Expected performance of Makemkv and eSATA

[nate500]

I ran a couple of searches and didn't come up with much that was linux-specific.

I'm new to Blu ray, and new to eSATA but old to Linux..

I have a LG "Super Multi Blue" 12x eSATA drive connected to an Nvidia MCP55 SATA chipset

OS: Debian 6.0 64-bit (2.6.32-5-amd64)
Computer: HP xw9400 Workstation
CPUs: 2 x quad core Opteron 2380
RAM: 12GB ECC
Destination disk: 4x2TB SATA disks in RAID 10 with 3ware SATA controller and 256MB of battery backed write back cache

'iostat -x' reports the Blu ray drive is pegged at 100% utilization, however the Makemkv program is reporting
ripping at 2.3x at around 10MB/sec. CPU usage overall is 20-25%

I'm not sure if this is typical or not I wouldn't think it would be, might it be the SATA driver? SATA chipset? The only other thing on that SATA controller is SSD boot disk which for the most part is idle. The 3ware RAID array is pretty much idle.

Code: Select all

Device:         rrqm/s   wrqm/s     r/s     w/s   rsec/s   wsec/s avgrq-sz avgqu-sz   await  svctm  %util
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     0.99   32.67  33.07  99.20
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.77  32.13  99.60
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.67  33.20  99.60
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     0.99   32.52  31.87  98.80
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.67  33.20  99.60
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     0.99   32.65  32.00  99.20
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.80  33.33 100.00
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.65  32.13  99.60
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     0.99   32.40  33.07  99.20
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     0.99   32.39  31.87  98.80
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     0.99   32.40  33.07  99.20
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.77  32.26 100.00
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.67  33.33 100.00
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.65  32.26 100.00
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.52  32.13  99.60
scd2              0.00     0.00   30.00    0.00 23040.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.53  33.33 100.00
scd2              0.00     0.00   31.00    0.00 23808.00     0.00   768.00     1.00   32.39  32.13  99.60

Just curious what 'typical' performance can be expected under Linux with an eSATA drive (hopefully I
didn't waste my $$ by getting a drive that I'll never be able to see to near it's full potential!)

I only have 1 set of Blu ray discs at the moment (Stargate Atlantis). The drive came with a blank blu
ray I suppose I could try and burn a bunch of stuff and test the read speed from that at some point.

If there is a more optimal SATA controller I could get let me know.

Looking at LG's site there is no firmware listed for my drive (my specific drive is not even listed, but one very similar to it is.

Code: Select all

[1749655.279127] scsi 10:0:0:0: CD-ROM            HL-DT-ST BD-RE  BE12LU30  4261 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0

Normally I expect the firmware to be reported on that line, maybe it is the 4261 number..

thanks

UPDATE: On disc 2 I seem to be sustaining 4.3x or ~18.5MB/s . I have handbrake running at the same time using ~7 cpu cores.

[crowfax]

Ripping speed tends to come down to the disc a lot of the time in my experiance. Some won't go over 2x. Some sit at 3.8x or 4.4x the while time.

I have no idea why.