LS210D 128MB Blocks

[crf]

One of our clients recently migrated their network storage to a Buffalo LS210D so the entire office can work on the same data. The drive is mapped to the same drive letter in Windows 10 on each PC. Their program began to operate very slowly on the data, so I went over to look and found that Windows Explorer was reporting the file size as a minimum of 128 MB on disk, even if the file size itself was small.

This appears to be the same issue as the one described here > http://forums.buffalotech.com/index.php?topic=24915.0
but that post has no solution other than "ignore it." Ignoring this is not acceptable, as it is slowing their workflow to an unacceptable level.
Another description of what might be a similar issue with no answer can be found here > http://forums.buffalotech.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=bafc9ivu2ec2o69qv0c6j24ae2&topic=20309.0

In the past, the drive has stopped connecting due to SMB direct being enabled in Windows 10, and I've disabled it in the past, but I'm guessing Windows updates re-enabled it, as it it was on when I checked. One employee reported that the speed improved after disabling it again, but I have not verified.

Is this a known issue? What can we do to permanently fix this problem? The drive must be mapped to a drive letter for a solution to be acceptable.

** Web admin says firmware is latest

[1000001101000]

From what I've read about the filesize/size on disk display issue it really seems to be a display issue and shouldn't be affecting performance. @oxygen8 spent a lot of time looking into it back then but I don't recall what he eventually determined.

I read a bit about smb-direct and don't really understand how it would be a factor, though disabling it seems reasonable:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/storage/file-server/smb-direct

I tried to find info about how much overhead is involved with mapping a share on multiple machines etc but didn't find much information.

Honestly, dealing with multiple clients doing random r/w over samba is a lot to ask from a consumer-grade single-drive device like that.

[crf]

There's about seven total clients accessing the device, but only three would be using it at a given time. The rest are turned off. I've ruled out program specific database errors, running the utility the application provides to scan and repair the DB. I'm at their office now and the machine is SMB direct turned off is still experience the slowness, so I don't suspect that it's the culprit now.

On their previous network drive (a small WD that eventually fell off the desk) this had not been an issue. And during the first few months of the Buffalo LinkStation, the speed was perfectly reasonable.

The DB and files can be copied to a local folder at a reasonable speed, and the application will then run normally when pointed to the local folder. Anything more I can try?

[As3nd0r]

As 1000001101000 said, the thing with the 128mb cluster size is display value only, I doubt it would cause any access or speed issues.

On the speed issues, this unit is a home user device, I have a 220 myself and worked on a few others and all got into trouble if more than 2 clients access them at any given time. It's not the fastest in the first place and multiple users can easily push it to its limits. GUI gets really sluggish, transfer speeds go down, worst case you get timeouts/disconnects if too much is going on. I get around 40MB/s r/w on SMB2 if I am lucky (with one client connected), most of the time its less. Don't get me wrong, the unit is ok (and good value) for what its made for, but putting it into a company network with multiple clients is not the best idea.

Now you did mention it worked fine initially, so my guess here would be a) more users b) more data written/read within any given timeframe or c) hard drive. Less likely, but still possible, would be some firmware/settings issue, to rule those out you can simply reset it from the interface (it won't hurt the data as long as you select initialize and NOT erase/format)). Nevertheless, do a backup beforehand.

[1000001101000]

It might be interesting to compare the hardware of that previous device to the LS210 to try to find where the shortfall is (assuming there is one). I would assume it was something older than the LS210 but given that the LS210 is already a 6yr old device that may not be a good assumption. If the previous device had more memory or a faster hard drive that might be a clue. 

One thing you could experiment with is SMB2 vs SMB1 though using SMB1 on Windows 10 is generally inadvisable for security reasons.

One of the disadvantages of working with consumer-grade stuff is that you don't have a whole lot of options for performance tuning/troubleshooting. It might be worth contacting Buffalo support for advice on how to work with the options that you do have.