New AS6204T from Florida

[kevmeist]

Just bought an 6204T and put 3 * 4TB HGST drives in it. Setup seemed relatively easy although I had to search for the default admin username and password. Maybe this should be up front somewhere when the setup runs?

Backup to a MyArchive disk in Bay 4 seems very slow to me. It's going to take about 9 hours at current rates for, I think, 600 to 700GB of data pulled over from my Windows Home Server box. I could dump all of my files from the WHS box to a Fantom 2TB drive in about 20 minutes...maybe less.

I do NOT understand why a disk to disk transfer inside the 6204T should be so slow.

How to back up PCs on the network took a little bit of finding (for others, search for "Backup Plan for Windows" on the web). I have NOT tried running this yet.

I am a retired software developer of about 45 years.

[orion]

Greetings!

How do you connect your WHS box to your AS6204T? I guess it's USB interface, right? The speed (700GB takes 6 hours) is only 22MB/s. I think it's USB 2.0 controller, rather than USB 3.0. USB controller is normally working in relatively low speed (compared to native SATA interface). I guess HGST 4TB HDD should be able to reach 150MB/s easily (continuous read). However, if you put this HDD into a USB box, the speed should be much lower than 150MB/s (even it's USB 3.0 interface).

If you do internal disk data transfer on AS6204T, I believe you should be able to see the throughput near to 150MB/s.

[kevmeist]

No, I did NOT connect the WHS to the AS6204T at all.

This is what I did:
1. I used the WHS to dump all of my shares to a 2TB Fantom ESATA drive attached to the WHS box
2. Then I attached that same ESATA drive to the AS6204T and copied the files across to the AS6204T.
3. That seemed pretty quick, although I didn't time it.

Then, I went into the ADM storage manager and defined Bay 4 as a "MyArchive" drive. So, now I have 3 * 4TB HGST drives in Bay 1 through 3 and another HD (WD Red drive) in Bay 4 as the MyArchive drive.

Then, I went into backup through the ADM console and told the AS6204T to backup to the MyArchive disk - this is the part that seems very slow. At 75% of this backup, I had a power cut at the house. The AS6204T was not on a UPS yet, so the backup failed at around the 7 hour mark. I looked at the Storage Manager and saw that my shares were ~428GB (not what I thought before), so the 75% meant that the 7 hours processed ~321GB of the 428GB. If my math is correct, that is only around 0.76/minute.

So, the backup I tried via the ADM Backup function was running from the RAID array in the AS6204T to Bay 4 in the AS6204T...this shouldn't be that slow IMHO. This is disk to disk transfer in the same box.

[orion]

Ok, 0.76 GB / minute (13MB/s) is quite slow. I guess you create an "Internal Backup" job under ADM web -> Backup & Restore -> Internal Backup. This way should be very fast. If you choose "Remote Sync", that way will somehow slower (it owns a feature called incremental backup).

There is a possible case: you enabled encryption function in MyArchive volume. If you did, that should be the root cause to be slower.

By the way, what's the file system format you choose in MyArchive volume? I tried EXT4 format before and that's pretty fast (native SATA HDD speed).

[kevmeist]

Well, the external backup of the 428GB took around 8 hours.

Then, I decided to do the internal backup to the MyArchive disk in Bay 4 again (as yesterday was aborted due to the power glitch).

I “removed” the aborted backup and removed the MyArchive” disk with the ASUS Storage Manager and set it up again from scratch.

Now, the backup to the “MyArchive” disk in Bay4 of the 428GB took only about 68 minutes.

I just don’t understand it…really weird.

No encryption selected. The 68 minute MyArchive backup was EXT4. I might have selected NTFS on the first one, but don't remember for sure. No remote sync. My backups are kept locally, with a father/son rotation with the latest generation being kept at my son's home. It's not clear to me whether future internal backups will be incremental or not.

[orion]

NTFS format should be fast enough, although I did not compare the speed between NTFS and EXT4. Anyway, good to hear that the backup speed is back to normal.

By the way, if your son owns a NAS which have "rsync" service, you should setup a scheduled "Remote Sync" job. You don't need to switch disks physically. Let machine do the job to synchronize data automatically through internet. Life should be more joyful and easy. ("Remote Sync" can do incremental backup. It means that it will do full copy at the first time. The first job takes longer time. Then it'll copy the changes only, rather than full contents, at the next time.)

[kevmeist]

Thanks Orion......no NAS at my son's home unfortunately. I understand incremental backups.

I am setting up doing both internal backups to a MyArchive disks (father/son rotation) in bay4 and an external backup to my ESATA HD (which stays in my home).

It's not clear, from me reading ASUS documentation, whether subsequent backups are also incremental or not (this is the subject of a TS request to ASUS on 9/28 which has not been answered yet).

[kevmeist]

BTW, it seems that ASUS "USA" technical support still originates from Taiwan (or in that time zone). On another issue trying to setup a CloudID, they want to login remotely via TeamViewer and for me to leave TV up and running so that they can log in "sometime". That won't happen unless I am sitting at the PC watching what they are doing. I dislike the idea of sending a TV username/password over unsecured email and then leaving TV up and running with that username and password "ready" to use.

I have no problem letting them use TV and the one time password (if I am here and watching), but do NOT like the idea of leaving TV up with that connection possible (in theory). My PC sleeps when I am not using it anyway. Being retired FBI IT makes me more than a bit suspicious <g>.

[orion]

Thanks Orion......no NAS at my son's home unfortunately. I understand incremental backups.

I am setting up doing both internal backups to a MyArchive disks (father/son rotation) in bay4 and an external backup to my ESATA HD (which stays in my home).

It's not clear, from me reading ASUS documentation, whether subsequent backups are also incremental or not (this is the subject of a TS request to ASUS on 9/28 which has not been answered yet).

No, it does not do incremental backup if you select internal backup. However you can enable "skip existing file if not modified". That should be able to speed up the whole process.

PS: I usually get their replies within 2 days. It might take more time (e-mail back and forth) if team viewer session is not suitable for you. I did team viewer session several times with them (of course, it's supervised by me during the whole session).

[MikeG.6.5]

BTW, it seems that ASUS "USA" technical support still originates from Taiwan (or in that time zone). On another issue trying to setup a CloudID, they want to login remotely via TeamViewer and for me to leave TV up and running so that they can log in "sometime". That won't happen unless I am sitting at the PC watching what they are doing. I dislike the idea of sending a TV username/password over unsecured email and then leaving TV up and running with that username and password "ready" to use.

I have no problem letting them use TV and the one time password (if I am here and watching), but do NOT like the idea of leaving TV up with that connection possible (in theory). My PC sleeps when I am not using it anyway. Being retired FBI IT makes me more than a bit suspicious <g>.

I have voiced exactly the same concern many many times. And have been trying to get Asustor to put someone on as a Tech Support agent in the US. I've gone so far as to ask if they want my own resume to submit, but haven't gotten a response to that question, either...

When I was working in Alaska I had a few instances where I needed to have tech support TV into my machine to work on it. It was always after 11:00pm my time there. I expect that the lateness only gets worse. Having just one Tech Support agent in the US would be a dramatic improvement, IMO.