NAS Transfer Speeds.

[RhoXS]

I use a DLink DNS-323 NAS as a common location on our home/business network to store files both my wife and I need access to. We also use it as a repository for backing up entire data folders. It has two 1 TB drives set up in a RAID 1 configuration.

I have never been completely satisfied with the DNS-323 because of its slow transfer rates (11 MB/s or so at best). It also takes a long time to start up, causing annoying delays when accessing it after has been idle for any length of time. The DNS-323 also has a pathetically small fan and I perceive the drives get much hotter than necessary.

I want to replace it but would like some suggestions so I do not buy something new and end up with essentially same performance. Is the 11 MB/s or so the best transfer rate I am going to achieve with any NAS? The only thing between the NAS and my desktop is a DLink 8 Port DGS-2208 Gigabit switch so I am assuming the bottle neck is the NAS itself.

I do not want to run FreeNAS because that means building and maintaining another system unit. I want to stay with the convenience of a self contained (except for the drives) black box. The Netgear RND2000-200NAS (Marvell 1.6 Ghz Processor) and the Netgear RNDU2000-100NAS (Intel Atom single-core processor) seem like possible alternatives but I would like to learn more from someone with experience with these units.

Any thoughts would be welcome.

 

[F1shF4t]

Have a look at some reviews for that NAS to see what kind of speeds they were getting. Also are you sure your desktop is connected at gigabit speeds? Can you set the idle time before the drives spin down?

I have never used DLink NAS units so can't help you with them, but I have thecus and synology ones at home, which I just use for storage.

Synology DS411J is a nice little NAS box, its 4 bay and probably a bit more than what you are looking for. For RAID 5 it gets ~40MB/s read and ~24MB/s write. Thecus 3 Bay (N3200XXX) ones are much faster but the synology has a more user friendly software interface.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I think that most of those tiny self-contained standalone NAS units (as opposed to a real server, like the HP microserver), max out at around 15MB/sec transfers, even on Gigabit. This is due to their weak processors.

At least my IDE "Gigabit NAS" (NS-349) did. Until it died recently. HD inside was fine though.

 

[lsv]

Sounds like OP needs to build a box 🙂

 

[ashieru]

i know this is a very old thread

but i am using firmware 1.05, hw ver B
jumbo frames turned on @9000

i discovered some special quirk or maybe its a bug.:twisted:

if you block the NAS from connecting to the internet, it seems to transfer faster. my fastest speed attainable is 26mb/s

 

[mikeford]

How are you measuring the speed, full details.

 

[rchunter]

The higher end synology's can get around 100mb/sec. DS1513+ and DS1813+ can do 100mb/second.

 

[ashieru]

How are you measuring the speed, full details.

i have some large files (over 500mb) and smaller files (under 5mb)

the higher speeds come from transfering the large files.

just then i turned off LLTD. and have gotten about an extra 1mb/s. according to a help text, it says disabling = may help increase "network" speed. which was quite interesting, the overhead in processing network matters eats into its speed :twisted:

i also tried using a lower jumbo frame (=5000). it does seem to lower xfer speed slightly on average.

so at best currently, jumbo frame 9000, LLTD off. internet blocked. max transfer speed = 22-27.2mb/s (xfering large files over 500mb)

the speed of transfer is just reading off the copy panel (ubuntu thundar). nothing fancy. i think there are better ways of benchmark, do suggest, i could try it on this 1 if you want

 

[dave_the_nerd]

The DNS-323 and 321 were just dog-slow because of their CPUs - they were originally specced out for 100Mbps ethernet, so anything that supported >12MB/sec transfers was cut to control costs.

Any modern dual-core NAS (ARM or x86) will fly in comparison.

Or, if you're feeling tinker-ey, bolt one of those new Raspberry Pis to a couple USB HDD enclosures, enable mdadm and see what happens. (It's basically the same thing.)