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I recently put together a report on my recent NAS build.
http://dl-client.getdropbox.com/u/49293/FreeNAS_Build.html
Updated: 2009 Aug 01
It runs FreeNAS 0.7RC1, contains five 750GB drives in a zfs/raidz configuration (for 3TB of storage and redundancy enough for one drive failure), gigabit ethernet, in a somewhat smallish case (read: non-tower).
I can haz comments?
My next task is to benchmark it, because while FTP to the machine gets around 300Mb/s, CIFS and AFP (my daily machine runs Mac OS X 10.5.7) write performance into the NAS are pathetic: 10-15Mb/s.
EDIT: Here are some primitive benchmarks. These were mostly done by copying a 1GB random data file back and forth in different ways. The tests of the previous day showing pathetic 10Mb/s write speeds are now showing much better. This could be attributed to two things. First, I "untweaked" the machine: undid changes to various parameters I don't understand, but had made because someone said it would be faster. Stupid idea, so I reverted most of the parameters back to the defaults to get a base reading. Second, I rebooted both the NAS and the desktop using the NAS.
The tests, FreeNAS base build (with only an increase in allowable memory use for ZFS):
- ping NAS
--- 192.168.2.250 ping statistics ---
8 packets transmitted, 8 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.160/0.177/0.189/0.011 ms - Run 'iperf -s' on NAS, 'iperf -c IPADDR' on host. (No manual changes to window size: server says 64KB, client says 129KB)
733 Mb/s - Same as #2, both sides window size set to 64KB. (Client actually uses 65KB)
627 Mb/s - FTP from host to NAS; transfer 1GB file of random data. Push and pull rates (bin mode set).
Push: 346 Mb/s
Pull: 136 Mb/s
I think the reason write is faster than read is because the NAS can make good use of the RAM as a write cache. Just my uneducated guess. - rsync -av to NAS
84.4 Mb/s - CIFS: cp sample.bin /Volumes/Media
267 Mb/s - CIFS: cp /Volumes/Media/sample.bin .
76 Mb/s
Interestingly, the first copy was only 42s, but the next three took 1m48s. What happened? (The rejected first copy was 194 Mb/s.) - CIFS: copy file via Finder to NAS
288 Mb/s - CIFS: copy file via Finder from NAS
87.8 Mb/s
This had the same "first fast, remainder not so fast" results as #8. (First copy was 221 Mb/s.)
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