Kernel 2.4 vs 2.6 Traffic Controller Performance

Kernel 2.4 vs 2.6 Traffic Controller Performance

[Sonny]

Hello
I hope this is the right place to ask this.Does any know if there is a
substantial difference in the performance of the traffic controller
between kernel 2.4 and 2.6. We tested it using 1 iperf server and use
250 and 500 clients, altering the burst. We use the top command to
check the idle time of our router to see this. The results we got from
the 2.4 kernel shows around 65-70% idle time while the 2.6 shows
60-65% idle time. We tried to use MRTG and we're not getting any
results either. We want to know if we could improve the bandwidth by
upgrading the kernel, else we would have to get a new bandwidth
manager.  Could anyone have the similar test regarding this or suggest
a better way to do this. Thanks in advance.

kernel 2.4 vs 2.6 Traffic Controller performance

[Sonny]

Hello
This is a repost, there seems to have a misunderstanding before.

I hope this is the right place to ask this. Does any know if there is a
substantial difference in the performance of the traffic controller
between kernel 2.4 and 2.6. We tested it using 1 iperf server and use
250 and 500 clients, altering the burst.

This is the set-up:
iperf client -  router (w/ traffic controller) - iperf server

We use the top command inside the router to check the idle time of our
router to see this. The results we got from the 2.4 kernel shows
around 65-70% idle time while the 2.6 shows
60-65% idle time. We tried to use MRTG and we're not getting any
results either. We want to know if we could improve the bandwidth by
upgrading the kernel, else we would have to get a new bandwidth
manager.  Have anyone performed a similar test or can suggest a better
way to do this. Thanks in advance.

Re: kernel 2.4 vs 2.6 Traffic Controller performance

[Eric Dumazet]

Sonny a écrit :
> Hello
> This is a repost, there seems to have a misunderstanding before.
> 
> I hope this is the right place to ask this. Does any know if there is a
> substantial difference in the performance of the traffic controller
> between kernel 2.4 and 2.6. We tested it using 1 iperf server and use
> 250 and 500 clients, altering the burst.
> 
> This is the set-up:
> iperf client -  router (w/ traffic controller) - iperf server
> 
> We use the top command inside the router to check the idle time of our
> router to see this. The results we got from the 2.4 kernel shows
> around 65-70% idle time while the 2.6 shows
> 60-65% idle time. We tried to use MRTG and we're not getting any
> results either. We want to know if we could improve the bandwidth by
> upgrading the kernel, else we would have to get a new bandwidth
> manager.  Have anyone performed a similar test or can suggest a better
> way to do this. Thanks in advance.
> -
Hi Sonny

I am not sure what you are asking here. 65-70% idle time (or 60-65%) is fine.

2.6 is also not very meaningfull, there are a lot of changes between 2.6.0 and 
2.6.23 :)

Why should you upgrade kernel ?
What bandwidth do you handle ?
What kind of platform is it ? (a new kernel wont help much if its a real old 
machine, or old NICs)

You seem to have some bandwidth problem but focus on cpu affairs...

Re: kernel 2.4 vs 2.6 Traffic Controller performance

[Sonny]

On 10/3/07, Eric Dumazet <dada1@cosmosbay.com> wrote:
> Sonny a écrit :
> > Hello
> > This is a repost, there seems to have a misunderstanding before.
> >
> > I hope this is the right place to ask this. Does any know if there is a
> > substantial difference in the performance of the traffic controller
> > between kernel 2.4 and 2.6. We tested it using 1 iperf server and use
> > 250 and 500 clients, altering the burst.
> >
> > This is the set-up:
> > iperf client -  router (w/ traffic controller) - iperf server
> >
> > We use the top command inside the router to check the idle time of our
> > router to see this. The results we got from the 2.4 kernel shows
> > around 65-70% idle time while the 2.6 shows
> > 60-65% idle time. We tried to use MRTG and we're not getting any
> > results either. We want to know if we could improve the bandwidth by
> > upgrading the kernel, else we would have to get a new bandwidth
> > manager.  Have anyone performed a similar test or can suggest a better
> > way to do this. Thanks in advance.
> > -
> Hi Sonny
>
> I am not sure what you are asking here. 65-70% idle time (or 60-65%) is fine.
>
> 2.6 is also not very meaningfull, there are a lot of changes between 2.6.0 and
> 2.6.23 :)
>
we're using 2.6.22

> Why should you upgrade kernel ?
we would like to test the difference bet 2 kernels performance

> What bandwidth do you handle ?
10 mbps

> What kind of platform is it ? (a new kernel wont help much if its a real old
> machine, or old NICs)
it's a P IV 2.8 GHz HT with 512 MB
>
> You seem to have some bandwidth problem but focus on cpu affairs...
Bandwidth is not a problem, we can get 10mbps without a hitch. But we
would like to know the scalability on the CPU vs the number of
clients. So far, for both kernels, we're getting 50% CPU utilization
using 500 clients and 384 burst kbps each.