Ridiculous Transfer Speeds - Please Help!

My Cloud OS 3 Personal & Network Attached Storage My Cloud
1

Hi Everyone,

Right i’ve been meaning to look into this problem for some time, but with work and family etc, I just didnt get the time… until now!

I’ve looked into this problem for a while, and it appears that many people have/have had this issue also, which is the transfer speeds (R/W) to the MyCloud devices. Mine is particularly bad… in fact its ridiculous!! So any help of ideas would be appreciated. My set up is as follows, and I’ve done the following also, to no avail…

Firstly, I work in IT, so I’d class myself as above average when it comes to this kind of stuff, and the terminology and how networks etc work…

So I have this…

2 x MyCloud 4TB Devices, both connected to an 8 port Gigabit Switch (Netgear GS108). Both ports on the switch have both link lights on, which means it’s connected at 1Gbps, not 10/100Mbps.

I’m aware that there are many factors that can affect speeds, ie. using wifi, size of files, allocation on disk etc etc, but both devices are connected to a 1Gbps switch, which means they can talk directly to each other, without going through the switch ports on my router, which i suspect at 10/100 (I would think).

When I do any kind of transfer between the devices, I’m getting between 2-3Mbps transfer speed! When as I understand it, they should be able to operate at around 80-90Mbps R/W.

I’ve followed the pinned post at the top of this forum, and turned off all of the suggested options on each device, Media Sharing, iTunes Server, Remote Access, Cloud Access etc etc… I’ve also SSH’d into both devices and stopped and disabled the services for database scanning. Both devices content scan are now IDLE. I’ve rebooted both devices, and still getting the same pathetic speeds?!!

The firmware on both devices are at v04.04.03-113, the latest firmware.

I’m at a loss now as to what to try next to improve the transfer r/w speeds. What i haven’t tried yet, is changing the ethernet cables, but i’m using the ones that came with the devices, which I assume will be at least CAT5e or CAT6, seeing as the devices support 1Gbps ports.

If anyone has any ideas, I’d be grateful of some suggestions!

Thanks
Darren

2

How are you doing the transfer between the two My Cloud’s? Using Windows File Explorer/Mac Finder? Using SSH to issue a copy/rsync or similar command? Using Safepoint to backup from one My Cloud to another? Using some other method to initiate the copy?

The best way is to issue the command through the SSH command terminal to copy the files from one My Cloud to another, which will avoid potentially routing the copying of the data through a computer when using Windows File Explorer or Mac Finder.

3

Hi Bennor
Using Windows Explorer. i also use Goodsync on my laptop to sync the two devices together, one is a back up of the other. Both deliver around 2-3Mbps.
I’ve just tried a NAS tester writing and reading a 400Mb temp file, and it gave 5.4Mbps. My laptop is connected via WiFi at 65mbps, so the max I would get is about 5MB/s, so that makes sense.
It’s the R/We between the devices on the switch, which should directly talk to each other…?
How would I test using Putty?

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Because your using a computer to initiate the copying it is possible the data from one My Cloud is flowing through the computer to the second My Cloud. That would explain why your getting horrible copying speed especially since you indicated one of the computers you used was on WiFi.

Try using Rsync from the SSH command line. If you don’t know how to use SSH or Rsync do an internet search, plenty of tutorials out there. Here is one that covers using Rsync to copy to a variety of locations.

http://www.tecmint.com/rsync-local-remote-file-synchronization-commands/

Also use the forum search function to search for “rsync” as there are several past threads discussing how to use Rsync to copy data from one My Cloud to another location (or My Cloud). Here is one such thread.

https://community.wd.com/t/success-3-rsync-backup-between-my-cloud-devices/93945

Don’t forget to enable SSH via the Dashboard > Settings > Network if it isn’t enabled already.

5

Hi Bennor,

OK so I’ve done a new test… My laptop only has a 10/100 ethernet port, so that wasnt going to help me test a 1Gbps connection. Fortunately, my work laptop does have a 1Gbps port.

So I connected my work laptop to my switch using a Cat 5e cable, and verified from the switch link lights and the status of the connection from the laptop, and both stated they were connected at 1Gbps (great!). I then mapped both of my Devices to my work laptop as network drives, and tested by copying an 800Mb file from one mycloud to the other… guess what… Transfer speed was around 70MB/s!

That’s made me feel better in the fact that the devices arent faulty, and the cables are indeed Cat5e… What i dont understand is why using windows explorer or any other sync software for that matter, it would ‘route’ the traffic through the laptop to the destination device, when its connected to the switch right next to the other one! I guess it may just be a windows thing!

I’ll do some more research, because unfortunately my laptop only has a 10/100 port, and it’s always on wifi and not ethernet…

Cheers

6

Its not necessarily a Windows thing. Stop and consider what your instructing your computer to do. You are instructing the computer to use the computer’s file manager (Windows File Explorer) to copy a file from one location/My Cloud to another/My Cloud. You are not telling the My Cloud to copy from one location/My Cloud to another/My Cloud.

Try using SSH + Rsync to perform the copy and see if that’s any faster (it should be) than using Windows File Explorer.

Ideally it would be great if the My Cloud firmware had its own file manager web based interface for copying files from the My Cloud to another location but, outside of Safepoint / Backup, it does not officially have the capability through the Dashboard to copy files to another location. Unofficially there are probably other modules/apps or entire firmwares one could load into the My Cloud to facilitate copying data direct from the My Cloud to another location.

Edit to add: If one is trying to copy a file to a USB hard drive attached to the My Cloud a process that also has potential slow speed issues that has been well discussed in prior threads; some have found that using the WD My Cloud Desktop software, the WD My Cloud mobile apps for Android/iOS or the MyCloud.com web portal may transfer the files faster than using the file manger on one’s computer.

7

Whilst extracting video files from my Humax (first to a USB HDD, then to the MyCloud, and then moving on the MyCloud), I’ve found that, even using Windows File Explorer to move files on the MyCloud, it must be instructing the MyCloud to move them locally, and not via the PC. Video files move location almost instantly.

Most of the time… I think it may be that if you move a folder/directory, it does it locally, but if you move individual files, it moves them via the PC. I need to investigate further. Next time I need to de-fluff the Humax, probably…

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Yeah its a bit goofy on when it copies fast and when it doesn’t. Copying within the My Cloud hard drive it copies fast, copying from the My Cloud to an attached USB hard drive in my experience its slow, same goes for copying from the My Cloud to a third location on the local network.

In my post above I wasn’t particularly clear when saying copying from one location to another, I was talking about from one My Cloud to another location on the local network (like another My Cloud) when using Windows File Explorer. I’ve since edited that post to try and make it a bit more clear.

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You should see the same results when you move a video/folder on a local disk drive to the same disk drive. Windows explorer will basically do a rename. Then try moving the file/folder to a different mounted drive. If both mount points are on the same disk it will be slower than if the mount points are of different physical disks.

RAC