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Phoenix32 · 11-12-2006, 03:18 AM

Okay, so I started a new topic because I could not seem to find the old one...

Alright, so what was the end results on the swapping of the CPU in a 4x00 unit for a faster CPU? Did it help it any? Did things speed up? I do not recall ever hearing if it helped (any benchmarks).

The 4000 uses a Pentium 233 CPU. RAID 5 can be demanding (during writes) on the CPU if you are doing mass xfer and so can the 100baseT.

For example, on my 4000 with the 4 x 250 Seagate drives and 256 megs of CL2 SDRAM, I get an average of 25MB transfer speed while writing (on a gigabit network with smart switches, so no bottlenecks there). This means about 75 minutes or so to xfer 15 Gigs to the SNAP.

Another example. On the same SNAP 4000, a format of those drives takes a little over an hour, but the RAID 5 parity build (where it says it is building the backup drive) takes about 17 hours 45 minutes.

While there is a limit on how fast you can transfer/build due to drive speed and the 100baseT, I would bet the CPU at 233Mhz is a limiting factor here (heavy XOR parity creation load). Now other than the mobile processors, the fastest Intel Socket 7 CPU was the 133Mhz. However, there are AMD K6-2 processors with faster speeds. I do not know if the 4000 main board would support a 100Mhz FSB, it might, but there are K6-2 models still with 333 and so forth speed on a 66Mhz FSB. It "MIGHT" make things a little faster on a SNAP 4000.

I do not remember what the CPU is on the 4100, but I bet it could be speeded up also.

Any ideas? Comments? Examples? Benchmarks?

Come on people let's not just let this forum be a place where people pass through to get some quick fix or plea for an OS update or whatever. Let's see if we can learn some new things? Maybe even improve on the units we have and can afford. Who's with me?

(Jontz, here would be the place for you to tell me what CPU the 4100 has in it)

11-12-2006, 03:18 AM	#1
Phoenix32 Thermophile Join Date: May 2006 Location: Yakima, WA Posts: 1,282	4x00 Unit CPUs Okay, so I started a new topic because I could not seem to find the old one... Alright, so what was the end results on the swapping of the CPU in a 4x00 unit for a faster CPU? Did it help it any? Did things speed up? I do not recall ever hearing if it helped (any benchmarks). The 4000 uses a Pentium 233 CPU. RAID 5 can be demanding (during writes) on the CPU if you are doing mass xfer and so can the 100baseT. For example, on my 4000 with the 4 x 250 Seagate drives and 256 megs of CL2 SDRAM, I get an average of 25MB transfer speed while writing (on a gigabit network with smart switches, so no bottlenecks there). This means about 75 minutes or so to xfer 15 Gigs to the SNAP. Another example. On the same SNAP 4000, a format of those drives takes a little over an hour, but the RAID 5 parity build (where it says it is building the backup drive) takes about 17 hours 45 minutes. While there is a limit on how fast you can transfer/build due to drive speed and the 100baseT, I would bet the CPU at 233Mhz is a limiting factor here (heavy XOR parity creation load). Now other than the mobile processors, the fastest Intel Socket 7 CPU was the 133Mhz. However, there are AMD K6-2 processors with faster speeds. I do not know if the 4000 main board would support a 100Mhz FSB, it might, but there are K6-2 models still with 333 and so forth speed on a 66Mhz FSB. It "MIGHT" make things a little faster on a SNAP 4000. I do not remember what the CPU is on the 4100, but I bet it could be speeded up also. Any ideas? Comments? Examples? Benchmarks? Come on people let's not just let this forum be a place where people pass through to get some quick fix or plea for an OS update or whatever. Let's see if we can learn some new things? Maybe even improve on the units we have and can afford. Who's with me? (Jontz, here would be the place for you to tell me what CPU the 4100 has in it)