On Tue, 2010-06-29 at 18:07 -0700, Aleksey Tsalolikhin wrote: > Situation: two similar servers, both with CentOS 5.4 64-bit. Making > an ext3 filesystem on one takes seconds, on the other minutes. > > Partition Size Server 1 Server 2 > > 1 GB 0.7 sec 0.3 sec > > 4 GB 2.5 sec 1.2 sec > > 40 GB 15 sec 13 min > > WTF > > e2fsprogs RPM is e2fsprogs-1.39-23.el5 on both systems > mkfs --version reports "util-linux 2.13-pre7" on both systems > mkfs -V reports the same on both systems (mke2fs 1.3 (29-May-2006) > Using EXT2FS Library version 1.39) > file size on mkfs and mkfs.ext3 binaries is identical > > However, checksum on these binaries differs across servers, and "cmp" > reports files are different > > I took "mkfs" and "mkfs.ext3" from server 1, put them on server 2, and > got an improvement: > > 40 GB 15 sec 3 min > > Just out of curiousity, I ran "rpm -V e2fsprogs" to see if rpm would > pick up the difference and sure enough, it complained mkfs.ext3 > changed. > > Both of these servers have CentOS 5.4; Server 1 was installed in Dec > 2009, Server 2 in April 2010. > > I'd like to: > > (a) account for the difference in the binaries, and > (b) see if something else is different that I can make the same to get > the mkfs.ext3 time down to 15 sec on both systems. > > Solving (a) should shed light on (b). Any ideas? ---- I think the answer is in your original statement - 'two similar servers' Similar says, not exactly and the hard drives, controller and RAID configuration differences would be the first place to look for your answer. Craig -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean.