ISCSI Slow Performance with 2003 SBS

[symm]

hi nsc

Check the firmware on the nic in the 2003 box, make sure it is up to date.

[nsc]

Hy,

i did a full update of the server (IBM xSeries 346), reboot and no change...

Really strange.

[enealDC]

You may need to tune your TCP params. Windows by default uses Naggle algo on 2003/2000. Disable that. See the MS iSCSI User Guide under:

"Addressing Slow Performance with iSCSI Clusters"

[nsc]

Ok thanks, i did, it's better now

Now i have another question, looks like Bonding is useless. I try RR, XOR and TLB, i get better performance with Active-Backup (Best at 90Mo / s).

Any info about that ? Look like with 2 servers, i have to break my bonding and use dedicated NIC for each server right ?

[budy]

That depends also on the switches and how they cope with bonding. There're several posts about this "issue". Bonding had been originally desinged for fault-tolerance, not speed.

I couldn't get more performance out of a bond as well, so I devided indeed to wire the server through dedicated links to my DSS, or in my case: run multiple links in different networks from my server to my DSS.

I am starting to seriously thinking of getting a pile of 10 GbE gear.

Cheers,
budy

[nsc]

I understand the fault-tolerance with Bonding but if i need more bandwith for iSCSI ?

My OpenE has 6 NIC Gigabit (2 x Intel Dual Port and 2 from MotherBoard) if i want best performance what is the best ?

For Performance what is the best ?

A switch with 802.3 ad or using 1 NIC for each iSCSI volume ?

[budy]

That's exact the same setup as mine. I am running one of my DSS on a Dell PE1750 with 2x onboard GbE and a PCI-X QuadPort GbE.

I do have a 802.3ad bond and I have just configured a firther NIC for connecting the 3rd iSCSI volume to one of my Xserves, that has also 4 GbE ports.
Up to now, I have been connecting my 2 iSCSI Volumes through the bond and never got more than 130 MB/sec, but now I have the 3rd iSCSI volume connected through the additional link and we'll see tomorrow how it works out, when the next full-backup is due.

Cheers,
budy