[CentOS] home directory server performance issues

Natxo Asenjo natxo.asenjo at gmail.com
Mon Dec 10 19:28:34 UTC 2012


On Mon, Dec 10, 2012 at 6:37 PM, Matt Garman <matthew.garman at gmail.com> wrote:
> I’m looking for advice and considerations on how to optimally setup
> and deploy an NFS-based home directory server.  In particular: (1) how
> to determine hardware requirements, and (2) how to best setup and
> configure the server.  We actually have a system in place, but the
> performance is pretty bad---the users often experience a fair amount
> of lag (1--5 seconds) when doing anything on their home directories,
> including an “ls” or writing a small text file.

I know this is the centos forum, however, if you are still in a
testing fase, then I can recommend you try solaris derivatives like
nexenta or omnios. The NFS server performance in linux is simple not
the same as on those using the same hardware. You get too true acls
(no posix, but nfsv4 acls, comparable to those in ntfs),
deduplication, compression, and snapshots (ZFS!).

Nexenta is free as in beer up to 18TB and has a great web interface,
omnios is just free but you need to know how to use solaris.

If you stay with the linux nfs servers, look into the io scheduler
setting of the disks. I managed to double the performance of a
proliant raid controller (don't remember which model, sorry) by
changing the standard cfq to noop. Shortly after that I came across
nexenta and moved all our NFS loads there. Later we got a netapp
cluster, but the nexenta filers are still kicking around.

-- 
groet,
natxo



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