1

Hi, so I have a synology DS1817+ and a server with a 4 port nic that I am using to connect to the Synology unit. I have created one big LUN with one target and enabled multiple sessions connected to a windows 2016 server and created a large ntfs volume. I have found out and verified with Synology that a target on there device is only capable of 2 connections max per target. So my question is can I create another target point it to the same LUN and connect the server to both targets so I can get 4 connections to my synology box for better throughput or will this cause problems with the files system. Only one server will be talking to this device.

2 Spice ups
2

SAN is not for sharing, that would be a NAS. iSCSI has no brokering and NTFS is not clustered. If you connect NTFS to two or more hosts they WILL corrupt each other’s data. You can’t use a SAN this way.

1 Spice up
3

Or is this just one server, and you are just trying to get MORE MPIO? I don’t believe that you can do that.

1 Spice up
4

Just one server connecting to it via iscsi I know two or more computers connecting to ntfs would cause corruption. Just looking to get better through put to the synology unit. I have 4 ports on it that I can bond together and 4 ports on my server that I could use to get better throughput. But as of right now I have two of the nic’s connected to the target using mcs I tried mpio as well but only still got two connections to it.

5

You can’t bond with iSCSI. MPIO is required. but sounds like two channels is the max. Normally that is enough, though.

1 Spice up
6

Sorry should have specified I only bonded the nics on the Synology not the server. Those just connect to the target individually. So I have two nics with two ips connecting to the iscsi Target on the Synology via the bonded nics on the Synology

7

Same, can’t bond in either place with iSCSI. It’ll cause problems.

2 Spice ups
8

I was not aware of this I thought I read in the documentation that’s how you get more through put. I’ve been running this way for years with out any problems. I’m wondering if I should unbond the nics on the Synology and just give the nics separate ips and connect to each via the iscsi intiator from windows using the nics on the server?

9

It will normally work, but will fail to deliver good throughput. With bonding, you max out at one link and waste the other. MPIO actually will speed you up.

Bonding works for NAS, MPIO for SAN.

1 Spice up
10

Yes, definitely unbond and move to MPIO

2 Spice ups
11

Thanks I will give that a try and I’m assuming that mpio beats mcs? I have been able to get 2gb throughput with the setup as is using the bonded nics on the snology connecting to it via the intiator in windows adding both nics individually in a session under mcs

1 Spice up
12

MCS is fine, might even be better.

1 Spice up
13

A great article by KOOLER about LACP and MPIO https://www.starwindsoftware.com/blog/lacp-vs-mpio-on-windows-platform-which-one-is-better-in-terms-of-redundancy-and-speed-in-this-case-2 explains everything mentioned above by Scott more deeply.

And another nice set of blog posts https://www.starwindsoftware.com/blog/storage-ha-on-the-cheap-fixing-synology-diskstation-flaky-performance-with-starwind-free-part-2-log-structured-file-system my colleagues made a while ago benchmarking Synology in various configurations. This particular one is how to squeeze more performance out of the Synology box and might be useful for you.

3 Spice ups
14

You can’t multi connect one LUN from the multiple initiators unless you have cluster-aware file system (NTFS is not). See:

Trying to be clear on this - use iSCSI instead of SMB

https://forums.starwindsoftware.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1392

You can’t use LACP with Windows as there’s no MC/S with Windows iSCSI initiator and Synology target (both should have MC/S to work with a bonded connections). MPIO, just like SAM & Artem told.

1 Spice up