best freebsd version for zfs file server

[Rick Macklem]

Jason Keltz wrote:
> Hi.
> I hope to soon put into production a new file server hosting many ZFS
> filesystem with FreeBSD. The system has 2 x 9205-8e cards, and 1 x
> 9207-8i card and 24 x 900 GB 10K RPM drives. I'm trying to figure out
> what is ultimately the "best" version of FreeBSD to run on a
> production
> file server. I believe that it doesn't make sense to stick directly to
> the 9.1/release because there have already been many ZFS problems that
> were solved in 9.1/stable. On the other hand, stable doesn't
> necessarily have to be "stable"! Of course "release" might not be
> "stable" either if there's a bug that say, causes a hang on my
> controller card, and it's not fixed in anything but "stable"! Yet,
> "stable" might "break" something else. I'm wondering what people who
> are running FreeBSD file servers in production do -- do you track
> individual changes, and compile release + individual bug fixes that
> likely affect you, or, in my case, if I run "stable", do all my
> testing
> with "stable", do I run that version of stable, and only attempt to
> upgrade to the next "stable" release while very carefully reviewing
> the
> bug list, then holding my breath when the server comes up? Any
> recommendations would be appreciated. I know there are a lot of people
> who are happily running FreeBSD file servers. :)
> 
> Jason.
> 
You might want to consider the attached patch which Garrett Wollman has
been testing. It is not even in head yet, but earlier versions of the
patch have been in testing for a while.

It allows you to adjust tunables to trade increased storage use in the DRC
(mostly mbuf clusters) for decreased mutex lock contention and cpu overheads.

rick

> On 03/19/2013 03:04 PM, Dmitry Morozovsky wrote:
> > On Tue, 19 Mar 2013, Tom Evans wrote:
> >
> >>> I'm currently in process of making new backup server, based on LSI
> >>> 9260
> >>> controller. I'm planning to use ZFS over disks, hence the most
> >>> natural way
> >>> seems to configure mfi to JBOD mode - but I can't find easy way to
> >>> reach this,
> >>> neither in BIOS utilities nor via MegaCli
> >> 9260 should be SAS-2008 based, so mps(4) not mfi(4).
> > Well, it at least detected by stable/9 GENERIC as mfi
> >
> >> The internet[1] suggests that this card should be flashable to a
> >> 9211-8i with IT mode firmware, which is just about the ultimate ZFS
> >> card, instant-JBOD on inserting a disk, passthru for SMART, high
> >> performance, etc.
> > Will check, thanks for the reference.
> >
> >> [1]
> >> http://blog.grem.de/sysadmin/LSI-SAS2008-Flashing-2012-04-12-22-17.html
> >>
> 
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