Time to upgrade NAS?

Hello

We have a Synology DS209 serving all of our shared files in or office (200gb).

There would generally be 3-4 people accessing the files at any one time.

There is a gigabit LAN in place.

We are finding the NAS getting progressively slower opening files and folders for viewing. Some of the folders have up to 1000 files and it can take up to 10 seconds for the NAS to load them, it cantake about 20 seconds to open a 20MB file. The resource monitor on the NAS shows the CPU idling at 50-75% while we are working. and up to 100% when opening files/folders.


If we were to upgrade to say a Synology DS715 or DS713+, could we expect a significant improvement in performance? I obviously dont want to spend £350 if there isn't a significant improvement.

Many thanks!

gmac said:

Hello

We have a Synology DS209 serving all of our shared files in or office (200gb).

There would generally be 3-4 people accessing the files at any one time.

There is a gigabit LAN in place.

Click to expand...

Hi,

I case you use the NAS for professional work, you should upgrade to something like this one: Thecus N4560 or even better Thecus N5810PRO - did you recognize the mini-UPS inside to prevent from data loss in case of power failure?
The main advantage is that this Thecus devices have as "real" Intel CPU (Dual or Quad-Core) which will never be the bottleneck - even if you add max. no of disks AND run some additional "tools/features" on the NAS!

The Synology devices (as far as I tested them) are always lacking proper multi user support and are in general much slower then the Thecus ones. Of course Synology is cheap, but you get only what you pay for!

With kind regards
Joe

joegreat said:

I case you use the NAS for professional work, you should upgrade to something like this one: Thecus N4560 or even better Thecus N5810PRO - did you recognize the mini-UPS inside to prevent from data loss in case of power failure?
The main advantage is that this Thecus devices have as "real" Intel CPU (Dual or Quad-Core) which will never be the bottleneck - even if you add max. no of disks AND run some additional "tools/features" on the NAS!

The Synology devices (as far as I tested them) are always lacking proper multi user support and are in general much slower then the Thecus ones. Of course Synology is cheap, but you get only what you pay for!

Click to expand...

It's probably time to consider an update/upgrade - Synology (and others like QNAP/Thecus/etc..) do have Intel based NAS devices that are more focused on the small/medium business market.

Since OP is already familiar with Synology, I would suggest staying with them as a vendor - all of the top-tier NAS vendors offer similar specs, so it's really about how to setup and manage the NAS, and this is why I would suggest staying with the incumbent vendor...

I wonder why Thecus doesn't get more attention here? I suspect they cater to video editors on Macs. Not sure.
There are some very vocal complaints about bad customer support from across the Pacific.
I've had great California support with my NAS, though I've only called maybe once a year since 2012.

gmac said:

Hello

We have a Synology DS209 serving all of our shared files in or office (200gb).

There would generally be 3-4 people accessing the files at any one time.

There is a gigabit LAN in place.

We are finding the NAS getting progressively slower opening files and folders for viewing. Some of the folders have up to 1000 files and it can take up to 10 seconds for the NAS to load them, it cantake about 20 seconds to open a 20MB file. The resource monitor on the NAS shows the CPU idling at 50-75% while we are working. and up to 100% when opening files/folders.


If we were to upgrade to say a Synology DS715 or DS713+, could we expect a significant improvement in performance? I obviously dont want to spend £350 if there isn't a significant improvement.

Many thanks!

Click to expand...

When you say progressively slower, do you mean during each work day or over the last year?

How full are the HDD's? If they are over 50% used, performance takes quite a hit.

Does a reboot of the entire network help (specifically, turn off all network devices; router, switches, NAS and clients and then turn them on again in that order)? Does changing the jumbo frame settings on all network devices that connect to this NAS help? Are the files just read or modified by each user?

Do you have the latest version of the DSM operating system?

How old are the HDD's installed and what size are they? You can get significant performance upgrades by using current HDD's even if they are much larger than your needs (they will still be cheaper than a new NAS + Drives).

If you have enough spare capacity on the NAS, copy the files to a new directory and delete the original files (permanently). Now, MOVE the copied files back to where they were. What you should have accomplished is a very basic defrag of those files as they should be less fragmented than what they were before.

Make sure you use the File station on the NAS and not do this simply with a client computer - using the File station (or the Synology equivalent) on the NAS will ensure that when you MOVE the files back to their original location, the only thing that will be written to the drives are the directory locations (and the files themselves will remain un-fragmented).

If the above suggestions do not work, then a new NAS would be worth considering fully.

It has gotten progressively slower over the last year or two. The HDDs are about 25% full. I have the latest DSM for that model (4.2).
The HDDs installed are probably 5 years old. I do have new spare HDDs in the office for another purpose so I might try swapping them in first to see if it makes any difference.

I have two drives in RAID 1. I understand the easiest way to replace these is to replace one at a time and let the NAS transfer the data onto the new drive before replacing the other?

Ill also try that defrag idea.

Thanks!

gmac said:

It has gotten progressively slower over the last year or two. The HDDs are about 25% full. I have the latest DSM for that model (4.2).
The HDDs installed are probably 5 years old. I do have new spare HDDs in the office for another purpose so I might try swapping them in first to see if it makes any difference.

I have two drives in RAID 1. I understand the easiest way to replace these is to replace one at a time and let the NAS transfer the data onto the new drive before replacing the other?

Ill also try that defrag idea.

Thanks!

Click to expand...

If the HDD's are that old and are 1TB or less in size, current drives will surely be faster. In using different sized drives, I have found the 3TB WD Reds to be the most responsive. Compared to the 4TB Reds, they were almost 25% faster and more responsive (on many different NAS's), even though both are much faster than the smaller capacities. I haven't directly compared larger capacities than 4TB so far, but they are too expensive in any case when you have less than 500GB of data to use them with.

Another thing you might want to try is to (especially after the quick 'defrag') is to use as little of the capacity of the drives as you can since you're only using 25% of them anyways. This is referred to as short-stroking and will noticeably speed up your NAS for small files as they will always be at the fastest part of the drive platter (the faster spinning, outer edges).

Does the DSM4.2 allow you to shrink the partition you're currently using? If not, I would be tempted to start again from scratch to see if this helps in the responsiveness of your current setup.

Do an external backup of your data files, reset the NAS to factory defaults and create a RAID1 array using only 35 or 40% of the capacity of the drives for testing purposes. I always setup system and data drives for the minimum space needed for the foreseeable future exactly for this reason. On Windows systems, they can easily be expanded as needed if the users needs change.

Looking forward to any progress you make with this.

And even if these tips don't work with your current setup, you might want to incorporate them in your next NAS setup.

However let's also consider that the NAS itself is a 6 year old model at this point and NAS performance has exceeded gains in general computing performance over the same period of time. So a new NAS, even a plain DS214 or DS215 is going to be significantly faster. The 209 couldn't come close to saturating a gigabit Ethernet link, the newer 214 and 215 models pretty much can and are also significantly faster in multiuser environments. If your data needs are so modest that you are only using about 25% of a 1TB drive, I'd suggest spending the money on a new 2-bay NAS instead of new drives. You'll see substantially more performance out of that.

I'm kinda thinking the same now rather than mess around with the old NAS. I haven't had the time to swap out the HDDs or play around with it yet.

I had my eye on a DS713+, the specs look pretty good.
However looking again, DS715 specs look a little better to my untrained eye and is about the same price. Can anyone advise which is a better machine?

Thanks

gmac said:

I'm kinda thinking the same now rather than mess around with the old NAS. I haven't had the time to swap out the HDDs or play around with it yet.

I had my eye on a DS713+, the specs look pretty good.
However looking again, DS715 specs look a little better to my untrained eye and is about the same price. Can anyone advise which is a better machine?

Thanks

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The DS715 is the one I would choose over the DS713+ easily. Double the RAM, double the cores and I envision double the usability as a result. Even $100 or more price difference is worth it if you expect to use it for the next half dozen years again.

Of course, that assumes that the real world performance differences also stack towards the DS715's favor.

If that last statement is true, it is not just a little better. It makes the DS713+ look like a toy, in the long term.

azazel1024 said:

However let's also consider that the NAS itself is a 6 year old model at this point and NAS performance has exceeded gains in general computing performance over the same period of time. So a new NAS, even a plain DS214 or DS215 is going to be significantly faster. The 209 couldn't come close to saturating a gigabit Ethernet link, the newer 214 and 215 models pretty much can and are also significantly faster in multiuser environments. If your data needs are so modest that you are only using about 25% of a 1TB drive, I'd suggest spending the money on a new 2-bay NAS instead of new drives. You'll see substantially more performance out of that.

Click to expand...

I agree that in the end a new NAS will probably be the best move. But I have also seen where throwing cash at a problem only brought more problems instead (and I've seen that many times over the years).

I would make the time to see what the limitations of the current setup really are and then we'll be in a better position to say buy new (HDD's, or NAS + HDD's), or not. Especially if the work load of the NAS hasn't changed in the last couple of years (there should be no reason for it to slow down).

Time is money of course. If testing the current setup is too intensive on the labor resources, then simply spending a little more money and getting new hardware (and an instant backup NAS) is the way to go.

Odds are good over 5 years it isn't slower, but the work being done through it is involving larger files, new computers hooked up to it, higher expectations. I don't disagree that throwing money at a problem is a bad way to solve it. At the same time, since it is being used in a business and I assume productivity and potential profit/earnings are wrapped up in the performance to some degree, spending $600-1,000 to "solve a problem" doesn't sound like a terrible way to spend money. Spending lots of time trying to diagnose a problem and possibly end up in the same place sounds like a good way to "waste time", which in business is money.

Personal use I'd tweak the heck out of it for a long time before making any decisions on a purchase, but in a business situation I'd move much more rapidly to just buying new equipment (not that I wouldn't spend any time troubleshooting).

azazel1024 said:

Odds are good over 5 years it isn't slower, but the work being done through it is involving larger files, new computers hooked up to it, higher expectations. I don't disagree that throwing money at a problem is a bad way to solve it. At the same time, since it is being used in a business and I assume productivity and potential profit/earnings are wrapped up in the performance to some degree, spending $600-1,000 to "solve a problem" doesn't sound like a terrible way to spend money. Spending lots of time trying to diagnose a problem and possibly end up in the same place sounds like a good way to "waste time", which in business is money.

Personal use I'd tweak the heck out of it for a long time before making any decisions on a purchase, but in a business situation I'd move much more rapidly to just buying new equipment (not that I wouldn't spend any time troubleshooting).

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We're basically agreeing on everything except how much time and money will be spent to do the trouble shooting I suggested.

Either way, the OP still hasn't responded on his/her course of action, so we're back to just guessing for a good solution to him/her.

L&LD said:

We're basically agreeing on everything except how much time and money will be spent to do the trouble shooting I suggested.

Either way, the OP still hasn't responded on his/her course of action, so we're back to just guessing for a good solution to him/her.

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Very true. My assumption is that the OP doesn't have an "IT shop" or even employee and is winging it with their basic knowledge of computers and networking. So my assumption would be that any troubleshooting would either be limited in nature or would take outside consulting (not simply asking on a forum) and thus money or possibly significant time on their part monkeying around with it.

I'd tear in to it for a day if I couldn't resolving things to satisfaction, I'd be hitting buy on my eRetailer shopping cart for a new NAS at the end of the day (if it were a business).

azazel1024 said:

Very true. My assumption is that the OP doesn't have an "IT shop" or even employee and is winging it with their basic knowledge of computers and networking. So my assumption would be that any troubleshooting would either be limited in nature or would take outside consulting (not simply asking on a forum) and thus money or possibly significant time on their part monkeying around with it.

I'd tear in to it for a day if I couldn't resolving things to satisfaction, I'd be hitting buy on my eRetailer shopping cart for a new NAS at the end of the day (if it were a business).

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OP possibly has no IT shop, but at least a half dozen employees.

Plus, the trouble shooting I suggested is pretty simple. If one can copy and paste, all that is left is to compare the before and after results. Letting us know if the workload changed would also help us help better too.

Back to the point - in a business scenario, a 5 year old machine is likely due to be updated - 5 years is a long time, and computers and networks have improved significantly - and time is money...

If the users are complaining about performance, that's lost time and productivity.

sfx2000 said:

Back to the point - in a business scenario, a 5 year old machine is likely due to be updated - 5 years is a long time, and computers and networks have improved significantly - and time is money...

If the users are complaining about performance, that's lost time and productivity.

Click to expand...

We've been through this before. We need the OP to answer some basic questions for us.

But, if the workflow hasn't changed, if the HDD's are working properly and if the files are not fragmented too severely then there should not be any reason to upgrade hardware if the same number of people are accessing the same files in the same way over the last ~18 months.

Even if new hardware fixes the problem (which would be surprising if it didn't), that is not solving anything - that is simply using a bigger hammer.

OP here again.

Unfortunately we don't have any IT support in our office and we depend totally on my own limited knowledge of IT and networking. I also have very limited time to be experimenting with the setup

So, I replaced the HDDs with new oversized 3TB HDDs. This process was very tedious an took a few days as the previous HDDs were formatted on a previous version of DSM and so couldnt deal with the large HDDs. There seems to have been an increase in performance with the new HDDs (WD Red). I dont know if its the increased capacity or just better spec drives.
I had actually ordered a new Synology DS715 before I finished upgrading the drives as I didnt expect such an increase in performance and didnt want to spend much more time messing with the setup. I would have had to upgrade the HDDs anyway before upgrading the NAS. So it will be interesting to see if there will be any further improvement between the current setup and the new NAS.

gmac said:

OP here again.

Unfortunately we don't have any IT support in our office and we depend totally on my own limited knowledge of IT and networking. I also have very limited time to be experimenting with the setup

So, I replaced the HDDs with new oversized 3TB HDDs. This process was very tedious an took a few days as the previous HDDs were formatted on a previous version of DSM and so couldnt deal with the large HDDs. There seems to have been an increase in performance with the new HDDs (WD Red). I dont know if its the increased capacity or just better spec drives.
I had actually ordered a new Synology DS715 before I finished upgrading the drives as I didnt expect such an increase in performance and didnt want to spend much more time messing with the setup. I would have had to upgrade the HDDs anyway before upgrading the NAS. So it will be interesting to see if there will be any further improvement between the current setup and the new NAS.

Click to expand...

Pay a consultant for some time to do it right. Don't risk data loss. Sounds like you have dumb managers.