Re: ICH6M SATA Controller, SATA2 NCQ disk and high iowait CPU time

gary.czek
2006-11-30T17:06:52Z

Tejun Heo <htejun@gmail.com> wrote:

> gary.czek wrote:
> > Hi, I have problem with my notebook Fujitsu-Siemens V8010. It has
> > Intel ICH6M chipset with SATA Controller. And SATA II disk Fujitsu
> > MHT2040BH with NCQ. If there is request on disk, iowait time of CPU
> > gets to 100% and whole system gets totally unresponsible. For
> > example apt upgrade (of average 10 packages totaling 30MB in .debs)
> > gets 30 minutes. CPU iowait time gets about 95% for whole 30
> > minutes.
> >
> > My notebook details:
> > CPU: Intel Celeron M 1,4GHz
> > MEM: 256MB 333MHz
> > HDD: Fujitsu MHT2040BH SATA II, NCQ, 5400rpm, 8MB buffer
> > SWP: 512MB swap partition
> > Chipset: ICH6M 82801FBM
> > GPU: Intel i915GM integrated
> >
> > kernel: 2.6.19-rc5
> > SATA Controller/disk driver: ata_piix and ahci tested, but results
> > of both were almost the same.
>
> 1. does 'mount -o remount,barrier=0 /' change anything?
>
> 2. 256MB is really small if you're running modern desktop
> environment. Please post the result of 'vmstat 5' while the machine
> is really slow.
>

First of all. I've reinstalled Ubuntu and installed Xfce instead of
Gnome. It seemed to me that it was much faster after reinstall. But as
I installed as much programs as I had installed before reinstall it
seems to me that it goes back to problems. Maybe it could by because of
I have running MySQL and PostgreSQL dbs. But they are accessed
minimally-not big queries and not so frequently (Only for use on
localhost). I use for some work postgres and for other mysql.

1. no, that changes nothing. Maybe I just didn't recognised the
difference.

2. if I coldn't find the real problem, I'll buy 1Gig RAM immediatelly.

"vmstat 5" when system is really slow shows following:

procs -----------memory---------- ---swap-- -----io---- -system-- ----cpu----
r b swpd free buff cache si so bi bo in cs us sy id wa
0 9 285904 3044 832 42088 75 46 247 98 484 746 5 2 80 13
0 4 285560 3628 692 43724 686 71 913 418 952 1651 18 3 0 79
0 3 285000 3616 688 43100 822 15 1431 766 939 1761 16 4 0 80
0 3 284372 3612 700 42344 703 0 1234 43 941 1697 18 3 7 72
1 2 284012 3176 580 42800 406 0 1054 74 834 1602 15 4 36 45
0 3 283820 3888 824 40044 413 23 1102 95 865 1767 17 3 0 80
0 1 286364 3904 900 41508 63 540 1023 629 928 1646 15 3 0 82
0 2 287500 4884 1120 44840 388 338 1606 431 902 1670 13 4 0 83
0 10 291148 3104 1296 46088 396 827 923 877 917 1521 10 3 0 87
0 3 292952 3728 1492 47524 259 474 730 606 889 1754 15 2 0 84
0 2 294960 3540 1588 47488 633 632 970 678 863 1630 12 2 0 86
0 2 297444 3828 1676 46496 648 674 774 735 886 1906 14 2 0 84
0 3 298184 3616 1684 46420 593 290 759 331 844 1792 12 3 0 85
0 5 297836 3852 1508 43576 632 168 990 229 814 1605 10 1 0 88
0 3 297996 4084 1240 41552 876 315 981 345 866 1466 7 2 0 91
0 5 296632 3272 1100 38324 1084 19 1593 59 878 1756 8 2 0 90
0 9 295768 3840 1128 38332 801 14 1244 170 870 1385 9 2 0 89
0 5 294748 3812 1068 37924 705 0 1053 61 844 1547 12 2 0 86
0 6 293664 3588 1100 37844 832 0 1206 23 848 1765 16 1 0 82
0 2 293040 4308 1152 37388 638 5 1070 101 680 1524 13 1 0 86
2 4 294140 3908 1248 37772 30 235 750 425 791 1539 14 3 0 83
0 2 295608 3876 1452 38568 185 356 676 464 883 1658 12 3 0 85
0 4 297092 3552 1500 38188 497 424 842 532 871 1433 9 2 0 89
0 4 298484 4004 1488 38136 612 416 806 563 866 1371 9 2 0 89
0 5 300004 4376 1476 38524 468 433 913 490 773 1475 12 1 0 86
0 3 303592 3948 1508 39556 286 844 993 1022 459 1457 16 1 0 82
0 2 305068 3644 1428 39000 399 385 868 482 871 1579 12 3 0 84
0 2 304912 3460 1464 40136 317 52 1200 139 710 1573 12 2 0 87
0 3 305848 3924 1808 39856 462 326 794 470 659 1491 13 3 0 84
0 9 312892 3260 1200 48304 354 1590 1477 5350 846 3194 8 6 0 87
0 12 314740 3356 1252 48252 747 478 1306 1416 643 1370 2 1 0 96
0 9 315192 3800 1380 46372 727 260 1390 1706 430 1484 2 1 0 97
0 5 313996 3716 1540 43844 826 49 1387 181 457 1311 0 1 0 99
0 9 313088 2928 1528 40200 1021 25 1742 67 435 1275 1 1 0 98
0 10 312608 3664 1484 38452 714 0 1438 436 391 1139 1 1 0 98
0 10 311692 3520 1564 37928 986 0 1876 87 431 1133 1 1 0 98
0 8 297540 3436 1532 38008 1000 0 1813 111 763 1360 3 2 0 95
0 10 296264 3636 1292 39056 796 0 2186 196 853 1456 1 2 0 97
0 10 295476 3948 984 40616 440 25 2082 162 783 1380 1 1 0 97
0 9 293580 25044 1088 44084 346 0 1915 159 373 1339 3 1 0 96
0 21 292148 16892 1220 45908 1228 0 1618 286 414 2652 1 2 0 97
0 20 290812 3420 1276 48468 1349 0 1862 14 575 1823 3 3 0 94
0 25 290764 3172 1036 45176 831 231 1337 289 824 3387 1 2 0 96
0 20 289884 4144 772 42756 802 22 1173 34 794 1227 0 2 0 98
0 23 289976 3612 644 44300 722 186 1204 211 595 1203 0 2 0 98
0 22 289108 3088 720 45608 694 0 1087 28 379 1092 3 0 0 97
0 24 288328 3824 844 44304 699 13 1266 61 382 1210 2 1 0 97
0 18 287232 3792 816 42800 1013 0 1258 46 392 1209 5 1 0 94
0 19 286932 4348 764 44516 598 104 1489 141 379 1127 25 0 0 75
0 17 286136 3924 836 44672 678 6 1015 71 403 1122 3 1 0 96
0 20 286872 3116 688 45728 566 318 1508 345 445 1017 2 1 0 96
0 18 288712 4008 736 45680 403 446 1121 474 759 950 2 1 0 97
0 22 288700 3068 652 46824 722 163 1489 208 684 1135 1 1 0 98
0 30 289812 3204 720 46408 471 307 1002 317 454 1240 7 1 0 92
0 26 290196 2940 744 45684 726 228 1573 304 467 1198 3 1 0 96
2 18 289556 3776 752 42448 825 46 1425 126 457 1552 15 1 0 85
0 15 288872 3684 772 41244 696 5 1326 30 423 1384 21 1 0 78
0 16 288168 3916 688 41116 661 5 1601 50 430 1266 12 1 0 88
0 15 287252 3460 768 40552 791 0 1431 58 456 1361 6 1 0 94
0 12 286428 3952 764 40156 694 8 1329 50 438 1330 4 1 0 95
0 13 286400 3472 796 40304 636 202 1585 235 450 1293 4 1 0 95
0 13 287240 3444 756 41528 398 295 1398 323 453 1202 10 1 0 88
0 10 287868 3996 816 42396 378 216 1378 274 459 1208 6 0 0 93
0 16 289792 2976 884 42992 404 474 1381 477 448 1302 8 1 0 90
1 13 289424 4032 772 41468 707 69 1407 128 914 1462 15 2 0 83
0 10 290736 3380 664 42468 508 434 1635 461 934 1551 31 1 0 68