Kernel Options fo a File Server

[Roland Smith]

On Wed, May 23, 2007 at 12:42:17PM -0700, PeterPluta wrote:
> Ivan Carey wrote:
> > 
> > Hello,
> > What would be the best Kernel options to run a file server?
> > I will be using an Intel server mother board with one Xeon quad core CPU 
> > installed (this mother board has 2 CPU sockets) 2GB RAM and dual 500Gb 
> > SATA HDD's
> > 
> > I am thinking of options that would make the kernel efficient as a pure 
> > file server.


> >From what I heard from most BSD'ers it's not really feasible to re-compile or
> customize the kernel much these days. If you truly need to compile/optimize
> the kernel you're already overworking your hardware. With that being said
> I’m curious myself, I'm always interested in squeezing a little out of my
> hardware.

(Please don't top post.)

Recompiling the kernel and customizing it (i.e. leaving things out that
you don't need) are not very hard at all.

Things like enabling kernel thread preemption and file system
softupdates might help with performance. But in general you could say
that removing code for devices and subsystems that aren't used anyway
might speed up booting a bit, but will not help much with speeding up
daily usage.

The tuning(7) manpage gives lots of tips on getting the best performance
out of your system. Note that the kernel occupies only a small section
of the material in that page. 

For instance, for a file server the file system layout is much moe
important due to higher transfer speeds from the outer edges of the disks.

Roland
-- 
R.F.Smith                                   http://www.xs4all.nl/~rsmith/
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