Speeding up network access to DrivePool

[RFOneWatt]

Hi,

 

I am looking for suggestions on increasing the network read/write speed for my DrivePool. 

 

I am currently using four 600GB 10k RPM drives as feeder drives - striped on a Highpoint 2720 controller. (2 drives per stripe set) Most of the rest of the pool is on a Highpoint 2740.

 

I'm not sure of the best way to approach this and am looking for suggestions.

 

I am thinking that NIC teaming might be somewhere to start?  Or maybe it's time to be looking at fiber?

 

At the moment I am using several cheap gigabit switches that I will be consolidating to a larger, more intelligent switch.

 

The motherboard has an Intel 82576 dual GB controller but I will be upgrading to a Supermicro X10DRI-O shortly.

 

Any suggestions / advice would be appreciated

 

Thanks!!

 

-Tony

 

[Umfriend]

Go 10GbE?

 

I wonder if that would work over Cat-6 UTP cables provided length did not exceed, say, 30 meters (CAT-6 is 1Gb/S up to 250m I believe), but now I am hijacking.

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Depends on the speed you're seeing. 

 

If it's ~100-120MB/s over the network, then you're maxing out the network connection. 

You'll need to do something like teaming, or get 10Gbps cards and networking hardware to get better speed.

 

If you're not seeing that, then enable the "Network IO Boost" speed. This uses additional system resources (CPU+Memory) to identify and prioritize network access of the pool.

 

 

 

As for the teaming, what base OS are you using?

[RFOneWatt]

Well, it appears I have other issues because from my personal workstation I am seeing MAX write speeds of 50 mbps to the storage server.

 

Local copies to the pool average around 100-250 mbps depending on what's going on.  Reads from the pool are 50-90 mbps. (Most of the drives in the pool are 5900 RPM HGST's)

 

Other machines on the same network are even worse - a couple only topping out at around 10.

 

I am thinking maybe I've got a bad patch cable (it's all Gigabit over CAT 5E) or possibly a bad switch?

 

Sigh.

 

Right now the O/S is Server 2008R2, soon to be 2008R2 Enterprise or possibly Server 2012 standard.

 

Thanks guys, 

Tony

[Christopher (Drashna)]

If the issues are happening only over the network... then there are a few issues, but a bad cable or switch definitely could be one of them.
 
 
Have you tried turnning on the "Network IO Boost" option in StableBit DrivePool? It may help. 
If it doesn't:

For the Network Adapter (in device management or "Configure" on the properties page):
Flow control: on (client and server)
"checksum" or "Offload": Off (client and server)
jumbo frames: off or default (client and server)
Green Ethernet: off (this decreases the power used, and for me seems to cause issues, Client and Server)
Interrupt Moderation: off (client and server)
Under network connection, where "Internet Protocol Version 4" is, make sure "QoS Packet Scheduling" is turned off or removed on all clients. (Client and Server)

 

 
run "netsh interface tcp set global autotuninglevel=highlyrestricted" in an elevated console on the client and server, if Vista/Server 2008 or up.

These settings may help with network performance. Or at least, in my experience, have.

 

 

A good test is copying files from an SSD to an SSD over the network. This way, you can be reasonable certain that disk throughput isn't the bottleneck. 

[RFOneWatt]

Hey Guys -- Sorry to bail on this thread so long ago. After I read it Mr. Drashna got me thinking.... 

 

Let's say this:  It appears that it's a bad idea to have every piece of network hardware in the house(s) on battery back-ups --particularly when it's cheap hardware.   

 

The power in the neighborhood hasn't gone out for a significant amount of time which meant I had several "junk/dumb" GB switches (meaning Trendnet, TP-Link and the like.) that haven't been power cycled in many, many months.  

 

So.....I'm not sure which switch/router was the problem but after power cycling all of them (and doing nothing else) everything basically matches your guesstimates above.

 

So with this system now up, running & stable I'm about to begin a 4224 build.  Once that's up and running I can revisit the 4220 box and clean up a few loose ends that are bugging me..but at this point it's 100% stable.

 

With my new 4224 build (Meant to separate my media server from my storage server)  I can do things a bit more slowly and concentrate on a few key points. 

 

Originally I was just going to upgrade the motherboard in the 4220 and call it a day but at this point I can't afford any significant downtime and wanted to spend time tweaking (specifically the network side of things) so I decided a totally new build was in order and began collecting all the pieces which have mostly arrived.

 

I'm sure you don't remember me Drashna but you came to my rescue a couple times (On two separate Sundays no less) during the 4220 build which was my first "serious" experience with DrivePool & Highpoint controllers... I sincerely appreciate it.

 

~RF

 

 

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Well, I'm going to go with "cheap hardware, you get what you pay for"

 

I'm glad to hear that everything appears to be stable now. And power cycling everything probably helped (I had to do that on my Linksys E3000 router at least once a week, or it would get really unstable....)

 

And I can definitely understand about the downtime. I'm definitely in the same boat.

 

 

And separating the media server from anything else isn't a bad idea. Especially when dealing to Plex or Emby, which can be resource hogs.

 

And you're very welcome.

I enjoy working and helping people out, and I know that some people really only have time on the weekends!

[RFOneWatt]

Well, I certainly appreciate your dedication. 

 

Yes - It's actually a big problem when you start to accumulate so much data that's constantly in use. Where do you stick that data when you need to work/change, etc.  Heck, I bit the bullet and began a second build rather than deal with downtime. 

 

Having to power cycle anything periodically to guarantee availability is completely unacceptable in my book.. even at home.

 

I just picked up a Cisco SG200 26 port switch that will be replacing almost all of the cheap switches.  Most of the cabling is being replaced also.  I think it will be pretty interesting to see the change in performance. 

 

Speaking of PLex being a resource hog... below is my 4220 box serving one Xbox 360, two Playstation 3’s, two PS3's at the other neighbors, My daughters Samsung Tablet, my Galaxy S5 and our main Samsung TV along with two Chrome Plex clients.

 

Everything is physically wired to the network at 1GB except for the tablet and my phone. (The XBOX next door is wired @ 100M)

 

This is everything running perfectly, everything in 1080P HD.  

 

Anything more and we start to get stuttering…..

 

 

 

 

Now I'm working out the best configuration between the switch and both Norco boxes.... hmm.... 

 

~RF

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Well, I had a friend buy me a Netgear 24 port managed switch.  they're worth it with "higher end network" configurations like ours. 

 

As for how to attach the servers.... the switch appears to have 10gbit ports.

Need I say more? If everything (including each other) is going to access the servers, then you want the biggest pipes (seriously, that Al Gore "a series of tubes" quote is sooo freaking accurate) going to where the most traffic is going to be.

 

 

And very nice. Unfortunately, Emby is horrible when it comes to transcoding. 2 streams and it's done. Fortunately, the Home Theater app uses network shares when possible.

[RFOneWatt]

Well, I had a friend buy me a Netgear 24 port managed switch.  they're worth it with "higher end network" configurations like ours. 

 

As for how to attach the servers.... the switch appears to have 10gbit ports.

Need I say more? If everything (including each other) is going to access the servers, then you want the biggest pipes (seriously, that Al Gore "a series of tubes" quote is sooo freaking accurate) going to where the most traffic is going to be.

 

 

And very nice. Unfortunately, Emby is horrible when it comes to transcoding. 2 streams and it's done. Fortunately, the Home Theater app uses network shares when possible.

 

 

Geez... I need friends like yours.

 

EMBY... I've heard of it - appears to be a media server like say, Serviio / Plex?

 

I remember trying Plex out a couple years ago and ditching it for that reason - terrible resource hog (compared to TVersity at the time.) Plex is so feature rich and robust these days I can't even consider running something else at the moment.  (Although I do run a Serviio on a workhorse box of mine as backup to Plex.)

 

Anyways, yes, The switch upgrade was a necessity. (along with most of the cabling)

 

I've lived in the same house since 1997 so everything has been an addition to the network. Routers, neighbors, repeaters, etc. I will have that Cisco in place and all important wiring re-slung over the next couple of weeks. During that time I need to figure out the new backbone of the 4220 and 4224.

 

I knew you'd notice the GBIC's on the SG200-26, Drasha. Can't get much past you. 

 

My 4220 box has the Supermicro X8-DTi-F and the new 4224 box is being built on the X10-DRi-0 board.

 

What would be your configuration recommendation on getting these two boxes fluently yapping which each while simultaneously saturating all of the clients?  <big grin> 

 

Hmmmm......

 

~RF

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Well, he did buy it off eBay, so it was a lot cheaper.

But I've helped that friend out a lot, so he bought it as "payment" of sorts.

 

 

Emby is the new name for MediaBrowser. They've rebranded, but yes, very much like Plex.  

 

Plex has gotten a lot better about transcoding though. They use a heavily customized version of ffmpeg, IIRC.  While Emby uses the stock one.... And Emby is horrible about CPU usage, unfortunately. Nearly unusable for me.

 

And I can definitely understand the re-wiring stuff. Did the same (still doing...) after I got the switch.

 

And yeah, definitely noticed it. Attention to details is important.

 

As for configuration, not really. Well, not more than you've already probably planned out.

That and a couple of the 10Gbit NICs to connect to your switch. 
And Plex or whatever is going to be doing the heavy CPU usage on the X10 board, clearly. 

[RFOneWatt]

As for configuration, not really. Well, not more than you've already probably planned out.

That and a couple of the 10Gbit NICs to connect to your switch. 

And Plex or whatever is going to be doing the heavy CPU usage on the X10 board, clearly. 

 

I haven't really planned much too much aside from the most obvious.

 

I was poking around E-Bay earlier - quite the range in price on 10Gbit adaptors.  Seems like Intel is the logical choice but I've got some reading to do. 

 

Do you have any experience with one model/brand over another?   

 

Like I said, I'm not much of a hardware person but I'm learning.

 

~RF

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Intel. That's the usual way to go. 

 

Aside from that... no, I don't have any experience with that stuff yet.  

As for the price range, it varies from the people that just want the hardware gone, to the people that want to recoup their entire cost (aka sell it at what they bought it at).

 

It really depends on the seller in question, and how desperate they are.

[RFOneWatt]

Intel. That's the usual way to go. 

 

Aside from that... no, I don't have any experience with that stuff yet.  

As for the price range, it varies from the people that just want the hardware gone, to the people that want to recoup their entire cost (aka sell it at what they bought it at).

 

It really depends on the seller in question, and how desperate they are.

 

OK, Gotcha. Time to start trolling E-Bay.

 

As I said before, I'm not much of a hardware guy so .... ummmm...

 

Two 10GB NIC's, one for each Norco box...

 

Two Mini GBIC's for the Cisco SG200?

 

Am I missing anything Drashna?   

 

WWDD???  

 

haha

 

~RF

[Christopher (Drashna)]

If it makes you feel any better, I need to start looking into the 10gb networking stuff, as well.

So aside from that, not sure.

[RobbieH]

For a while Emby was less a resource hog than Plex, because Plex would try to transcode the entire stream right up front. A while back Plex changed this, which has helped a ton. On my system, I really don't see much difference between Plex and Emby with several streams going at the same time. I'm trying really hard to switch to Plex for good (even though I'm a paid Emby supporter), but every once in a while Plex will let me down and I'll have to go back to Emby. Plex Theater still has issues playing back media sometimes - the picture will go all kaleidoscope on me for a few seconds, yet every other player will play the video fine. The Plex app for Windows 8.1 is terrible, and my daughter is good at telling me how bad it is on a regular basis. 

 

Take my comments with this grain of salt - I'm not bashing either, and/or I'm bashing them both. I haven't found a clear winner yet, but my bet is on Plex. They are so close to getting it right, it seems they just don't have the resources to get there. If they could just get that little bit better, I'd switch my pass from annual to lifetime.

[Christopher (Drashna)]

For a while Emby was less a resource hog than Plex, because Plex would try to transcode the entire stream right up front. A while back Plex changed this, which has helped a ton. On my system, I really don't see much difference between Plex and Emby with several streams going at the same time. I'm trying really hard to switch to Plex for good (even though I'm a paid Emby supporter), but every once in a while Plex will let me down and I'll have to go back to Emby. Plex Theater still has issues playing back media sometimes - the picture will go all kaleidoscope on me for a few seconds, yet every other player will play the video fine. The Plex app for Windows 8.1 is terrible, and my daughter is good at telling me how bad it is on a regular basis. 

 

Take my comments with this grain of salt - I'm not bashing either, and/or I'm bashing them both. I haven't found a clear winner yet, but my bet is on Plex. They are so close to getting it right, it seems they just don't have the resources to get there. If they could just get that little bit better, I'd switch my pass from annual to lifetime.

Quality wise, Emby is the winner, clearly.  And the UI? So much better, by far. Especially if you support them and get access to the CoverArt plugin.  In fact, I've had friends compare it Netflix, because of the UI. 

Plex ... isn't there. 

 

 

But as for streams... everything I have is 720p or higher.  And when transcoding, I can get 1, maybe 2 streams before it starts stuttering.

 

But I've seen people that have some very nice systems (dual CPU Xeon's) that can transcode 20 streams without an issue.

 

 

I'd also love if Emby would compile a version of ffmpeg that used the GPU accelleration.  I got 4-6 times the performance out of it... but it was unstable. FFMPEG would fail to close properly, and block other streams from starting.  And that is if it started.... 

But 20-30 fps vs 130-150fps .... a HUGE difference. And that's with just the onboard video for the Xeon E3-1245v3 CPU!

[RobbieH]

Unfortunately, I haven't found a way to use GPU acceleration on anything due to the fact I'm using VMWare, using the 1246v3. It appears I can do it if I add a discrete card to the server, but as yet I haven't needed to boost ffmpeg performance. And even then, it seems the ffmpeg stuff I've looked at, such as Handbrake and MCEBuddy, want the Intel integrated GPU to use for acceleration, so even with a discrete card I'm SOL.

 

RIght now I can't change my password for my online account for Emby, I get an error. And, I can't change my Emby forum password, any time I go to the page it just says "Your password will be unlocked in 14 minutes". These little problems drive me crazy. But yes, when it comes to PQ on my HTPC, Emby wins.

[RFOneWatt]

Somehow Emby has slipped under my radar over the last few years. I might have to take a look at it for the heck of it.

 

I've tried most every DLNA server that I've run across and my experience goes like this.....

 

The first DLNA media server I ever used was TVersity, for a few reasons. #1) It was the first and only (at the time) DLNA server that would transcode AND only when needed on a per device basis. #2) It was 100% free. #3) I simply couldn't find anything better. Free or Paid. 

 

I needed to feed original X-Boxes running XBMC, X-Box 360's and several WDTV Live boxes but the majority of clients were/are Playstation 3's. After A LOT of tweaking I got TVersity where I wanted it and had no complaints for several years. It just worked.

 

Like you said Plex wanted to transcode everything which made it basically unusable for more than one or two streams so I stuck with TVersity.  It just worked.

 

Then I ran across Serviio and have been using it for about a year or so. A few short months ago I decided to check Plex out once again and wow,  I haven't looked back. Plex has its (minor) quirks but they are working their butts off over there and I have zero complaints. The community support is superb and they will get around to fixing what little annoyances I have. I notice the Plex server is updated about once every two weeks or so.

 

I didn't even know they had a Windows 8 app. If it's that bad just open up a browser (suggest Chrome in desktop mode) and skip using the app entirely. I have been extremely impressed with all of the Plex clients that I have tried (they sure support a lot!) but I must say the Samsung Smart-TV app is stunning. The PS3 & Android app are great also. I've read that the Roku 3 and Vizio clients are also wonderful. 

 

Personally I think the best experience is had in Chrome.

 

I know we're not exactly apples-2-apples with our configurations (DLNA, etc.) but I just wanted to share my experiences.

 

I still run Serviio in tandem with Plex though as a backup. I did pay for it and it works great in case I ever have an issue with Plex I can just stream from Serviio, it's on a different machine and pointed at the same media (drive)pool as my Plex server.. although I haven't had to use it yet.

 

PLex has come a long way in the past several months. I 'spect they got some funding.

 

Now go upgrade your Plex pass and show them some more love. They aren't slouching over there and I'm sure any issues you have will be resolved.

 

WIth all that said I wish you the best viewing experience and thanks for sharing your thoughts.    

 

Now to decide on the 10GB hardware I need.... Argh.. need more hours in the day to research!!!! 

 

~RF

 

 

 

 

[otispresley]

Yeah, I was on VMware, and the only way you could do GPU acceleration in a VM was to do PCI Passthrough (DirectPath I/O) of the card to the VM, and the last time I checked, only certain AMD cards seemed to work half way right.

 

I do have Sandy Bridge Xeon's in my server and so used an Ubuntu Server VM with the Handbrake CLI to do my encodes for mobile device viewing.  I just wrote a script that mounts the DrivePool shares and checks the two directory structures for differences and either creates or deletes a mobile encode to match the main video directory structure.  I do not encode my in-home files, just use tsMuxer re-package the unaltered video, subtitles, and audio streams into an M2TS container.  Depending on the file size and parameters, Handbrake normally takes anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes to encode a feature length video at the lower resolution.

 

 

Unfortunately, I haven't found a way to use GPU acceleration on anything due to the fact I'm using VMWare, using the 1246v3. It appears I can do it if I add a discrete card to the server, but as yet I haven't needed to boost ffmpeg performance. And even then, it seems the ffmpeg stuff I've looked at, such as Handbrake and MCEBuddy, want the Intel integrated GPU to use for acceleration, so even with a discrete card I'm SOL.

 

RIght now I can't change my password for my online account for Emby, I get an error. And, I can't change my Emby forum password, any time I go to the page it just says "Your password will be unlocked in 14 minutes". These little problems drive me crazy. But yes, when it comes to PQ on my HTPC, Emby wins.

[RFOneWatt]

Quality wise, Emby is the winner, clearly.  And the UI? So much better, by far. Especially if you support them and get access to the CoverArt plugin.  In fact, I've had friends compare it Netflix, because of the UI. 

Plex ... isn't there. 

 

 

But as for streams... everything I have is 720p or higher.  And when transcoding, I can get 1, maybe 2 streams before it starts stuttering.

 

But I've seen people that have some very nice systems (dual CPU Xeon's) that can transcode 20 streams without an issue.

 

 

I'd also love if Emby would compile a version of ffmpeg that used the GPU accelleration.  I got 4-6 times the performance out of it... but it was unstable. FFMPEG would fail to close properly, and block other streams from starting.  And that is if it started.... 

But 20-30 fps vs 130-150fps .... a HUGE difference. And that's with just the onboard video for the Xeon E3-1245v3 CPU!

 

 

I somehow missed this response earlier.  I didn't realize Emby was that nice. (as in an actual Plex competitor) 

 

It really is hard to believe the UI is so that much better, Plex is beautiful.

 

Argh. Now I feel the need to install it just to compare.

 

........more hours in the day!

 

~RF

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Well, also, Emby (MediaBrowser Server) doesn't use hardlinks for it's metadata, so so you can place it in the pool without any issues.

 

And it seems to use about a third of the space for metadata (plex uses ~150GBs, while emby uses ~60GBs) 

[RFOneWatt]

There goes my weekend......sigh.

 

How I missed Emby in my travels is beyond me...

 

I think we're going to be going head to head with Plex at this point.

 

 

....maybe I'll just go camping. haha 

[Christopher (Drashna)]

There goes my weekend......sigh.

 

How I missed Emby in my travels is beyond me...

 

I think we're going to be going head to head with Plex at this point.

 

 

....maybe I'll just go camping. haha 

lol.

 

And to be honest, I'd really love to pull out Plex's transcoder and use it in Emby.

 

Plex does a better job, performance wise. While Emby is much much prettier (and easier to manage data on).

[RFOneWatt]

lol.

 

And to be honest, I'd really love to pull out Plex's transcoder and use it in Emby.

 

Plex does a better job, performance wise. While Emby is much much prettier (and easier to manage data on).

 

Well, I installed Emby last night on a new HTPC I've been playing with and pointed it at my media library, over the network. 

 

Nobody mentioned it was open source!!  

 

#1:  How long has Emby (Media Browser) been in existence?

 

So far I am very impressed.  It's clear they are going toe to toe with PLex, which is great. 

 

I was a bit annoyed when I found my cleanly organized media directories were all filled up with metadata this morning but I found those options this morning..

 

So I've had zero time to play with it but this is going to be interesting!!

 

~RF

[Christopher (Drashna)]

Since at least the WHSv1 days... but it started off as a Windows Media Center only app.

 

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/13752/getting-started-with-media-browser-for-windows-media-center/

Published in 2010.

 

 

As for MediaBrowser Server, a couple of years, I think.

 

 

And yeah, it's open source, and one of the few open source projects that I really like. 

 

As for the metadata, I don't mind.

I've been using sickbeard for a long while to grab that stuff anyways (for XBMC and the like). 

 

 

And check out the metadata manager. It's ... worlds beyond Plex's "implementation" (which feels like it's an after thought tacked on...)

OOh, and don't forget to check for the "Emby" service.

It should work, just set it to automatic and reboot!