FreeNAS/General Networking Problem

I'm planning on setting up a software raid 1 array using freenas which is to be installed on my old PC, which is wired up to the router.

I'm just testing things out at the moment. I have a 120GB IDE drive on there at the moment. It's working fine, except the connectivity seems to be very bad.

My main machine is running Vista, and also wired to the router. As a test, I thought I'd upload a load of photos to see how it handled, but it took forever. Vista told me that it was going at anywhere between 100-300KB/sec. I'd assume it's supposed to go much faster?

Once the photos are on, they're very hard to open - they either take ages to display or simply show nothing at all. I also tried a single photo on a wireless connected XP machine. That felt faster to upload, but was very slow to open again.

I thought I'd ping both the router and the NAS box from my PC. The results are below:

Router:
Packets Sent: 315
Packets Received: 268
Lost 47 (14%)

NAS Box:
Packets Sent: 213
Packets Received: 188
Lost 25 (11%)

I'm not expert, but I would have expected pretty much zero packet loss since there are no other machines between mine and the router. Is there something wrong here?

Also, these errors keep appearing in the freenas logs:

kernel: acd1: FAILURE - READ_BIG ILLEGAL REQUEST asc=0x64 ascq=0x00

Could anyone provide any advise please?
From what I can see, it could either be:

• A bad connection to the router, but surely < 15% loss wouldn't cause a major issue for non-streaming media would it? If this is the problem, could I need a new router?
• Something wrong with freenas - I've googled the error, and it could mean that I've used a bad disk to run freenas from. I might try another soon. However, I've also read that it could be error to ignore...
• Finally - vista. This is pretty much the first time I've done any networking with vista. I know it had problems when it was released, but did they ever fix the networking problems?

If it helps, I should be reinstalling vista in the next week or so. I was going to do this anyway, and I doubt it is the problem. I might see if I can get hold of a spare router from someone if I can too.

I don't suppose it's feasible to replace the NICs and cabling for testing purposes? What kind of ping results do you get between the XP and the Vista machine? If you can narrow it down to just the FreeNAS box I'd be tempted to suggest a flaky NIC in the box, which should be cheap enough to fix (hell, I'll happily give you a spare). Anything more than 0&#37; packet loss is a bad thing in my eyes.

Alternatively as you said it *could* be the disk. Does your box have a seperate disk for the OS and the datastore? What are the chances you could boot from a bootcd and run some disk diagnostics?

as Splash said - see if you can swap out to a different NIC
also have you installed freenas directly to the drive ? I'm actually running mine on the LiveCD + USB stick version and its fine.

Yep, I'm suspecting the NICs. I guess it *could* be the switch on the router, but you could also prove this wrong by running the machines across a small switch rather than the router (again, I have a small 10/100 switch I don't mind loaning you in the interests of testing).

Its a totally random suggestion, but the error;

kernel: acd1: FAILURE - READ_BIG ILLEGAL REQUEST asc=0x64 ascq=0x00

sounds like it might be something to do with frame size perhaps?

Could is be an issue with Jumbo Frames being enabled on the FreeNAS device, or does it have any settings for that? I've not used it in ages so I couldn't say either way.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Moby-Dick

as Splash said - see if you can swap out to a different NIC
also have you installed freenas directly to the drive ? I'm actually running mine on the LiveCD + USB stick version and its fine.

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I'm just running it the same as you, but with a floppy (not used them in years) instead of the USB.

I only have spare wireless NICs lieing around, and I would have thought they might attract packet loss anyway...

Pre-post edit
I just lost my net connection. Reason being that the router kicked everyone off. I've tried all 4 ethernet ports, and nothing seems to be working. The wireless looks dead too.

I'm just connected via an old BT voyager thing now, which only has 1 ethernet and 1 USB for networking. I guess this is pretty much certain now (and I've been thinking it for sometime really) - the router is on its way out.

Just out of curiosity, I thought I'd ping the BT voyager router as well:

BT Voyager Router:
Packets Sent: 286
Packets Received: 276
Lost 10 (3&#37;)

Much less packet loss. All losses seemed to be at the very beginning, and I didn't notice any near the end at all.

I'll see what I can do about getting another router now I think. I've heard good things about a Lynksys with the tomato firmware, but it looks like they don't come with a modem included like my current one.

Anyone have any router preferences?
I guess it'll be OK to get a router without a modem, and use the BT voyager box for the gateway?
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Linksys-WRT5...8779105&sr=1-1

Am I right to sway towards devices that are compatible with the tomato firmware, or are there better solutions out these days?

In my eyes 3&#37; packet loss on a local network is still too much, but it's your call...

3&#37; does seem high for a cabled connection - I was getting less than that on wireless.

I wonder if there is something thats running excessive broadcasts on the LAN for example - can you test with just a switch , client and NAS ?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Splash

In my eyes 3&#37; packet loss on a local network is still too much, but it's your call...

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Well, I'd agree - 3% is probably quite high for a cabled local network, but then at the same time, my current router seems to have packed in so I think my hand is forced.

Since there were pretty much no packets lost after about the first 15 last night, I thought I'd do another now for a longer duration:

BT Voyager Router v2:
Packets Sent: 741
Packets Received: 739
Lost 2 (0%)

As you can see, better results. Either way, I still can't get a wireless connection, or even more than one wired connection at a time, so I'll be needing a new router anyway. Does anyone have any thoughts, or will one such as the linksys WRT54GL with the tomato firmware using a BT provided ADSL modem be OK?

OK - here's an interesting development.

I restarted the router again by turning the power off and on, which got everything working again, but only for a few minutes. My network connectivity soon disappeared, and I thought I was back to square one again.

However, the wired connection of the NAS box stayed up, and so did the wireless for down stairs. This would have lead me to believe that there's something wrong with my NIC as you both said earlier on, but then the BT voyager router connects fine to my PC no problems.

This is the same for both windows vista and ubuntu on the same PC, so it's definitely a hardware issue somewhere down the line.

If it's the router, then why is the NAS working wired and the PC downstairs working wireless atm?
If it's my NIC or my ethernet cable, then how come both work for the BT voyager?

Any ideas?

Don't suppose you could do a diagram of your network could you? The way you describe it has me a little confused.

http://www.gliffy.com/pubdoc/1560734/M.jpg

This looks about right.

* Downstairs is wireless.
* NAS and my PC are wired to the router.

However, only the BT voyager 205 router that we have seems to be able to work with my PC. This doesn't have wireless, and only has 1 ethernet port. Therefore, when this is connected to my PC only I have the internet. The other 2 PCs are still networked together via the wireless router though.

Ok... Not sure what you mean by

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ajbrun

The other 2 PCs are still networked together via the wireless router though

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MyPC and NAS are wired to the router, Downstairs PC is wireless - is this right?

My suggestion would be to manually assign statics to your PC and the NAS (which should be static anyways), then disconnect both from the router and attach to a switch (I repeat my offer of a loan - where in York are you?) and see if you get any packet loss. If you get more than 1&#37; you're looking at a problem with one of the NICs, which you can troubleshoot by pinging the third PC from each machine (use a linux livecd if needs be for the NAS).

If it turns out to be the NIC in either machine you can replace it. If not... we'll deal with that when we get to it.

Sorry - not had chance to reply back lately.

I borrowed a router from a friend. This one worked much better than the other one, so now it is mine :).

Thanks for the offer of the loan all the same, but everything seems to be ship shape now.