Slow file transfer between 2 NAS

[jmjg]

I have 2 network drives connected to my router and I a trying to copy files from one drive to the other and the whole process seems to be taking so long. As far as I can tell both drives as well as my computer are all connected at gigabit speed but sometimes the transfer slows down to be crawling at less then 100 Kbps and other times I see it up to 7 to 10 Mbs (sometimes seen it up to 30 Mbs but that seems to be pretty rare). Since both drives are connected to the same router as my computer, shouldn't I see a lot faster speeds? Could something in my router be affecting the transfer speed. I leave it running when I am not doing anything on the computer so it should not be affected by other network activity. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[boosted1g]

Many routers do a poor job of high transfer speeds for USB attached storage drives, cheaper routers will do even worse.
What router is it, does the router have 2 usb ports or are you using a hub, and are you using external power source for the hard drives or is the router powering it? If the router is powering 2 2.5 laptop drives I could very well see the transfer speed suffering badly.

Having drives in a computer or dedicated NAS box is usually always faster then using router usb ports.

 

[jmjg]

The 2 network drives are each connected to the Ethernet ports not USB. I am using a computer running Windows 7 to do the transfer, not sure if I can do it without a PC connected. The drives are each WD my cloud drives.

 

[jmjg]

Also the router both drives are connected to is a Netgear WNDR 3400 Duel Band WI-FI router.

 

[jsmithepa]

So you have ROUTER <- USB HUB <- DRIVES 1/2?.

First notice both drives are sharing the same USB port, so if you got both going the total bandwidth is gonna be split in half.

Then the drives don't talk to themselves directly. The data copy goes DRIVE1 -> HUB -> ROUTER > (PC WHICH ISSUED COPY COMMAND) -> ROUTER -> HUB -> DRIVE2. So if PC on wireless, God saves the queen.

Now your router maybe "too intelligent," it may low-priority simple data transfer against all other traffic. Is this happening when NOTHING ELSE is going on the LAN?

 

[boosted1g]

Try doing a ping test to the IP of the MyCloud drives to see what the speed is.

 

[boosted1g]

So you have ROUTER <- USB HUB <- DRIVES 1/2?.

First notice both drives are sharing the same USB port, so if you got both going the total bandwidth is gonna be split in half.

Then the drives don't talk to themselves directly. The data copy goes DRIVE1 -> HUB -> ROUTER > (PC WHICH ISSUED COPY COMMAND) -> ROUTER -> HUB -> DRIVE2. So if PC on wireless, God saves the queen.

Now your router maybe "too intelligent," it may low-priority simple data transfer against all other traffic. Is this happening when NOTHING ELSE is going on the LAN?

He said the drives are connected to Ethernet. The WD MyCloud drives have an Ethernet port built into them.

Since the drives are on the switch portion the router should not even care about packet prioritization.

 

[boosted1g]

The 2 network drives are each connected to the Ethernet ports not USB. I am using a computer running Windows 7 to do the transfer, not sure if I can do it without a PC connected. The drives are each WD my cloud drives.

No there is no way to tell the drive to move the file without accessing it from a PC either via SMB share, ftp or other method.

Is the PC you are using connected via Ethernet or wifi?

When you do this you are adding your PC as a middle man. The data actually has to go from Disk A to your PC, then from your PC to Disk B.

 

[jmjg]

Right I understand this, was just wondering if there is a better way. I have tried both using explorer and also with the program ultracopier and either way I get the same results. Currently trying to move a a bunch of folders that take up 150 mob, and it has been running for over a day now.

 

[jmjg]

Try doing a ping test to the IP of the MyCloud drives to see what the speed is.

How an I tell the speed with a Ping?

 

[jsmithepa]

If the rates vary that much as reported, either you are doing it through WIFI, or you have LOOPS in your LAN as if you have ethernet and WIFI activated on your PC at the same time, this will cause LOOPing and the packet confused as whether it should go out the ethernet interface or the WIFI interface.

 

[jmjg]

If the rates vary that much as reported, either you are doing it through WIFI, or you have LOOPS in your LAN as if you have ethernet and WIFI activated on your PC at the same time, this will cause LOOPing and the packet confused as whether it should go out the ethernet interface or the WIFI interface.

So you are saying that may be happening due to the fact I have both wireless and wired connections. I checked my wireless connection on my computer an it was enabled, but was not currently connected. I have disabled the wireless on the PC, to see if that makes a difference.