with Intel Network cards.

Hi,

I have similar issue, getting 200Mbits a second which is about 25MBytes per second. I expect a lot more using raid6 with 8 drives and BBU unit attached. I have Write cache turned on and all settings in 3ware card seem correct.

I have only now noticed that open-e has an option for iscsi for WB cache, should this be turned on rather than write-through which is the default?

thanks

Yes use the Write Backup for performance with the Target.