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    [solved] pfSense (2.6.0 & 22.01 ) is very slow on Hyper-V

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    • P
      PaulPrior
      last edited by

      So, disabling RSC has restored the network speed between VMs behind the pfSense and the internet (HTTPS download speeds), but the inter-vlan SMB file copy speeds are awful. Not quite dial-up modem speeds but almost.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • stephenw10S
        stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
        last edited by stephenw10

        Neither of you using hardware pass-through?

        You both have VLANs on hn NICs directly?
        I could definitely believe it was some hardware VLAN off-load issue.

        What do you see in: sysctl hw.hn

        Steve

        Bob.DigB D P 4 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • Bob.DigB
          Bob.Dig LAYER 8 @stephenw10
          last edited by Bob.Dig

          @stephenw10 said in After Upgrade inter (V)LAN communication is very slow on Hyper-V, for others WAN Speed is affected:

          sysctl hw.hn


          hw.hn.vf_xpnt_attwait: 2
          hw.hn.vf_xpnt_accbpf: 0
          hw.hn.vf_transparent: 1
          hw.hn.vfmap:
          hw.hn.vflist:
          hw.hn.tx_agg_pkts: -1
          hw.hn.tx_agg_size: -1
          hw.hn.lro_mbufq_depth: 0
          hw.hn.tx_swq_depth: 0
          hw.hn.tx_ring_cnt: 0
          hw.hn.chan_cnt: 0
          hw.hn.use_if_start: 0
          hw.hn.use_txdesc_bufring: 1
          hw.hn.tx_taskq_mode: 0
          hw.hn.tx_taskq_cnt: 1
          hw.hn.lro_entry_count: 128
          hw.hn.direct_tx_size: 128
          hw.hn.tx_chimney_size: 0
          hw.hn.tso_maxlen: 65535
          hw.hn.udpcs_fixup_mtu: 1420
          hw.hn.udpcs_fixup: 0
          hw.hn.enable_udp6cs: 1
          hw.hn.enable_udp4cs: 1
          hw.hn.trust_hostip: 1
          hw.hn.trust_hostudp: 1
          hw.hn.trust_hosttcp: 1

          Is looking the same on both "machines".

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          • Bob.DigB
            Bob.Dig LAYER 8 @stephenw10
            last edited by Bob.Dig

            @stephenw10 I moved the Windows machine to a new vNIC and vSwitch, this time without VLAN. Problem stays, so seems not VLAN related.

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            • stephenw10S
              stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
              last edited by

              There are two loader variables we set in Azure that you don't have:

              hw.hn.vf_transparent="0"
              hw.hn.use_if_start="1"
              

              I have no particular insight into what those do though. And that didn't change in 2.6.

              How is your traffic between internal interfaces different to via your WAN in the new setup?

              Steve

              Bob.DigB 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Bob.DigB
                Bob.Dig LAYER 8 @stephenw10
                last edited by Bob.Dig

                @stephenw10 There is no difference at all.

                For the last two hours I tried to test with iperf between the hosts, with the old and new pfsense, and I couldn't measure any differences... so it might be SMB specific?
                I only see one other person having the same problem.
                It wouldn't been the first time I had to install pfSense fresh from the get-go after a new version. Whatever my usecase is, it might be special...
                So I guess "This is the Way".

                D Bob.DigB 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • P
                  PaulPrior
                  last edited by

                  Finally had to revert back to v2.5.2, the performance is just too poor on 2.6.0 to cope with. I'll have another shot at testing 2.6.0 at the weekend.

                  Lesson learned on my part here; always take a checkpoint before upgrading the firmware.

                  On the plus side, 2.5.2 is blisteringly fast!

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • D
                    Dominixise @Bob.Dig
                    last edited by

                    @bob-dig

                    Sorry to derail your topic but I am searching google too (maybe its a NAT issue with Hyper-V)

                    Here is some links with info that might be helpful:
                    https://superuser.com/questions/1266248/hyper-v-external-network-switch-kills-my-hosts-network-performance

                    https://anandthearchitect.com/2018/01/06/windows-10-how-to-setup-nat-network-for-hyper-v-guests/

                    Dom

                    Bob.DigB 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • D
                      DonZalmrol @stephenw10
                      last edited by DonZalmrol

                      @stephenw10 said in After Upgrade inter (V)LAN communication is very slow (on Hyper-V).:

                      Neither of you using hardware pass-through?

                      You both have VLANs on hn NICs directly?
                      I could definitely believe it was some hardware VLAN off-load issue.

                      What do you see in: sysctl hw.hn

                      Steve

                      1. No, disabled in PFSense:
                        ce246da9-9add-4111-b5d3-1f6f4cca2499-image.png Enabling/ disabling ALTQ seems to have no measurable impact at this moment.

                      2. No, on Hyper-V its a direct virtual hardware adapter with a VLAN assigned to it, so for PFSense the interface is just an interface, I do not use any VLANs in PFSense. This is repeated for 8 interfaces.

                      3. sysctl hw.hn output:

                      hw.hn.vf_xpnt_attwait: 2
                      hw.hn.vf_xpnt_accbpf: 0
                      hw.hn.vf_transparent: 0
                      hw.hn.vfmap:
                      hw.hn.vflist:
                      hw.hn.tx_agg_pkts: -1
                      hw.hn.tx_agg_size: -1
                      hw.hn.lro_mbufq_depth: 0
                      hw.hn.tx_swq_depth: 0
                      hw.hn.tx_ring_cnt: 0
                      hw.hn.chan_cnt: 0
                      hw.hn.use_if_start: 1
                      hw.hn.use_txdesc_bufring: 1
                      hw.hn.tx_taskq_mode: 0
                      hw.hn.tx_taskq_cnt: 1
                      hw.hn.lro_entry_count: 128
                      hw.hn.direct_tx_size: 128
                      hw.hn.tx_chimney_size: 0
                      hw.hn.tso_maxlen: 65535
                      hw.hn.udpcs_fixup_mtu: 1420
                      hw.hn.udpcs_fixup: 0
                      hw.hn.enable_udp6cs: 1
                      hw.hn.enable_udp4cs: 1
                      hw.hn.trust_hostip: 1
                      hw.hn.trust_hostudp: 1
                      hw.hn.trust_hosttcp: 1
                      

                      Some images on how the PFSense guest is set up:
                      NW Adapter
                      df7c02a5-48ce-4a1b-87c9-d53e583ecd6f-image.png

                      HW Acceleration
                      5ce85ca0-1577-42a9-9e18-57b962ce46d8-image.png

                      Advanced features 1/2
                      da4b6515-ade6-49a4-a440-cef89030afe7-image.png

                      Advanced features 2/2
                      ad746300-f64f-4ba1-8c96-bc8ac4a2731f-image.png

                      My server's physical NW adapter is teamed in LACP:
                      a87b53e8-0899-4601-83a2-84d9463439e6-image.png

                      Using a HPE 10G 2-Port 546FLR-SFP+ (FLR -> Flexible LOM (Lan On Motherboard) Rack ) card which uses a Mellanox X-3 Pro processor which is supported by FreeBSD.
                      Datasheet: https://www.hpe.com/psnow/doc/c04543737.pdf?jumpid=in_lit-psnow-getpdf

                      @RMH-0 It matches my speedtest, the test is in Mbps (megabits/s) while PFSense is in MBps (megabytes/s), this is my speedtest output:
                      188b7ed3-71d5-412f-85c6-5e5c5ef3b3e7-image.png

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                      • P
                        PaulPrior @stephenw10
                        last edited by

                        @stephenw10 I disabled all of the hardware offloading (and many combinations of partially on and off). The only setting that increased speed was to disable ALTQ support which doubled the throughput but since it has already become about 10-20 times slower a doubling wasn't great.
                        All of my adapters are Hyper-V virtual adapters except for the one on the WAN interface which bonds to a physical intel adapter.
                        Back on v2.5.2 now and inter-vlan performance is an order of magnitude better.

                        D 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                        • D
                          DonZalmrol @PaulPrior
                          last edited by

                          @paulprior glad to hear that, I'm going to rollback my other site (B) and keep this one on 2.6.0 for further troubleshooting.

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • Bob.DigB
                            Bob.Dig LAYER 8 @Dominixise
                            last edited by Bob.Dig

                            @dominixise said in After Upgrade inter (V)LAN communication is very slow (on Hyper-V).:

                            Here is some links with info that might be helpful:
                            https://superuser.com/questions/1266248/hyper-v-external-network-switch-kills-my-hosts-network-performance

                            I already tried using just private vSwitches, nothing changed.

                            @stephenw10 said in After Upgrade inter (V)LAN communication is very slow (on Hyper-V).:

                            There are two loader variables we set in Azure that you don't have:

                            I added those to "SystemAdvancedSystem Tunables" and did a reboot but it didn't changed anything.

                            I did some more iperfing, this time also the other way around, so I changed client and server and there it shows:

                            C:\>iperf2.exe -c 192.168.1.10 -p 4711 -t 60 -i 10
                            ------------------------------------------------------------
                            Client connecting to 192.168.1.10, TCP port 4711
                            TCP window size: 64.0 KByte (default)
                            ------------------------------------------------------------
                            [  1] local 192.168.183.10 port 55124 connected with 192.168.1.10 port 4711
                            [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
                            [  1] 0.00-10.00 sec  1.38 MBytes  1.15 Mbits/sec
                            [  1] 10.00-20.00 sec   128 KBytes   105 Kbits/sec
                            [  1] 20.00-30.00 sec   256 KBytes   210 Kbits/sec
                            [  1] 30.00-40.00 sec   256 KBytes   210 Kbits/sec
                            [  1] 40.00-50.00 sec   128 KBytes   105 Kbits/sec
                            [  1] 50.00-60.00 sec   256 KBytes   210 Kbits/sec
                            [  1] 0.00-123.86 sec  2.38 MBytes   161 Kbits/sec
                            
                            C:\>iperf2.exe -c 192.168.183.10 -p 4711 -t 60 -i 10
                            ------------------------------------------------------------
                            Client connecting to 192.168.183.10, TCP port 4711
                            TCP window size: 64.0 KByte (default)
                            ------------------------------------------------------------
                            [  1] local 192.168.1.10 port 56363 connected with 192.168.183.10 port 4711
                            [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
                            [  1] 0.00-10.00 sec  6.29 GBytes  5.41 Gbits/sec
                            [  1] 10.00-20.00 sec  6.28 GBytes  5.40 Gbits/sec
                            [  1] 20.00-30.00 sec  6.94 GBytes  5.97 Gbits/sec
                            [  1] 30.00-40.00 sec  6.81 GBytes  5.85 Gbits/sec
                            [  1] 40.00-50.00 sec  6.99 GBytes  6.01 Gbits/sec
                            [  1] 50.00-60.00 sec  6.94 GBytes  5.96 Gbits/sec
                            [  1] 0.00-60.00 sec  40.3 GBytes  5.77 Gbits/sec
                            

                            Only tcp is affected and it only shows when "my" machine is the server, not the other way around. It is not SMB specific and I already mentioned that connecting to socks proxy in another vlan also makes these problems.

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                            • Bob.DigB
                              Bob.Dig LAYER 8
                              last edited by Bob.Dig

                              I made yet another test, just private switches between two VMs and the pfSense VM, no external, no physical switch involved and no VLAN.

                              Again TCP is problematic, this time in both directions. One UDP bench for reference.

                              C:\>iperf2.exe -c 192.168.45.100 -p 4711 -t 60 -i 10
                              ------------------------------------------------------------
                              Client connecting to 192.168.45.100, TCP port 4711
                              TCP window size: 64.0 KByte (default)
                              ------------------------------------------------------------
                              [  1] local 192.168.44.100 port 52446 connected with 192.168.45.100 port 4711
                              [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
                              [  1] 0.00-10.00 sec   384 KBytes   315 Kbits/sec
                              [  1] 10.00-20.00 sec   256 KBytes   210 Kbits/sec
                              [  1] 20.00-30.00 sec   128 KBytes   105 Kbits/sec
                              [  1] 30.00-40.00 sec   256 KBytes   210 Kbits/sec
                              [  1] 40.00-50.00 sec   256 KBytes   210 Kbits/sec
                              [  1] 50.00-60.00 sec   128 KBytes   105 Kbits/sec
                              [  1] 0.00-121.14 sec  1.38 MBytes  95.2 Kbits/sec
                              
                              
                              C:\>iperf2.exe -c 192.168.44.100 -p 4711 -t 60 -i 10
                              ------------------------------------------------------------
                              Client connecting to 192.168.44.100, TCP port 4711
                              TCP window size: 64.0 KByte (default)
                              ------------------------------------------------------------
                              [  1] local 192.168.45.100 port 55314 connected with 192.168.44.100 port 4711
                              [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
                              [  1] 0.00-10.00 sec  4.00 MBytes  3.36 Mbits/sec
                              [  1] 10.00-20.00 sec  3.88 MBytes  3.25 Mbits/sec
                              [  1] 20.00-30.00 sec  3.88 MBytes  3.25 Mbits/sec
                              [  1] 30.00-40.00 sec  3.88 MBytes  3.25 Mbits/sec
                              [  1] 40.00-50.00 sec  3.88 MBytes  3.25 Mbits/sec
                              [  1] 50.00-60.00 sec  3.88 MBytes  3.25 Mbits/sec
                              [  1] 0.00-61.97 sec  23.5 MBytes  3.18 Mbits/sec
                              
                              
                              C:\>iperf2.exe -c 192.168.44.100 -p 4712 -u -t 60 -i 10 -b 10000M
                              ------------------------------------------------------------
                              Client connecting to 192.168.44.100, UDP port 4712
                              Sending 1470 byte datagrams, IPG target: 1.12 us (kalman adjust)
                              UDP buffer size: 64.0 KByte (default)
                              ------------------------------------------------------------
                              [  1] local 192.168.45.100 port 62027 connected with 192.168.44.100 port 4712
                              [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
                              [  1] 0.00-10.00 sec  3.61 GBytes  3.10 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] 10.00-20.00 sec  3.63 GBytes  3.12 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] 20.00-30.00 sec  3.67 GBytes  3.15 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] 30.00-40.00 sec  3.63 GBytes  3.12 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] 40.00-50.00 sec  3.67 GBytes  3.15 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] 50.00-60.00 sec  3.70 GBytes  3.18 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] 0.00-60.00 sec  21.9 GBytes  3.14 Gbits/sec
                              [  1] Sent 16009349 datagrams
                              [  1] Server Report:
                              [ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth        Jitter   Lost/Total Datagrams
                              [  1] 0.00-60.00 sec  21.6 GBytes  3.09 Gbits/sec   0.915 ms 254222/16009348 (1.6%)
                              
                              

                              I am kinda done. 😉

                              D 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • D
                                DonZalmrol @Bob.Dig
                                last edited by

                                @bob-dig how is your Hyper-V guest set up? Similar to mine? Perhaps you need to disable VMQ and SR-IOV and test again?

                                Bob.DigB 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                • Bob.DigB
                                  Bob.Dig LAYER 8 @DonZalmrol
                                  last edited by

                                  @donzalmrol Already did this, didn't helped.

                                  D 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • D
                                    DonZalmrol @Bob.Dig
                                    last edited by

                                    Ran an Iperf between two 10G my host and one guest:
                                    05dc8918-9076-49af-8d5b-09388dc26e8a-image.png

                                    f19352b2-a7be-4e1a-a776-76cda71a8002-image.png

                                    Receive quite good results on both TCP and UDP.

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                                    • T
                                      ttmcmurry
                                      last edited by ttmcmurry

                                      This same scenario just played out in my environment as well. I spent hours on the line with my ISP trying to figure it out and left for the night with them escalating to a higher level technician.

                                      It occurred to me after getting off the phone to search the internet for pfsense and hyper-v in the last week and it led me straight to this article. The hyper-v config changes for RSC were unnecessary for my setup (it was already $false).

                                      I just spun up a new pfSense Hyper-V VM running 2.5.2 and restored from pfSense Auto Backup using the pre-upgrade auto config save, and everything is running perfectly. There were no Windows updates, no changes to Hyper-V / I reverted the settings I changed during diagnostics.

                                      There's certainly something not right with 2.6.0. I re-learned that I need to make fewer major changes in one setting.

                                      I took the opportunity to test pfSense 2.6.0 on various versions of Windows & Hyper-V. This same behavior occurred in Server 2016 (14393.4886), Windows 10 (19044.1526), and Windows 11 (22000.493).

                                      Bob.DigB 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                      • Bob.DigB
                                        Bob.Dig LAYER 8 @ttmcmurry
                                        last edited by Bob.Dig

                                        @ttmcmurry said in After Upgrade inter (V)LAN communication is very slow (on Hyper-V).:

                                        I took the opportunity to test pfSense 2.6.0 on various versions of Windows & Hyper-V. This same behavior occurred in Server 2016 (14393.4886), Windows 10 (19044.1526), and Windows 11 (22000.493).

                                        That must have been some immense work on your part. What have you tried other then changing the host os?

                                        T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • T
                                          ttmcmurry @Bob.Dig
                                          last edited by ttmcmurry

                                          @bob-dig it didn't take that much time :) pfSense installs & configures fast! I grabbed two laptops, stuck some extra USB NICs on them, then probably spent 15 minutes on each installation to reproduce the issue. The ease of reproducing the issue across various hardware and Windows versions does speak to the consistency of the pfSense software; even though it has this undesirable problem, at least it's consistent and reproducible. Theoretically making finding the root cause easier.

                                          Other things I tried

                                          • Reboots 😊 (Gateway, Switch, Host, VM)
                                          • On the same day I upgraded to 2.6, my ATT Gateway also got a firmware release. I jumped to conclusions & laid blame upon ATT and pursued them for a fix that was never to come.
                                          • Examined Hyper-V vSwitch settings to ensure they were configured appropriately, bound to the correct physical uplinks (no changes made)
                                          • Examined HV VM vNIC settings to ensure nothing has changed; set to pfSense recommendations (no changes made)
                                          • Double checked my switching for loops/STP, logs, errors, unexpected BPDUs from someone adding a switch somewhere I didn't know about
                                          • Interfaced with the ATT Gateway directly with laptop to test performance (this led to isolating Hyper-V as the problem)
                                          • Upgraded Intel I350-T4 drivers & PROset to 27.0 (2022/02/09) which didn't fix or make anything worse.
                                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                          • stephenw10S
                                            stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                            last edited by

                                            And you are also seeing it specifically between VLANs on hn(4) NICs?

                                            T 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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