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artsug
Starting Member
USA
6 Posts |
 Posted - July 22 2010 : 19:48:37
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My client runs Small Business Server 2008 on a machine with an Asus P6T WS Pro motherboard. This board is equipped with an Intel X58/ICH10R chipset, which provides a number of RAID options for its six SATA3 ports.
Three 500 Gb WD Enterprise drives (7200 RPM, 32 Gb cache) are set up as a single RAID 5 array using the chipset firmware. The array is divided (again, using the firmware) into
two volumes: a 200 GB C drive and a 735 Gb D drive.
Windows sees two hard drives, which are set up as Basic partitions and formatted using the OS. Currently, the C drive is about half full (100 Gb in use) and the D drive is about one-third full(about 250 Gb in use).
We have been using Reflect as a backup system since April, 2010, backing up to a 1 Tb eSata drive.
Last June, I rebuilt the RAID array and restored both C and D from a verified full backup. The Restore took about 13 hours, and succeeded. I had expected it to take about 90 minutes.
I searched the Macrium web site, and was advised to add the Intel RAID drivers to the
Windows PE Recovery CD. I did so, using the same drivers that Windows loads for itself.
Last night (after the office closed) I booted the server from the new Recovery CD
and started a full image of both drives to a 1 Tb eSata drive. The C drive imaged in
a very impressive 20 minutes, with peak data transfer rates over 800 mb/s.
When Reflect began imaging drive D the rate dropped to under 300 mb/s immediately.
It became progressively slower as it ran. When the Time Remaining value reached 3 hours
I canceled the job.
I started another image without rebooting, this time choosing only the C drive. Once again, Reflect imaged the entire drive in 20 minutes, and took another 10 minutes to verify the image.
I wanted to test the restore time using the new CD, so I started a restore of the new image at 7:15 last night.
This restore (of 100 Gb of data to a 200 Gb partition, from a full, verified image that took 20 minutes to create) finally completed at a quarter past noon today, taking an incredible seventeen plus hours and costing my client half a day's production.
The new drivers doubled the backup performance for drive c and halved the backup performance for drive d, even though the two drives are firmware subdivisions of the same physical drives and controller.
The restore performance (which I was tryng to improve) declined by two-thirds.
Please note that I had booted from the Recovery CD; Reflect had the system to itself. There was no contention for the drives.
Why isn't the backup performance the same for the two volumes?
Why does an image that takes 20 minutes to create take over 17 hours to restore?
What can I do to reduce the restore time to a usable level?
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Nick
Moderator
United Kingdom
3469 Posts |
Posted - July 22 2010 : 20:26:28
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Hi
Thanks for contacting us. Sorry you are having problems with Macrium Reflect.
quote:
Why isn't the backup performance the same for the two volumes?
It should be. Disk I/O performance is ultimately determined by the OS, hardware and other disk activity on the source and target drive. What is the imaging speed of this drive when you create an image from Windows rather than from the rescue CD?
quote:
Why does an image that takes 20 minutes to create take over 17 hours to restore?
We suspect that the problem is with the eSata connection of the backup drive. Windows PE may not have a diver optimized for your eSata controller and this could be causing a bottleneck when reading. If your external disk has USB 2.0 or fire-wire connection then swapping to either of them could solve the problem.
Also, although eSata has a theoretical speed advantage over USB 2.0 we have found that in practice this rarely holds true.
Kind Regards
Nick - Macrium Support
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Edited by - Nick on July 22 2010 20:46:17 |
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artsug
Starting Member
USA
6 Posts |
Posted - July 22 2010 : 20:47:24
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quote:
Disk I/O performance is ultimately determined by the OS, hardware and other disk activity on the source and target drive. Do you have any anti-virus software that might be interfering with the imaging of the drive?
I had booted from the Recovery CD -- there was no AV loaded, and Reflect had the system to itself.
A full image of both drives (under Windows) normally takes about 100 minutes.
I'll test again over the weekend, and I'll try using a USB 2 drive as a destination.
Should I add a driver for the sata controller (in addition to the RAID driver) to the recovery environment? |
Edited by - artsug on July 22 2010 20:51:12 |
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Nick
Moderator
United Kingdom
3469 Posts |
Posted - July 22 2010 : 20:56:31
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quote:
I had booted from the Recovery CD -- there was no AV loaded, and Reflect had the system to itself.
Yes, sorry I amended my post before you answered.
It may be that your eSata driver is 'choking' after a certain amount of sustained throughput.
quote:
Should I add a driver for the sata controller (in addition to the RAID driver) to the recovery environment?
You may find that USB 2.0 is the answer. If not then add an appropriate driver for your eSata controller if you can.
Kind Regards
Nick - Macrium Support
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artsug
Starting Member
USA
6 Posts |
Posted - July 22 2010 : 21:08:33
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Thanks for the quick word.
I'll try both methods over the weekend and report back. |
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Restore time -- RAID array with drivers loaded
