February 8, 201412 yr Hi All, I'm a new unRAID user and am having a really strange issue with download speeds with SABNZBD. By the way, this was all seemed to be working fine until I set the Download Speed Limit under Tuning on the General tab in SABNZBD to 3750kbps. I have since cleared the value, restarted SABNZBD's PLG twice from UnRAID, and even verified that the sabnzbd.ini file showed a 0 under bandwidth_limit. Honestly, I just think the issue starting at this time was coincidental. The strange thing is it will climb to almost maximum speed which for my FIOS connection is approximately 4.2MB/s and then it will drop to 100-200Kb/sec and then climb up again and bounce up and down between those two levels. I am also seeing a big bump in system load while the download is active. Just for reference, I have an Intel Xeon E3-1230v2 w/ 16GB of RAM in my UnRAID box. With 4 cores and hyperthreading, I am seeing the following from the sabnzb website: Checking top, I am seeing the following while the download is active: If I pause the download in sabnzbd and wait a couple of minutes this is the result in top: The load average has gone higher than 4 with the download active. I'm not sure what is considered overloaded with a quad core Xeon with hyperthreading. I'm assuming that you wouldn't be able to have a load of 8 despite the virtual cores. I have also tested my usenet connection with separate software to confirm it isn't a provider problem, and I'm getting my full bandwidth. Here is what my router's real time bandwidth monitor is showing: I am at a loss at this point. I had just moved to UnRAID from a hackintosh with an i7-3570 that could handle 3 transcodes and a download without this problem. I'm sure there is something I'm missing, but I just don't know where to look. One additional note, I am using a 7200RPM 1TB cache drive that is currently nearly empty for the download and unrar'ing of files and then the post processing moves it to the proper share. Any ideas? I wish I could interpret the top results a little better, but I'm a bit of a neophyte.
February 11, 201412 yr Author I am not entirely sure why, but after rebooting my UnRAID server this has not been an issue again. I wish I knew what had caused it, but unfortunately I ran out of time to try and figure it out.
February 21, 201412 yr Author Oddly enough this problem is back. I thought I had it resolved, but even after a reboot I am still seeing incredibly slow download speeds, and even the post-processing of files is taking an inordinate amount of time. I'm unrar'ing to my 7200rpm cache drive.
February 21, 201412 yr my suggestion would be to move to nzbget, much lighter than sab and very efficient Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk
February 21, 201412 yr Author my suggestion would be to move to nzbget, much lighter than sab and very efficient Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk I'm testing out nzbget. It is maintaining the download speed, but my sysload is peaking at over 8 during just the download, and the unpacking is taking an unbelievably long time. 9gb file is reportedly going to take 1 hour and 40 minutes to unrar. I have the E3-1230 v2 (Quad Core w/ hyperthreading) and unpacking the temp files to a 7200 RPM cache. I guess I was expecting faster. My Mac processed files a lot faster.
February 21, 201412 yr Who's sab plugin are you using? Installed any new plugins that use python? Check versions in all your plugins that installs it. Are you using SSL to the usenet server? Check versions in all your plugins that install openssl. How many ports are you using in the usenet server config? Occurring on same nzb or any nzb? Added ram to you system recently? What is your article cache setting? One of the top reports had a 21%wa so something was hammering a disk at the time which is why the sysload was going up. Full syslog might be helpful.
February 22, 201412 yr Author Who's sab plugin are you using? Installed any new plugins that use python? Check versions in all your plugins that installs it. Are you using SSL to the usenet server? Check versions in all your plugins that install openssl. How many ports are you using in the usenet server config? Occurring on same nzb or any nzb? Added ram to you system recently? What is your article cache setting? One of the top reports had a 21%wa so something was hammering a disk at the time which is why the sysload was going up. Full syslog might be helpful. I'm using Influencer's plugins for SAB, CP and SickBeard. No new plugins that use python. Well I am using plexmediaserver as well. I am using 25 connections to my usenet server yes I'm using SSL. The strange thing is that when the problem is in repro it seems to be any nzb. It has happened twice now. The first time a reboot of my server fixed the problem. Now it doesn't seem to help. No added RAM. My server has 16GB that I started with. Initially I set the article cache to default which I believe is 0. After I experienced the problem I bumped it to 128MB but it didn't seem to have any impact. I'll see if I can still repro and if so I'll attach a syslog. I'm testing out nzbget now, but it seems to have its own set of problems.
February 22, 201412 yr 8 on that CPU is not a real cause for concern, taht would generally indicate that you are at full capacity, however, sabnzbd probably shouldn't be causing such a high load just downloading, my X3430 would sometimes hit 16-18 when downloading + repairing/unpacking, I now have an X3470 in it and even that I've seen go to 4 (not really been paying attention though)
February 22, 201412 yr I realize this is not going to help, but sab is one of the most troublesome pieces of software I have installed, ever. It is as though the Windows ME/Vista team developed it. It seems to "decay" over time. I had it running on unraid for a few months, and began having major issues, and scrapped it completely, fearing the stability of my file server. I now run nothing on my unraid server except unraid. Then ran it on a dual core Atom, life was good for almost a year (Windows XP), then various problems would crop up (sometimes it would post process correctly, sometimes not, sometimes it would dupe download, sometimes not, CPU was 100% all the time, sometimes not, web interface wouldn't respond, etc) I am now running it on a six core Phenom II with 8GB RAM (Windows 7) just long enough to clear my queue. Same thing. Worked for a few months. Now CPU pegs a lot, if I am doing ANYTHING else with the network connection (copying a file to the server), the unrar process will take hours, I can't change the download speed (I type in the value and sab resets it) 99/100 times I try, but 1/100 times it works and changes speed. Still getting dupe downloads, and post processing doesn't always work. It is horrible, horrible, horrible. Between unraid, Windows XP, and 7, I've probably re-downloaded and re-installed it a 100 times with a hope and a prayer, and that's not an exaggeration. I had forgotten all about nzbget until it was mentioned here, I will be giving that a look.
February 22, 201412 yr my suggestion would be to move to nzbget, much lighter than sab and very efficient Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk I'm testing out nzbget. It is maintaining the download speed, but my sysload is peaking at over 8 during just the download, and the unpacking is taking an unbelievably long time. 9gb file is reportedly going to take 1 hour and 40 minutes to unrar. I have the E3-1230 v2 (Quad Core w/ hyperthreading) and unpacking the temp files to a 7200 RPM cache. I guess I was expecting faster. My Mac processed files a lot faster. i have a E3 1240v2 ... not sure how much more horsepower it has vs the 1230, but i can tell you that nzbget (currently running as docker container) uses approx 5% of one core ... load while downloading is 0.22, 0.15, 0.14 ... its not unraring right now but i seem to remember seeing load go up to 3, maybe 4. there's got to be something else going on with your setup ... nevertheless, i would switch to nzbget regardless ... i used sab and it was "horrible, horrible, horrible" as tucansam said ... never looked back
February 22, 201412 yr Author my suggestion would be to move to nzbget, much lighter than sab and very efficient Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk I'm testing out nzbget. It is maintaining the download speed, but my sysload is peaking at over 8 during just the download, and the unpacking is taking an unbelievably long time. 9gb file is reportedly going to take 1 hour and 40 minutes to unrar. I have the E3-1230 v2 (Quad Core w/ hyperthreading) and unpacking the temp files to a 7200 RPM cache. I guess I was expecting faster. My Mac processed files a lot faster. i have a E3 1240v2 ... not sure how much more horsepower it has vs the 1230, but i can tell you that nzbget (currently running as docker container) uses approx 5% of one core ... load while downloading is 0.22, 0.15, 0.14 ... its not unraring right now but i seem to remember seeing load go up to 3, maybe 4. there's got to be something else going on with your setup ... nevertheless, i would switch to nzbget regardless ... i used sab and it was "horrible, horrible, horrible" as tucansam said ... never looked back Would you be willing to either send me your nzbget.conf file with any of your personal date removed, or show me a screenshot. Maybe there is a setting I've done wrong. I noticed that when I am trying to grab a TV show it ends up downloading a second file as a backup which I don't think is normal.
February 22, 201412 yr sure, here's the nzbget.conf ... pls note that in my setup i'm using two separate disks (/mnt/cache and /mnt/storage point to different hard drives) /mnt/cache: for temporary files /mnt/storage: for finished files (this could be a cache disk in an unraid setup) also, make sure you have correct paths to unrar and 7zip executables other than that, it's a pretty standard configuration. also, try and run top, then press 1 ... it will show per cpu usage ... or run htop, which is a bit more graphical (not sure if it's included in base unraid). nzbget.conf
February 22, 201412 yr Author sure, here's the nzbget.conf ... pls note that in my setup i'm using two separate disks (/mnt/cache and /mnt/storage point to different hard drives) /mnt/cache: for temporary files /mnt/storage: for finished files (this could be a cache disk in an unraid setup) also, make sure you have correct paths to unrar and 7zip executables other than that, it's a pretty standard configuration. also, try and run top, then press 1 ... it will show per cpu usage ... or run htop, which is a bit more graphical (not sure if it's included in base unraid). Thanks, I'll give this a look!
February 22, 201412 yr I've been running sab for about 4 years and never had any issues, but give that other app a try
February 22, 201412 yr Author I ended up going back to sabnzbd. NZBGet was more of a headache than sabnzbd for me. Everything is working for the moment, but the next time this reproduces, I'll be sure to post pictures as well as my system.log.
February 22, 201412 yr I run sab at higher speeds than what you show and sysloads don't get wonky like you show. The only time I get fluctuating download speeds is if I am trying to transfer faster than my VPN router can handle or too many ports used for the current speed. Couple things to note is to keep the port count realistic for the speed you are running. More ports does not necessarily mean better performance/faster downloads. Too many ports for the speed can have a negative affect. Only need as many ports as is necessary to saturate the bandwidth you have available or limited to. Using article cache will reduce unnecessary frequent drive hits during download and pausing download during post-processing is also worthy of a tick in the settings. Google tuning sabnzbd for other pointers.
February 22, 201412 yr Author I run sab at higher speeds than what you show and sysloads don't get wonky like you show. The only time I get fluctuating download speeds is if I am trying to transfer faster than my VPN router can handle or too many ports used for the current speed. Couple things to note is to keep the port count realistic for the speed you are running. More ports does not necessarily mean better performance/faster downloads. Too many ports for the speed can have a negative affect. Only need as many ports as is necessary to saturate the bandwidth you have available or limited to. Using article cache will reduce unnecessary frequent drive hits during download and pausing download during post-processing is also worthy of a tick in the settings. Google tuning sabnzbd for other pointers. I think part of the sysload issue was the result of two Plex transcoding sessions. I am starting to think that sysload wasn't really an issue. Especially given the processor and RAM I have in my UnRAID box. I have dropped the connections from 30 to 15 which still maxes out of my speed. I have also started using article cache. I'll see what happens over the next week or so. Thanks for the additional tips.
February 22, 201412 yr I don't have much to being to the table but when I tried nzbget I didn't like fact that it showed my passwords in plain text. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
February 22, 201412 yr usenet is the wild west with only a barest nod to standardizations for posts. it fundamentally is not designed to do what it now used for. throw in crazy naming schemes, different encoding, the complete map of compression types and a myriad of other crazyness I wont go into and you can get OTT loads easily. when trying to debug you need to find a nzb that creates the symptom and then use that as a baseline for testing I also concur nzbget is vastly superior to sab now but quite a bit of an initial learning curve
February 22, 201412 yr I would like to know if nzbget is also able to stream downloads to XBMC via Pneumatic. Do you guys know if that is possible?
February 24, 201412 yr I think part of the sysload issue was the result of two Plex transcoding sessions. I am starting to think that sysload wasn't really an issue. Especially given the processor and RAM I have in my UnRAID box. I have dropped the connections from 30 to 15 which still maxes out of my speed. I have also started using article cache. I'll see what happens over the next week or so. Thanks for the additional tips. I've been using 250MB for my article cache on unRAID even before Influencer's plugins and that seems to work well for me. Also, related to your graphs, that does look much like a Plex transcoding session (since it bursts, then pauses, bursts, pauses, and so on).
February 24, 201412 yr Author Ok, the problem is back in repro now. I am seeing the download speed fluctuating all over the place at the moment. There is one transcoding session from Plex, but I don't see how this would cause a problem since I am still way below a system load that would cause an issue. One other note, normally unpacking with sabnzb is relatively quick. While the problem is happening is it unbelievably slow. If I didn't know any better I'd think that something completely buried at the moment, but I have 16GB of RAM and 8 cores. Another thing to add, I had Plex become completely unresponsive and had to kill it in UnRAID. Plex as well as all of my other apps reside on a 7200 RPM Hitachi cache drive. I just timed a file unraring and it took 25 seconds to unrar a 5MB file. Earlier when the problem wasn't occurring it was doing a file every couple of seconds. Granted, I don't know what the file size to compare, but 25 seconds to unrar a 5MB file seems incredibly slow to me given my processor, RAM and system load. Here is the system at it's absolute worst: I had performed a quick SMART test without a problem. Anyone else have any ideas? This is maddening. I was thinking that setting up a faster, dedicated server would improve my situation. It has made it worse.
February 24, 201412 yr Author I was able to clear the problem again by rebooting my UnRAID. I tried to stop the sabnzbd service in the UnRAID menu and it just hangs. When I tried to unmount my disks so I could reboot, it hung on syncing file system despite having deleted the problematic file. I had to execute the powerdown script in order reboot. I will admit my relative lack of experience in troubleshooting Linux. I am using the Influencer plugins for sabnzbd, CouchPotato, and SickBeard. Could it be a problem with Python conflicts?
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