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SMB Network Share Access slow (MAC OS X SL and Windows 2008 Server)

Hi,

I've added some iMacs with 10.6 to the Active Directory. This works totally fine. Anyways, I have some trouble, when accessing shares on my network. I found out, that some problems came up, because my network name was XXX.XXX.local I changed the Domain name of the Active Directory, but still the problems exist:
When opening the finder, Open Office or Microsoft Word on the Mac and browsing through files and folders, it sometimes takes up to 30 seconds and more, until the content of a folder appears... I already tried ADmitMac from Thursby, but it didn't seem to fix this problem. When accessing the shares from a Windows machine, they run pretty fast. Any idea?

Lenovo, Mac OS X (10.6.4)

Posted on Sep 6, 2010 6:04 AM

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26 replies

Sep 19, 2010 6:08 PM in response to suppenhuhn

You never said what this "Active Directory" server is? Is it 2003, 2008 or OS X Server 10.5.x or 10.6.X?

I have read some on sServer 2003 can speed up connections by implementing the setting fixes describe in the Microsoft article New registry entry for controlling the TCP Acknowledgment (ACK) behavior in Windows XP and in Windows Server 2003 and it Also helped 10.6 client users SMB speed. It might help if you have access to the Domain server machine.

Note: If you Windows name ends in .Local then read the Apple document Mac OS X v10.6: Active Directory binding lost on network transition (.local domain).

Sep 20, 2010 6:58 AM in response to suppenhuhn

The AD is a 2003 Enterprise, and the shares are on a different 2003 Enterprise box. WINS is already configured and being pulled from DHCP. It is very speratic, sometimes if browses fine with folders with almost 30K files, and sometimes it hangs with folders with 5 files. But it isn't always the same folders causing the problem. One minute the folder is fine, and the next it takes 30-45 seconds to show the directory.

Sep 28, 2010 4:34 PM in response to suppenhuhn

I too have the exact same problem and need to figure it out soon. Very slow response times. It seems the server is getting over utilized (look at your resource monitor).

Current configuration are:
MAC OS 10.6.4 using a Windows 2008x64 as a file server. Clients are connecting via SMB.
Whats the common denominator here?
Our users are using Adobe InDesign 3. When users open the file located on the server and submits a print job directly to the printer, the InDesign links ( some files contain around 100 ) reach back to the server to reference the file before it prints. This may be why the server's resources are heavily affected and may be the reason why it may cause slow response times for other MAC users who try and save, open or copy files from / to the server. We have not found a soultion and all things mentioned here including the internet links did not work. We are still testing other variables (copy the Indesign files locally to detemine if print times decrease, etc. Any comments appreciated.

Sep 30, 2010 8:38 AM in response to shodazz

Okay. We found the solution. Extremez-IP, a thrid party tool that we installed on the server significantly reduced response times.

There is an incompatibilty with the basic SMB protocol MACS use to communicate with Windows. Essentially the amount of data genereated when MACs open a file ( as well as pull file info ) generate an extremely huge amount of traffic through SMB, and only the AFP protocol can effeciently pull the data across the two platforms without the server taking a performance hit if it was to pull the same data through SMB. Mainly OS X and above seem to be the most affected.

Message was edited by: shodazz

SMB Network Share Access slow (MAC OS X SL and Windows 2008 Server)

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