NS4100+ very slow transfer speed

[funcii]

Hi.

I recently purchased an N4100+ and stacked it with 4x750 gig drives and built it (eventually) into RAID 5.

I am now trying to see what it is capable of and have to say I am very disappointed. If I can not sort this out it is going back for a refund.

The transfer speed for the writing of a single 700 meg file -- across a known-good gigabit LAN -- is a paltry 4.4 MB/s.

For reading the same sized file it is 8.6 MB/s.

If I transfer the same file between two computers here I get exactly 40 MB/s.

Is there something I have perhaps misconfigured? Some things to try? Or is this simply a fundamental design flaw?

This is from a Mac but I don't see why that should make a difference.

Thanks in advance for any guidance offered.

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[triggad]

I've purchased a N4100+ with the same HD config (4x750 Raid 5) and here its the same. Between 2 an 4 Mb/s Writespeed and 4 to 8 MB/s reading.

The N4100+ was intended to be a Backup for my N5200pro but today i tried a backup of a 100 GB folder and its running since 4 pm (cet) and its no finished yet. (about 7 hours later).

If I dont get a solution to solve the speed problem i think i will return the N4100+ to my local dealer.

So i hope someone here (perhaps one from thecus) is able to help us with our speed problem.
Greets
triggad

[AshW]

I posted in another thread about a long Raid 5 build time. I am now also experiencing slow transfer rates. I did have it configured as JBOD with 2 disks initially while I transfered data around before building the Raid and the transfer times seemed much better when configured as JBOD. Maybe it's the Raid 5 config that is causing the issues.

I have 4x400Gb drives in mine.

[triggad]

I also think that it is possible, that the speed issues come through the raid5. but the raid5 is the reason why i bought this NAS.

So I would be very happy if someone from thecus could join our little discussion here.

Greets
triggad

[funcii]

The N4100+ was intended to be a Backup for my N5200pro

What sort of speeds do you get with your N5200pro?

Although to be honest my confidence in Thecus has taken a serious knock and I'm not sure I want to shell out even MORE money after this fiasco.

I can't believe that if this is a RAID5 issue (and it's looking that way) that they market it as they do. Do they think people aren't going to *notice*?

This has wasted me *hours*. Not happy.

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[triggad]

The N5200pro is giving me speeds between 30 and 40 MB/s. This is as i expectet from a NAS. So i thougt the 4100+ would at least give me about 20 MB/s.

[Thecus - Yvon]

Dear Sir,

About the N4100 4*750Gb performance in RAID5, following media review for your reference. If need the higher performance, we would recommend choose N5200 or N5200 PRO for bettere performance.

Following link about N4100 media review your reference:
Tom's Hardware: Thecus_n4100_brings_storage_space_to_your_lan
Hardware zone: Thecus N4100 NAS
HEXUS reviews: Thecus N4100

Yvon.

[funcii]

Dear Sir,

About the N4100 4*750Gb performance in RAID5, following media review for your reference. If need the higher performance, we would recommend choose N5200 or N5200 PRO for bettere performance.

Following link about N4100 media review your reference:
Tom's Hardware:
Hardware zone:
HEXUS reviews:

Yvon.

Thank you for your response although I note that pointing people at those three third party reviews is your standard response to anyone complaining about the N4100+'s performance and to be frank I find it unacceptable.

You (Thecus) can not market a device as having a gigabit interface if it performs at sub-100Mbit speeds. Well, you can, but people will realise you're lying to them and will never buy another one of your products, ever. Like me. I'm absolutely stunned that you would try and get away with this. You could have saved so many people so much time by putting the expected transfer speeds in the documentation somewhere instead of just hoping nobody would notice it ran like a slug.

I could back up my server quicker by getting my 7-year-old to write out the contents of every file with a pencil.

So, back it goes to the supplier and, oh great, I just write off the days I've just spent trying to work out what I was doing wrong.

--

[AshW]

This is from the article Yvon linked to on Hardware Zone:

In terms of performance, the generic Intel 80219 XScale processor does not have enough raw processing power to perform RAID 5 operations. In most of our tests, RAID 5 throughputs were low (especially when it comes to writing data) and it shows that its XOR engine is not powerful enough to keep up. This is to be expected since the processor is not optimized for XOR operations and it's likely just running software RAID 5. However, RAID 0 and RAID 1 tests came up with better throughput rates but they were still slower than expected - so much so that it hardly even saturates the Gigabit Ethernet port.

Yvon - you seem to be recommending that for Raid 5 configuration, don't buy an N4100+. This is very dissapointing if this is the case as they are marketed as Raid 5 devices??

[itlity]

I am not going to pretend I am satisfied with the N4100+ overall performances in the sense I wouldn't have expected something more powerful, so don't misread me. Same comment for the documentation which by now should be more complete and give more precisely limits of products.

As I was a complete beginner I went through the reviews and eventually I chose the N4100+ for the right balance between the SOHO requirements and price.

Our requirements are very simple: I wanted to have our 5 desktops to allow users to access mails and files from a shared server, that's basic office use. On the top of that there are a number of PC used for software development & tests which connect to the server for backup purpose.

We bought an N4100+ and put 4*500GB HDDs, configure it in RAID5 though initially we wanted RAID1 -but not possible with this unit.

Our N4100+ is fine for that though slow at start up but this is nothing compared with the time lost in backups, finding out why backups were duplicated and cleaning the mess created by developers who have other things to do than to backup their "office" files.

Thanks to the module addition and super-users of other TheCus units, we even now use it to test our web site and do some FTP, that's damn slow but at least there is no need to duplicate the files from our server to a more powerful server and sync the two: we'll certainly use an N5100Pro for that in the near future.

All this is to point out that the N4100+ fits our initial requirements -with the exception of the RAID1 issue.

The other day, somebody brought some DivX movies and we put them on the N4100+: 3 guys were looking at the movies simultaneously. OK, this is not intensive file/DB operations.

Yes, I entirely support any action to see the product documentation improved and the library of architecture cases extended and more specific to products?

On the opposite side, I cannot say TheCus misled me: as pointed out by Yvon, all the reviews emphasized the weaknesses of the N4100 and there are a number of comparisons with its competitors.

Now, I am going to be "pushy" but it's just to make my point clear.

Using 1*Gb Ethernet controller instead of 100*Mb one is not going to make difference in the final price, it was certainly more a design point TheCus kept from a HW reference design more than a deliberate choice.

Though we can regret the doc doesn't show explicitly it's a software RAID implementation, all the reviews mentionned it.

Considering the level of requirements you have, I wouldn't think you're not IT savvy guys: isn't it rather an issue with the N4100+ meeting your requirements rather than a real problem with the N4100 itself. And then realizing you've made the wrong decision? This is common stuff and we've all foot the bills for these mistakes.

I would rather go for a discussion with your reseller and TheCus to find out how you can exchange your N4100+ for an N5200Pro or similar.

Patrice

PS: or I would be very pleased to hear that TheCus is working on a N4100++ embedding a new CPU board like the one in the N5200Pro that we could buy and install in one year time in our N4100+!

[webstyler]

:'(

I have buy 1 weeks ago n4100+

Transfer Rate is really slow (on Gb lan).. and after search I have found this thread..



There are any solution for better transfer rate or the only way is sell n4100+ ? :/

Tx

[funcii]

It's rubbish. Get rid of it. The 5200 is way better.

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[webstyler]

It's rubbish. Get rid of it. The 5200 is way better.

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I don't buy other "thecus"