From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Apr 17 11:52:04 2007 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8FC9016A401 for ; Tue, 17 Apr 2007 11:52:04 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from tom@tomjudge.com) Received: from s200aog11.obsmtp.com (s200aog11.obsmtp.com [207.126.144.125]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 5413513C44B for ; Tue, 17 Apr 2007 11:51:47 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from tom@tomjudge.com) Received: from source ([217.206.187.80]) by eu1sys200aob011.postini.com ([207.126.147.11]) with SMTP; Tue, 17 Apr 2007 11:51:39 UTC Received: from [10.0.0.89] (bill.mintel.co.uk [10.0.0.89]) by rodney.mintel.co.uk (Postfix) with ESMTP id 6DFFB181426; Tue, 17 Apr 2007 12:51:39 +0100 (BST) Message-ID: <4624B4FE.1070402@tomjudge.com> Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2007 12:52:30 +0100 From: Tom Judge User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5.0.10 (X11/20070306) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Richard Tector References: <460959E8.207@thekeelecentre.com> <46095CA9.7060701@thekeelecentre.com> In-Reply-To: <46095CA9.7060701@thekeelecentre.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org, Ivan Voras Subject: Re: Dell SAS5 Performance Issue X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2007 11:52:04 -0000 Richard Tector wrote: > Ivan Voras wrote: >> Richard Tector wrote: >> >>> I'm suffering from very slow write performance on a Dell PowerEdge 860 >>> with the SAS5/IR controller (mpt driver) running either 6.2-RELEASE or >>> 6.2-STABLE with sources from yesterday. The controller hosts 2 Western >>> Digital 320GB SATA disks in a RAID1 configuration. >>> Reads approach 65MB/s however writes appear extremely slow, in the >>> region of 6-7MB/s with a dd and a blocksize of 1MB all the way down to >>> about 300KB/s while extracting a ports snapshot. >>> >>> It was suggested to me that perhaps write caching has been disabled on >>> the controller however no options exist within the BIOS configuration to >>> view/adjust *any* caching options. >>> >> >> You looked in the controller's BIOS, not motherboard's, right? > Indeed I did. >> There should be at least a "write through" vs "write back" switch... > Correct, there should be options, but there aren't. The controller BIOS > has very few options at all in fact. > >> No, but can you post the relevant bits for the controller from dmesg? >> > Sure: > > mpt0: port 0xec00-0xecff mem > 0xfe9fc000-0xfe9fffff,0xfe9e0000-0xfe9effff irq 16 at device 8.0 on pci2 > mpt0: [GIANT-LOCKED] > mpt0: MPI Version=1.5.12.0 > mpt0: mpt_cam_event: 0x16 > mpt0: Unhandled Event Notify Frame. Event 0x16 (ACK not required). > mpt0: mpt_cam_event: 0x12 > mpt0: Unhandled Event Notify Frame. Event 0x12 (ACK not required). > mpt0: mpt_cam_event: 0x12 > mpt0: Unhandled Event Notify Frame. Event 0x12 (ACK not required). > mpt0: mpt_cam_event: 0x16 > mpt0: Unhandled Event Notify Frame. Event 0x16 (ACK not required). > [...snip...] > da0 at mpt0 bus 0 target 0 lun 0 > da0: Fixed Direct Access SCSI-5 device > da0: 300.000MB/s transfers, Tagged Queueing Enabled > da0: 305175MB (624998400 512 byte sectors: 255H 63S/T 38904C) I have just stumbled across this problem on 4 PE860's and 2 PE840's. I have been through the BIOS of the card and found no information about caching in any of the menus. I then decided to take the card out and could not see any place to attach a cache battery backup unit, I could also not see any ram chips on the card. Is there any news on the performance of this card? Tom