James Nord's reply to Win2K and multiple Samba 2.07 servers

[G+D Computing Pty Ltd]

Hello again,

Thanks James for your replies.

In regards to the slow read/write, the software vendor is aware of the 
problem, at some stage they will buffer the read/write, but it won't happen 
overnight, the binary file is quite complicated. So there are no updates 
available for this particular issue and I don't expect any for a couple of 
months. The software in question can generate large files, up to 2 gig, 
some reads are buffered but not all. But it goes a bit further than this, 
why does NT4.0 and Win2K behave so differently with network read/writes ? 
Obivously there are of differences between the two, but if Win95 through to 
ME and NT4.0 do a decent job, seems a bit strange that Win2K can't deliver 
the same peformance. Incidently reading the file from NT4.0 to Win2K seems 
to have no problem.

I tried setting security = server and set password server to the name of 
the other samba server and edited the hosts file to make sure it could find 
it okay. Pinging the hostname is fine, but authenticating a windows client 
would not work. I'll try again, it was late at night I was tired etc, could 
somebody confirm that you need to have a local account for every smb user ?

Edmund


>G+D Computing Pty Ltd wrote:
>
>>Hello to all,
>>This is my first ever use of a mailing list so bear with my ramblings and 
>>illiterate prose.
>>I have been using samba from 2.03 to 2.07 for over a year now. We run 
>>DHCP, WINS on the samba (acting as domain) box running Mandrake 6.0. 
>>Windows machines are running everything from Win95 up to Win2K. With 
>>Win2K I have problems with slow read/write, particularly for one 
>>application which reads byte by byte.
>
>I assume you have tried to see if the application has any updates?
>
>>This program stores its data files on the server. Both ftp and Windows 
>>explorer file speed is very similar, so I don't like to point the finger 
>>at Samba. But this application reading byte by byte is painfully slow. I 
>>note the 2nd read of the same file is much faster, but I assume this is 
>>Win2K caching the file. If I turn off oplocks, then always the same file 
>>read is slow.
>>It's got to the point where I have removed Win2K and gone back to NT4.0 
>>sp6. NT4.0 has no speed file read problems. Is there something nasty in 
>>Win2K that you guys may know ?
>>It seems like there is an overhead for calling a byte read which is 
>>inefficient, but surely the operating system (Win2K) can compensate for this ?
>>I think the general network is okay, and since NT4.0 and other windows 
>>boxes have no problem, what's Win2K doing special ?
>>SP1 is installed on win2k computers (well it was when I was running it)
>>I've found samba to be very reliable and stable. I've recently added a 
>>2nd Samba server running Redhat 6.2. I wanted the share authentication to 
>>be done via the first samba's smb password list,
>
>look at
>  security = server
>  password server = <name-of-server>
>
>/James
>
>--
>Technology is a word that describes something that doesn't work yet.
>         Douglas Adams

--------------------------------------
G+D Computing
Suite 1, Level 7
541 Kent Street
SYDNEY 2000
Tel: + 61 2 9264 2977
Fax: + 61 2 9264 2066
e-mail: strand7 at gd.com.au
http://www.strand.aust.com
--------------------------------------