How to tune FreeNAS 8 ZFS for better performance

[tmacka88]

Hi,

Just started with FreeNAS so quite new to it all. Im trying to tune my setup for better performance.

My set up is:
8GB RAM
1X2TB SATA 3 HDD
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.33GHz
ASRock G41C-VS Motherboard
OS Version: FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE-p1
FreeNas Build: FreeNAS-8.0-RELEASE-amd64

Also any other ways of speeding up performance would greatly be appreciated.

These are my performance Write speed ATM:
1. 2,199MB in 53.7s =40.95MB/s
2. 3,254MB in 72.9s=44.64MB/s
3. 736MB in 15.6s=47.18MB
4. 3,741MB in 82.9s=45.13MB/s
5. 26,530MB in 590s=44.97MB/s

Read:
1. 2,199MB in 37.1s=59.27MB/s
2. 3,254MB in 58s=56.1MB/s
3. 736MB in 16.6s=44.34MB
4. 3,741MB in 63.4s=59MB/s
5. 26,530MB in 466s=56.93MB/s
Ave Read= 55.13MB/s

Or are these good speeds.
Thanks Again.

 

[ProtoSD]

There are ton of ZFS tuning guides if you google for 'zfs tuning', here's a short one for FreeBSD on which FreeNAS is based.
ZFSTuningGuide

Just make sure you have your GUI config settings saved. If you make a typo or choose a bad setting you may not be able to boot and need to reflash unless you have a FreeBSD system you can connect your USB flash drive to and remove the offending setting. There is a performance thread here with a common method for testing and people posting their results. You would probably be better to use those tests so you have results to compare to.

 

[tmacka88]

I was told it doesn't work with freeness 8 though?

 

[ProtoSD]

Hmmmm..... don't believe everything you hear. Tuning ZFS does work in FreeNAS, if you are not reckless about it. You just need to remember that the changes you make need to be backed up before you do an upgrade. I definitely recommend doing some reading about it first and start out with only a few parameters so you can test your results.

Looking at your configuration again, it only looks like you are using 1 harddrive, so you probably aren't using ZFS, although you do have a good amount of RAM if that's what you are planning to use later.

 

[tmacka88]

Yeh I only have one hdd attached ATM but I am using ZFS. I'll look into what u said. Thanks. So will you get better performance with multiple hdd in ZFS setup?

 

[ProtoSD]

It depends on how you set them up, how many, RAM, etc. I don't think there's any real advantage to using ZFS on a single disk.

 

[tmacka88]

Yeh I only have one ATM just test everything and get it working the way I want to then I'm puting more in like another 1 or 2 2tb. Which i will add to later as well.

 

[pauldonovan]

A single disk still gives you snapshots, data integrity, datasets with quotas and compression settings. All valuable features.

 

[ProtoSD]

A chain is only as strong as it's weakest link.... if the disk fails those features won't help. @tmacka88 do you use any of those features? If you're planning to add disks later, you'll either need to create a mirror, or move all your data off before you can properly create a raidz array which is where you'll get the most benefit from ZFS.

 

[gcooper]

It depends on how you set them up, how many, RAM, etc. I don't think there's any real advantage to using ZFS on a single disk.

There is in some regard, but in reality you should really have at least a mirror setup. Unless you have SMART enabled and know how to parse the output, it's really easy to miss a dying disk (that's what happened to the first disk that was installed in my workstation at iX >_>...).

 

[digitaltrash]

I was told in another thread that maximum performance on the disk side is achieved when the number of disks in a set follows "the power of 2" rule. Then I've seen mixed opinions about this statement, both here on this forum and elsewhere on the internet. Can someone who really knows about this please put an end to the issue? I think that would benefit a lot of n00bs like myself!

 

[klint76]

how do you test you read/ write speeds?

Noob

Hi,

Just started with FreeNAS so quite new to it all. Im trying to tune my setup for better performance.

My set up is:
8GB RAM
1X2TB SATA 3 HDD
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.33GHz
ASRock G41C-VS Motherboard
OS Version: FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE-p1
FreeNas Build: FreeNAS-8.0-RELEASE-amd64

Also any other ways of speeding up performance would greatly be appreciated.

These are my performance Write speed ATM:
1. 2,199MB in 53.7s =40.95MB/s
2. 3,254MB in 72.9s=44.64MB/s
3. 736MB in 15.6s=47.18MB
4. 3,741MB in 82.9s=45.13MB/s
5. 26,530MB in 590s=44.97MB/s

Read:
1. 2,199MB in 37.1s=59.27MB/s
2. 3,254MB in 58s=56.1MB/s
3. 736MB in 16.6s=44.34MB
4. 3,741MB in 63.4s=59MB/s
5. 26,530MB in 466s=56.93MB/s
Ave Read= 55.13MB/s

Or are these good speeds.
Thanks Again.