Very slow performance after installing RAID controllers

[Thomas Cameron]

OK, more info.

It looks like I was wrong - ftp, http and scp performance are all fine.
Also, the speed copying from one RAID array to another is good, and copying
data within the RAID array (i.e. cp foo.tar.gz bar.tar.gz) is very fast,
too.

This is definitely a Samba problem.  It's like there's some kind of
disconnect between Samba and the disk subsystem.

Any pointers?

Thomas

> Hi all -
>
> I never got an answer last time I posted this, so I'll try again.
>
> I have an old Compaq Proliant 2500R with dual PPro 200 CPUs and a gig of =
> RAM.  I used to have an external Proliant Storage System F1 array with =
> seven 9.1GB drives attached to the on-board SCSI controller on the =
> server, and I used software RAID under Red Hat 7.0.  The performance of =
> Samba (2.0.6, maybe?) was great - very fast copying files to and from =
> the server over 100MB/s ethernet.
>
> I just installed two Smart-2/P array controllers and an additional F1 =
> external array, this one with 36GB drives.  This puts one external array =
> on each of the array controllers.  I also upgraded to Red Hat 7.1.  Now, =
> network performance is horrible!  a 100 meg file takes 15-20 minutes to =
> copy from the server to a client PC.
>
> Here's the weird part - when I copy files from one external array to the =
> other using the cp command at the console, it is very fast (650MB in =
> under two minutes).  When I copy files within each array, it is also =
> similarly fast.  So, I don't think it is disk subsystem - I only mention =
> it because I'm grasping at straws here.
>
> I have tried downloading and compiling Samba 2.2.2.  I have fiddled with =
> SO_SNDBUF and SO_RCVBUF as well, but it doesn't affect the speed at all.
>
> Anyone have any idea why network performance would tank so badly in =
> these circumstances?  I really don't want to yank the array controllers, =
> but I'm about at the end of my rope...
>
> Thanks for any guidance at all.
> Thomas Cameron