.........................Contents


1. NFS Overview 1
..NFS Characteristics 1
..NFS Version 2 and Version 3 2
.....NFS Version 3 Features 2
..Tuning Cycle 4
..Third Party Tools 5
2. Hardware Overview 7
..NFS File Servers 7
.....Dedicated NFS Servers 11
.....Enterprise Servers 13
.....Workgroup Servers 19
..Disk Expansion Units 24
.....SPARCstorage Array Subsystem 24
.....Sun RSM Array 2000 26
.....Sun Enterprise Network Array 27
.....SPARCstorage MultiPack 28
.....SPARCstorage UniPack 29


3. Analyzing NFS Performance 31
..Tuning the NFS Server 31
.....Optimizing Performance 31
.....Resolving Performance Problems 32
..Checking Network, Server, and Client Performance 32
..· To Check the Network 33
.....Checking the NFS Server 37
..· To Check the NFS Server 37
.....Checking Each Client 52
..· To Check Each Client 52
4. Configuring the Server and the Client to Maximize NFS Performance 57
..Tuning to Improve NFS Performance 57
..· To Monitor and Tune Server Performance 58
.....Balancing NFS Server Workload 58
..Networking Requirements 59
.....Data-Intensive Applications 59
.....· To Configure the Network When the Primary Application
.............of Your Server is Data-Intensive 60
.....Attribute-Intensive Applications 60
.....Systems with More Than One Class of Users 61
..Disk Drives 61
..· To Determine if Disks are the Bottleneck 61
.....Limiting Disk Bottlenecks 61
.....Replicating File Systems 62
.....Adding the Cache File System 63
.....Configuring Rules for Disk Drives 65
.....Using Solstice DiskSuite or Online: DiskSuite to Spread
.........Disk Access Load 66


.....Using Log-Based File Systems with Solstice DiskSuite or
.........Online: DiskSuite 3.0 67
.....Using the Optimum Zones of the Disk 67
..Central Processor Units 68
.....Determining CPU usage 68
..Memory 70
.....Determining if an NFS Server Is Memory Bound 70
..· To Determine if the Server Is Memory Bound 70
.....Calculating Memory 71
.....Swap Space 72
.....· To Set Up Swap Space 72
..Prestoserve NFS Accelerator 73
.....NVRAM-NVSIMM 73
.....NVRAM SBus 74
..Tuning Parameters 74
.....Setting the Number of NFS Threads in /etc/init.d/nfs.server 74</>
.....Identifying Buffer Sizes and Tuning Variables 75
.....Using /etc/system to Modify Kernel Variables 76
.....Adjusting Cache Size: maxusers 76</>
.....Adjusting the Buffer Cache (bufhwm) 77</>
.....Directory Name Lookup Cache (DNLC) 78
.....· To Reset ncsize 79</>
.....Increasing the Inode Cache 79
..· To Increase the Inode Cache With Solaris 2.4 or 2.5
.........Software Environments 80
.....Increasing Read Throughput 81
.....· To Increase the Number of Read-Aheads With Version 2 81
.....· To Increase the Number of Read-Aheads With Version 3 82


5. Troubleshooting 83
..Troubleshooting Tools 83
.....General Troubleshooting Tuning Tips 83
.....Client Bottlenecks 85
.....Server Bottlenecks 85
.....Network Bottlenecks 87
A. Using NFS Performance-Monitoring and Benchmarking Tools 89
..NFS Monitoring Tools 90
..Network Monitoring Tools 91
.....`snoop 91`
..LADDIS 97
.....LADDIS Benchmark 98
.....Interpreting LADDIS Results 99