Hello,
we are using Firestreamer-RM under Windows Server 2003, running on a Pentium 4 at 3GHz. Our data are backed up on a network drive connected via iSCSI. During the backup, CPU usage is constantly near 100% and the throughput is rather poor. Process Explorer shows that the load is due to NRDVDSTR.sys and ntoskrnl.exe, hosted by the System process.
I tried switching off compression, but this did not significantly change the time needed for backup.
Is such a high CPU load considered normal? I realize that the hardware is quite ancient, but we are stuck with it for now.
High CPU usage during backup
If by size of the tape you mean the size of the resulting backup file, this varies between 800GB and 1.2TB. This huge size also means I can't just perform the backup locally. For testing, I have copied 16GB to the iSCSI drive, both as one large file and a collection of small files. CPU use was around 10% for Explorer and System process combined during the copy operation.
OK, I logged into the server on Friday, half an our after the backup started. The backup file was already around 30GB and CPU usage was very low (around 10%). At this rate, the task should have completed in approximately 15h. However, on Monday, the backup task was still running, using the CPU at 100%.
So, the CPU usage indeed goes up at some later time. I also tried to run some performance logs to capture this in detail, but this failed somehow. Do you have a hunch what the problem with the backup might be?
So, the CPU usage indeed goes up at some later time. I also tried to run some performance logs to capture this in detail, but this failed somehow. Do you have a hunch what the problem with the backup might be?
Check the kernel and user memory usage in Task Manager when the CPU usage is low and when it's high. Most likely, you have a memory leak. See Why does the amount of available memory rapidly decrease during a tape operation?
Best regards,
John Smith
Cristalink Support
John Smith
Cristalink Support