[Samba] suggestions for a "fast" fileserver - 1G / 10G - focus on smb.conf/samba

[gcarter at aesgi.com]

My suggestion would be to take a look at the latest kernels.

Don't forget, just recently added to the LINUX kernel has been better threaded
I/O, and the ability to treat block devices as assisted cache facilities.

First thing I would do is download 3.13.7 (Just released).

Secondly, don't use the binary RPM's with the distro.  They are generic
architecturally speaking.

Use the latest GCC stack, and use XEON instruction optimizations to compile and
build the binary and kernel.

Secondly, I would implement block device caching.

For directed I/O and Network I/O I got a good 20% performance boost all around
just doing nothing with my existing Samba config and implementing the above.

That was significant and you will notice bigger gains the more people you have
accessing your Samba server (i.e. In this case a server that has about 300 users
at any given time.).

Also, make sure you have a good spread on your APIC.

If you see all of your interrupts going through processor 0, your operating
system kernel is not using the hardware efficiently.

Make sure your APIC is working, and you got good interrupt load spread across
the PCIXpress backplane/bus between your Network card, Memory, and SATA/SCSI
controllers.

Building a professional SAMBA system goes way beyond the smb.conf file,
unfortunately.

But hopefully these are some tips to help you get started.

-gc


On March 25, 2014 at 10:17 AM Emmanuel Florac <eflorac at intellique.com> wrote:
> Le Tue, 25 Mar 2014 08:14:06 +0100 vous écriviez:
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > thanks for all the feedback and topics.
> >
> > May be I can/should draw a better picture of my settings and question.
> >
> > We "still" use samba 3.6.9-167 from Red Hat with an openldap backend.
>
> That shouldn't be a problem, really.
>
> > I tried from an older posting somewhere:
> >
> > socket options = TCP_NODELAY IPTOS_LOWDELAY SO_RCVBUF=65536
> > SO_SNDBUF=65536
>
> Normally these are not necessary. In particular I'm pretty sure
> enforcing buffer size can do more harm than good.
>
> > We have some reliable, fast hardware SATA ISCSI raid boxes with min.
> > 12 disks, most are 16 disks, configured in raid 10, 5, 6 depending
> > on the use case and date stored. (e.g. lots of smaller r/w, some are
> > big files min. some Gig.)
> ><...>
> >
> > So what can speed up smb?
>
> What is the disk subsystem performance like from the samba
> server point of view? Do you use the nobarrier/barrier=0 option on the
> shared filesystem?
>
> --
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Emmanuel Florac | Direction technique
> | Intellique
> | <eflorac at intellique.com>
> | +33 1 78 94 84 02
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