We compiled samba 3.6.6 to see if the new smb2 protocol could enhance transfer speeds
I used a file of 330 MB and used windows 7 that has smb2 support. samba 3.6.6 was running on a nwsp2
Also a compariosn was made with the current version of samba (3.0.24) as present in our firmware on this moment.
The results with samba 3.6.6:
With samba 3.6.6 running indeed smb2 is faster then smb1 protocol in write and read, about 20%
The graph below shows network performance using samba 3.6.6 while writing the file to the nwsp2
The last part of the graph is a writing a file to the nwsp2 with smb2, the first two hills are the same file with smb1.
You can see it smb2 hill is about 20% higher and finish in a shorter time.
Vertical is % of max speed of the connection (1 gigabit/s connection), horizontal is time.
Comparison with samba 3.0.24 performance
The bad news is that samba 3.6.6 with smb1 protocol is much slower then samba 3.0.24. Samba 3.0.24 has only smb1.
It appears that smb1 with samba 3.0.24 is even faster then samba 3.6.6 using smb2
In the graph below you can see network performance using smb 3.0.24 and writing the same file to the nwsp2 (first hill) and reading the same file (second hill). You can see it that the max speed is higher then samba 3.6.6 with smb2 in previous graph. Also it finish in shorter time proofing that data transfer is faster
conclusion
It makes no sense to implement samba 3.6.6 with smb2 support to enhance transfer speeds. Clients not having smb2 capability will even loose performance and with smb2 the performance also not match the current speed with samba 3.0.24 and smb1.
The most likely reason why we do not get a performance improvement is that the cpu and memory speed of the nwsp2 are the limiting factor. The binaries (executables) of samba 3.6.6. are much much bigger then those of samba 3.0.24 and ask for more cpu time and memory which go onto account of performance. Apperently this effect is bigger then the gain of the new smb2 protocol. Although the nwsp has 256 MB of RAM and a 800 mhz processor its is still not a strong computer. I will see if the size of samba 3.6.6 can be reduced by leaving out not required options and if this then brings improvement or not.