While I am not an expert at NAS setup, I think I know just enough to get myself in trouble from time to time. I am in the process of moving data from a TS-251+ setup to a TS-473A setup. Both are using QTS 5.2. My hope was to eliminate quite a bit of cloud storage I am currently paying for and increase the speed of my editing by having my working files on the local network.
Existing system:
TS-251+, 8GB RAM - 2 x WD RED PRO 4TB RAID 1 : TR-004 - 4 x WD Red PRO 12TB RAID 5
New System:
TR-473A, 32GB RAM, 2TB CACHE R/W - 4 x WD RED Pro 20TB RAID 5
I moved the TR-004 directly to the new TS-473A and it was recognized and attached. I did this thinking I would get better transfer speeds of the data (about 15TB - mostly raw video files, average 3GB) instead of moving the data through a hybrid mount of the TS-251+. I have not installed any functional apps on the new box yet to ensure no resource bottlenecks during setup.
Unfortunately, the transfer has been painfully slow. The transfer has been running for a little more than6 days with an average transfer speed of 27MB/s (calculated). At times when I have checked on the transfer it was reaching just over 60MB/s and others as slow as 8MB/s. For most of this time I have not had the TS-473A connected to the network, just the TR-004.
I had not noticed the transfer speed issue with the TS-251+ as I was mostly writing files to the drive as backup but my hope was to use the new storage capacity of the TS-473A combined with the TR-004 to completely replace my cloud storage. Is this a normal read situation with the TR-004 or could I have done something wrong in my setup to create the issue myself? I have a hi quality USB 3.0 cable connected between the 2 units (have used it on a 16TB external with great throughput).
Get rid of the cache for sure..QTS cache does not destage right and slows transfers down, on top only limited scanerios would benefit from cache, video editing does not.
Hmm. OK. I thought the cache would help with the transfer speed during my editing as I am typically reading and writing the same files over a period of time during each project. Once the project ends I work on new files.
Anything else that might help? Is this specific to the TR-004? Should I set it up as a DAS instead and access it that way?
Yes, my expectation was to exceed 100 MB/s on a direct USB connection. The drives themselves on the TR are in good shape with less than 30K hours each. All were installed at the same time. The 20TB drives have less than 10K hours. The cache in M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 4 so well within the speck. I don’t understand why the transfer is so slow.
I just checked the log and it has been running at between 2.6 and 10 MB/s since I first posted.
Just a quick update on the performance. The transfer speed after 9 1/2 days has now averaged 2.25MB/s. (calculated). At this rate it should be completed in another 2 days. I will be performing some in depth drive performance testing once completed but I suspect the issue is in the setup. I just don’t know where yet.
So after just over 10 days, the TR-004 was able to transfer about 28.5TB to the TS-473A via USB. Quite a dismal result. After the transfer, I have detatched the Tr-004 and connected it back onto the TS-251+. To attempt to see if the results were replicated I began a transfer of 8TB onto the TS-251+. It is now transfering at a rate averaging above 128MB/s. So it would seem that the issue was related to the connection to the TS-473A, which only has USB 3.0 ports.
I would appreciate any suggestion on where to start looking for the issue as I would like to confirm what caused the slow transfer so I can avoid it happening again.