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afp server issue - very hign cpu load

hallo

i googled an searched this forum al long time but i found no solution.

my problem is that my os x 10.5.4 server with about 30 networked homeddrive users have an issue with the afp server. the afp server process uses all 8 cores of this newest intel xserve with 14 gigs of ram installed. when this happens all users get an spinning wheel. the incoming network traffik is reduced to some kb´s.

ok all users shut down there clients - restart server and about 30 minutes later i have the same problem.

i have dumped the network traffic with wireshark and there i see some tcp retransmissions.
now i need someone who can help me analyse the wireshark protocol, because i cant´s handle that.

so if there is someone out there who can help me plz send me an email to support@premedia.at so that i can send you the wireshark log.

thank you in advice

Macbook Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.4)

Posted on Aug 29, 2008 2:47 AM

279 replies

mici

Level 1

0 points

Oct 16, 2009 7:57 AM in response to Manfred Rumpl

are there some experience with 10.6.x server and RAID Level 5/6 ?
still causing cpu over load for AppleFileServer ?

since we sold our Tiburon RAID, we still working with 3 internal striped 1.5TB HD's ( server 10.5.6 is running on a macpro )

it isn't the best solution, but it works much better and saver thanit it did !
never again we had any crash of AppleFileServer !!

now the internal disc are running for nearly 18 months, it's time too change and besides we need more space too !
the question is; should we replace them with 3x2TB internal discs
ore decrease up to a raid system again ?
using 10.5x I don't have the courage but perhaps it's solved under 10.6x?

thanks for any inputs

Message was edited by: mici

JEEKR

Level 1

0 points

Oct 16, 2009 10:43 AM in response to Speamac

I've yet to have high cpu loads again on my server since upgrading to 10.5.8 so it seems to have resolved my issue since school started. When my network users cache was redirected to local drive before 10.5.8 upgrades things worked fine except of course for the MSWord saving issues. After the upgrade other programs started exhibiting the same saving issues MSWord had, even couldn't save textedit files to network homes without going to "save as". I ended up disabling the cache redirection to resolve the issue. Are you experiencing anything similar?

macyoshi

Level 1

0 points

Oct 16, 2009 10:50 AM in response to JEEKR

To take care of the saving issue after folder redirection, please read the info at the following website, this will take care of your issue:

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20051122213207398

Oct 26, 2009 7:16 AM in response to Timothy Stewart

We noticed that a lot of the users that were having this issue with AFP causing high CPU loads, were using RAIDS. We checked our settings in our RAID boxed and unchecked "Allow Host Cache Flushing" and our AFP server dropped from 338% to 4.5% immediately. Needless to say we are very happy and thought we should share.

Oct 28, 2009 5:17 AM in response to Manfred Rumpl

Has anyone found a reason why setting afp on server to disconnect idle users after 60 mins results in 300 users being listed after much more than 60 mins? This has been commented on before but CPU usage shoots up and new users are rejected at login.
The setting just does not seem to work as it should!

Ben Lloyd

Level 1

120 points

Nov 19, 2009 9:08 AM in response to sgatetech

I found that after doing what you did worked as-well. Unfortunately a week later our RAID Volume became corrupt and I had to destroy and recreate. Along with what you tried I adjusted the afp threshold and buffer settings for the clients and have had low cpu since.

Now I am experiencing something different. Small freezes- beach-ball for 15-30secs sometimes every 10mins or so. Any ideas people?

BPeppe

Level 1

0 points

Jan 5, 2010 8:02 AM in response to Manfred Rumpl

I'm still having this issue after trying all these suggestions. I'm not at 10.6, but that will be coming soon. The best luck I've had so far was to make sure all my Mac's were shut down and not communicating with the server in any way (150+/- clients). Then I rebooted the server a couple times to make sure it was 'happy'. This cleared the pegged CPU usage for well over a month, but it has come back. One thing I also noticed - if I'm in Activity Monitor watching AFP peg the CPU, when I hit the 'Sample Process' button the CPU usage drops to almost nothing while it samples. As soon as the sample is done, it jumps back up...

Jan 14, 2010 4:46 AM in response to Manfred Rumpl

Applying the latest firmware to our Promise RAID made a significant difference.

http://www.promise.com/support/download/downloadagree3.asp?fpath=Apple_Firmware2.5.zip

Feb 5, 2010 12:11 PM in response to netboy-uk

When you upgraded your server to 10.6, did you have to upgrade your clients? If not, what version are your clients running?

afp server issue - very hign cpu load