Recommendation for a decent 10G Base T 6+1 or 8 Switch (EDIT:and SMB Multichannel)

[jdnz]

I've read the Synology page on SMB multichannel Synology Community
and some other related pages as well and it seems to suggest (LAG) link aggregation (I'm learning acronyms) its something different from SMB multichannel but no reference to managed/unmanaged switches.

SMB multichannel has nothing to do with link aggregation - indeed they're mututally incompatible

SMB-MC it's not longer 'beta/experimental' - it's available in dsm7.1.1 onwards

it actually stopped being 'experimental in samba 4.15.0 released in sept 2021 - it's just taken qnap/synology ages to get up to a current-ish samba release (even on 7.2rc it's only samba 4.15.13 - miles behind the current release which is 4.18.2 )

What is SMB3 Multichannel and how is it different from Link Aggregation? - Synology Knowledge Center

Synology Knowledge Center offers comprehensive support, providing answers to frequently asked questions, troubleshooting steps, software tutorials, and all the technical documentation you may need.

kb.synology.com

DSM Technical Specifications | Synology Inc.

DSM 7.1 Tech Specifications - For DSM and Packages running on Synology NAS

www.synology.com

• SMB3 Multichannel
  • Available only on Synology NAS models running DSM 7.1.1 or above and using SMB Service 4.15
  • Only supports models using x86 platforms, which are as listed in Applied Models of this article
  • Supports the following client operating systems:
    • Windows Server 2012 and above
    • Windows 8 and above
    • macOS 11.3 and above
  • Either of the following must be installed on both server and client:
    • Multiple network adapters
    • One or more network adapters that support RSS (Receive Side Scaling)
  • Has the following limitations:
    • Enabling SMB3 Multichannel enables asynchronous read
    • SMB3 Multichannel and Link Aggregation cannot be enabled concurrently
    • Does not support RDMA (Remote Direct Memory Access)

is SMB3 and SMB multichannel the same thing of is just a Synology reference name?

no - SMB3 is the protocol, SMB-MC is just one specific feature available in SMB3

 

[MiguelC]

Looks great , think that is what I need.
Had no idea it was already implemented,I didn't have the time to set the drives on Synology up and got too much work to clear before that, tks.

Enabling SMB3 Multichannel enables asynchronous read
Does not support RDMA (Remote Direct Memory Access)

Is RDMA the latency bit? No problems there I guess, I mostly want to transfer big files in and out.
Also looked up asynchronous read, looks like its random read? Guess no harm there too.

It does look like to make the most of it will need to switch to a 8 port. But will do some testing on the current one before taking that step.

Tks for taking the time to explain it. It's a lot clear to me now.

 

[WanWizard]

Time for some networking 101

Aggrerating multiple network connections does not necessarily create a bigger pipe. Whether it is bonding, LAG, MLAG, MCLAG, portchannels or 802.3ad, all these use a hashing mechanism to determine which if the available physical links is used for any given packet.

There are lots of different mechanisms, from active/passive and round-robin to hashing based on source and destination MAC, IP or IP+Port.

Of all those mechanisms, only IP+Port will allow a single device to use more than one physical link when talking to another device, and only in the specific case that multiple applicaties (= IP ports) are in use between two two devices.

So, will bunding multiple physical links improve throughput? If you have a hundered clients, yes, probably. For a backup to a server? No, it won't, hashing will make all traffic pick the same fysical link.

If you have a switch that doesn't support bundling of some sort, you can still use it on the device, but then it only works for outgoing traffic , the switch will always use a single link, the one associated with the device's MAC address in the switch' MAC table. For this reason, actually only active/passive is advised, all other hashing mechanisms cause constant updates of the MAC table (as the switch will see the devices MAC address on multiple switch ports) which can have advers effects, especially if you use a switch stack of some sort.

SMB Multichannel is a strange beast, and I doubt very much, given the its features, that the Samba implementation is identical to the Windows one, in all respects, as to fully implement is, it needs access and cooperation of network drivers and other OS components. Not the way Linux works.

Remains the functionality of opening mutliple channels between client and server. This seems to be mainly geared towards better saturating the network link, but I can imagine (without looking at the detailed implementation) that it could benefit from bundling with IP+Port hashing, providing your switch supports that to as you would need it both ways to be effective.

 

[MiguelC]

Ok, so...finally had a break to at least do a preliminary setup to try things out, enabled SMB multichannel on Synology and started copying stuff. A few folders with around 100GB combined.

Its very initial finds but ATM I'm using the 5 port switch, need to connect 2 Macs, the Synology and one port to the local network so chose to connect the 2013 MacPro with both 1GbE ethernet ports combined in a virtual interface. (No idea if its called agregattion or whatever).
I tried first without Virtual Interface but didn't see any change in speeds.

One port only gives me around sustained 100MB/sec, both ethernet ports combined as Virtual interface (on MacOS Monterey) gives me around 173MB/sec, but varies a bit, between 130/175.

So I guess I will in fact opt to change switches for an 8 port just not sure what that will be.Will try to search locally to check noise levels as for what I've read so far every single one of them as somewhat loud fans.



EDIT: for SMB mutichannel does the Synology needs to have 2 active connections as well? In theory would the 2x1 GbE of Mac need to "talk" with 2 diferent ports on the Synology, or would it work even if the Synology has only 1 active 10GbE?

EDIT2: Oops, looks like I might have forgotten to turn of Wi-Fi, think I need to approach with more method:


After "dissolving" the Virtual Interface:




Might need to change thread name as well

 

[MiguelC]

Ok, so: finally migrated all the Drobo to the Synology and had some spare time to make some tests and tweak it a bit.

Think I'm gonna hold out trading the switch, until at least comes out a decent option on a fanless 8 port as I got to a decent compromise by using the "extra" ports of Synology connect directly to the Macs and got used to SMB3 Multichannel. ATM this is the configuration:


The general network we use is in the 192.168.0.0 range and by setting two of the "extra" 4x1G of Synology for the 10.10.0.0 range (no gateways or DNSs, just IP+Subnet Mask) I manage to get multichannel 10G+1G for the 2019 MacPro and 1G+1G for the 2013 MacPro.

Didnt test too much on the 2019 (was getting around 650MB/Sec in Activity Monitor) because its more than enough but the 2013 does get a decent boost:




Thanks all for the input and help.

 

[TXAG26]

Managed 5, 8, 12, 16 port 10GbE/10 SFP+ switches that are reasonably priced and relatively quiet are still quite rare. Shame we're still having to hunt unicorns in 2023.

 

[edge]

Managed 5, 8, 12, 16 port 10GbE/10 SFP+ switches that are reasonably priced and relatively quiet are still quite rare. Shame we're still having to hunt unicorns in 2023.

10GbaseT was and is a badly flawed idea. It kept alive the idea that copper has a place in any future network, when in reality copper dissipates so much energy as heat that it doesn't make sense over distances greater than traces. I wired my last house cat 6a - everything ran too hot and/or too loud or both while being electricity hogs. The only good thing I can say is they worked. Inexpensive SFP+ switches burn up when loaded with 10GBt.

I just bought a new house and moved into it. It is wired for cable and the ethernet is cat 6. Yippee! they wired ethernet - not to a patch panel, rj45 terminated wires in a closet with more cable that I might want if it was the late 80's and I was running thin wire <rolls eyes>. Cheap 10gbe would be here if we had killed the copper dinosaur (even cable companies get it - all new rollouts are FTTH). Last mile hell, last nm before in system silicon.

 

[TXAG26]

Hopefully this isn’t too OT, but if someone wanted to switch to 10GB SFP+ fiber NIC’s, what are some of the recommendations for using in ESXI?

 

[i386]

It depends on the esxi version. Recommended vendors for esxi: intel, mellanox, broadcom