Thunderbolt networking to Windows - speeds capped to 1Gb/e

[D_Evans]

Hi all,

So I have a bit of an issue I cant seem to solve.

I am going from a MBP Early 2011 to a Windows PC with a TB3 controller and port with Apple TB3 to TB1/2 converter.

I had my MBP Early 2011 (first gen thunderbolt, but 10Gbe capable I believe - Netowrk Utility lists it as such, as does my experience) connected to a Win10 PC, and when running Blackmagic Disk Speed test from the MBP and selecting the SSD boot drive of the PC I would see test speeds of around 500MB/s - so clearly it seems 10Gbe speeds.

However I was getting super slow access to external drives on the Windows machine - I spent a day trying to solve this and managed to eventually with a combination of changing some settings and changing the drives to 'optimal performance' (enabling cache).

However somewhere along the way something else changed, as now when I run BMD disk speed test I only get 120MB/s test speeds - suggesting I am getting an ethernet link speed of only 1Gbe.

The only thing I have changed which I cant change back (I think) is that I installed Sierra - but I am unsure if this is what caused the drop in speeds across the network.

I am going to at some point get hold of another MBP to see if the problem persists on that machine - or if it persists between two Macs, but for the life of me I cant think what would be limiting the speed. If anyone has any ideas or anything I can check then please do let me know!

 

[Andy2k]

I think your weakest link might be the SSD itself. 500 MB/s across a thunderbolt connection sounds blazing fast to me. Many consumer grade SSD's are only rated for a maximum of 500-600 MB/s. The thunderbolt connection will only be as fast as the maximum speed of the slowest SSD in the chain.

Also, many times after a 10.x version update. The spotlight app will re-index your SSD/HDD. This can cause huge performance problems but will resolve after it's indexed.

If you want to be able to go back to the old operating system, make a Time Machine backup before you upgrade it next time. That way you can go backwards if you have problems. Also, in case you brick your MacBook Pro you'll have a complete backup handy to save the day.

Lastly, you can go back to older versions of Mac OS X, the only caveat is you have to wipe the drive and start from a clean install. This wiping all your data and starting fresh (which isn't necessarily a bad thing).

Andy

Hi all,

So I have a bit of an issue I cant seem to solve.

I am going from a MBP Early 2011 to a Windows PC with a TB3 controller and port with Apple TB3 to TB1/2 converter.

I had my MBP Early 2011 (first gen thunderbolt, but 10Gbe capable I believe - Netowrk Utility lists it as such, as does my experience) connected to a Win10 PC, and when running Blackmagic Disk Speed test from the MBP and selecting the SSD boot drive of the PC I would see test speeds of around 500MB/s - so clearly it seems 10Gbe speeds.

However I was getting super slow access to external drives on the Windows machine - I spent a day trying to solve this and managed to eventually with a combination of changing some settings and changing the drives to 'optimal performance' (enabling cache).

However somewhere along the way something else changed, as now when I run BMD disk speed test I only get 120MB/s test speeds - suggesting I am getting an ethernet link speed of only 1Gbe.

The only thing I have changed which I cant change back (I think) is that I installed Sierra - but I am unsure if this is what caused the drop in speeds across the network.

I am going to at some point get hold of another MBP to see if the problem persists on that machine - or if it persists between two Macs, but for the life of me I cant think what would be limiting the speed. If anyone has any ideas or anything I can check then please do let me know!

 

[D_Evans]

Hey,

Thanks for the reply.

At 10Gbe the thunderbolt connection should be able to handle 500MB/s (should mention it's actually about 480MB/s) with ease - I dont know what kind of overheads TB/10Gbe has however.

'The slowest link in the chain' was a thought I had - the MBP 2011 has a HDD internally, so the BMD disk speed test is running from a device which does in fact max out at around the speeds I am seeing - however this does not seem to be a limiting factor as I can test an external raid over direct thunderbolt and BMD test shows its full speed (400MB/s in this case).

To add to the above - as in the OP, I already saw this test running at almost full speed across the TB network, so I don't think I am doing something that is not possible... it also seems suspect to me that it is specifically limited to what looks like exactly 1Gbe - like the wrong protocol is being invoked.

Cheers for the advice about backing up, although it is advice I am already well versed in but nearly always fail to take!

I want to avoid going back to Yosemite if possible. I feel like this should be solvable.
I may pop in a new hard drive and run a Yosemite install just to see if it is infact the OS X update causing the problem.

 

[Andy2k]

If you've ever downloaded Yosemite (in the past) for the Mac App Store it will still be available to you. I can still download Mac OS X Mavericks from the App Store 10.9.5. Log into the App Store and check the "purchased/downloaded" tab it should be there. If you can't get Mavericks from there I might have another solution. It you'll have to direct message me. Good luck. Don't worry about the time machine thing. I talk a big game (and never back mine up before upgrading). So don't feel like the lone wolf.


Andy

Hey,

Thanks for the reply.

At 10Gbe the thunderbolt connection should be able to handle 500MB/s (should mention it's actually about 480MB/s) with ease - I dont know what kind of overheads TB/10Gbe has however.

'The slowest link in the chain' was a thought I had - the MBP 2011 has a HDD internally, so the BMD disk speed test is running from a device which does in fact max out at around the speeds I am seeing - however this does not seem to be a limiting factor as I can test an external raid over direct thunderbolt and BMD test shows its full speed (400MB/s in this case).

To add to the above - as in the OP, I already saw this test running at almost full speed across the TB network, so I don't think I am doing something that is not possible... it also seems suspect to me that it is specifically limited to what looks like exactly 1Gbe - like the wrong protocol is being invoked.

Cheers for the advice about backing up, although it is advice I am already well versed in but nearly always fail to take!

I want to avoid going back to Yosemite if possible. I feel like this should be solvable.
I may pop in a new hard drive and run a Yosemite install just to see if it is infact the OS X update causing the problem.

 

[D_Evans]

Thanks for the offer, but I think I have a copy of Sierra lying around somewhere as I tend to save them when I update.

If not I am sure I can find one 0_0

 

[Winterfibre]

Does it make sense to go back to the last os as it will be properly patched.

 

[D_Evans]

Not sure I follow Winterfibre?

 

[D_Evans]

Finally found the solution to this, it was driving me certifiably insane.

Basically you have to connect to 'smb1' to do this with finder open click "go>connect to server" then type in the network address of your windows share, but rather than starting it with 'smb://' start it with 'cifs://'.

I still seem to have a bit of an overhead, but I'm seeing speeds of 300-320MB/s to the SSD of the windows machine now.

 

[D_Evans]

So as it turns out... not 'solved' but the speeds are better than they were... today they seem to be about 250MB/s
[doublepost=1497008802][/doublepost]Nut fully cracked!

Just needed to tun off SMB signing, **** yes.

https://dpron.com/os-x-10-11-5-slow-smb/

Minor overheads and great speeds.