On Tue, 21 Nov 2000, Brandt Dusthimer wrote: > and 2, I'm also usually the file sharing server. so you know you're good ... ;-) > However, when everyone's uploading/downloading to/from me, I > experience major system lag and if do anything (even simple command > prompt stuff) there upload/download time increases a lot. > SO, being the all powerful linux user that I am, !!! > I have decided to > start using SCSI. I am under the assumption that SCSI will help. If > I am wrong. . . well I don't exactly have money spurting out my > ears ( I bag groceries ), please tell me that I'm wrong.
What's the computer & LANCard of yours? Are you sure that your system is using IDE BM-DMA or at least DMA? First of all check that the drives are working in their best mode. hdparm -v /dev/hd? will show whether DMA is used. Of interest is also DRIVE read-ahead. You can tell the capabilities of your DRIVEs with hdparm -i /dev/hd?. You will find a entry MaxMultSect. Use that number to set MultSect with hdparm -m number. Second is the LANCard. If it's an ISAtype or a too simple PCI one, expect overhead code executed there that sums up under heavy traffic. Besides other info sources, the boot-messages may already tell you about your drives & lancard. A debian 2.2 copies them to /var/log/dmesg A girl in our network has a Fujitsu IDE 15G doing 15MB/sec and an IBM IDE 15G doing 13 MB/sec. Her LANcard is a cheapo ne2kpci and while she's gaming she can only tell by the noise from her hard drives that some guys are using her PC as the compiler station ... greetings, martin
