Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)
Date:      Fri, 11 May 2007 12:15:11 -0700
From:      David Wolfskill <david@catwhisker.org>
To:        Scott Long <scottl@samsco.org>
Cc:        stable@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: 6.2-R on Dell Poweredge 2950 with Dell PERC 5/i [mfi(4)]
Message-ID:  <20070511191511.GX64542@bunrab.catwhisker.org>
In-Reply-To: <4643A739.3080601@samsco.org>
References:  <20070510200211.GM64542@bunrab.catwhisker.org> <4643A739.3080601@samsco.org>

next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help

--QbLupA6O8PZD6SZa
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

On Thu, May 10, 2007 at 05:14:01PM -0600, Scott Long wrote:
> ...
> Not sure that this impression is entirely accurate.  The biggest problem
> with MFI machines is online RAID management.  The storage driver itself
> matured very quickly and has been very reliable.

Ah; good to know:  thank you.

> >Well, now a colleague is trying to run 6.2-R on one of these 2950s; dmesg
> >says the controller is:
> >
> >mfi0: <Dell PERC 5/i> mem 0xd80f0000-0xd80fffff,0xfc4e0000-0xfc4fffff ir=
q=20
> >78 at device 14.0 on pci2
> ...
> >and the disks looks like:
> >
> >mfid0: <MFI Logical Disk> on mfi0
> >mfid0: 418176MB (856424448 sectors) RAID volume '' is optimal
> >
>=20
> Looks A OK to me.

Even better.  :-)

> >The intended production workload involves creation and deletion of
> >a large number of files rather rapidly.
> ...
> sysctl vfs.ffs.doasyncfree=3D0 might help.  Running the syncer more=20
> frequently might also help, but I don't recall the sysctl node for
> that.

OK; I've relayed your suggestion to my colleague, but haven't heard back
from her yet.

> ...
> Very strange.  No chance that it was due to files that were deleted but
> still referenced by open apps?

I don't think so.  She's deployed 13 other boxen over the last few years
with -- naturally! -- different hardware specs, but all running
essentailly the same application.

The big question for her is whether or not the Dell 2950, as specified,
will do  the job.

> ...
> This sounds purely like a filesystem issue, not an MFI driver issue.

Hmmm... I'll admit to knowing little about RAID configurations; is it
possible that some RAID configurations might exacerbate problems with
such a workload -- or that others might be more amenable to it?

Thanks again!

Peace,
david
--=20
David H. Wolfskill				david@catwhisker.org
Believe SORBS at your own risk: 63.193.123.122 has been static since Aug 19=
99.

See http://www.catwhisker.org/~david/publickey.gpg for my public key.

--QbLupA6O8PZD6SZa
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
Content-Disposition: inline

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.0 (FreeBSD)

iEYEARECAAYFAkZEwL4ACgkQmprOCmdXAD35awCfWkOYgghLVhyM/J+GY8ez9+Hl
qYAAn0ajQXxwnP844XH6K0Som2Q4tWKF
=RjL2
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

--QbLupA6O8PZD6SZa--



Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20070511191511.GX64542>