[ale] NFS over wireless

[Matt Rideout]

I assume that you're running NFS over UDP? Switching to TCP is where I'd 
start.

William Witt wrote, On 08/30/2009 10:00 PM:
> The setup:
> I have an old laptop(+ a 500GB hd) acting as an NFS file server and uPnP 
> media server for my xbox360 connected via CAT5 and running 
> ubuntu-server.  I have two machines (mine and my wifes) plus the xbox 
> connected wirelessly.  My wife machine runs linuxMint and mine is 
> currently running Fedora 11.
>
> The problem:
> When either of us is copying large files (typically 1-2 GB movies) to 
> the file server, my wife's desktop and any nautilus windows will freeze 
> and sometimes crash.  I know it has to do with the NFS server because 
> when this happens "dmesg | tail" yeilds:
>
> [ 2109.988015] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2111.488016] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2112.988020] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2114.488016] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2115.988014] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2117.488015] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2118.988020] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2120.488016] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2121.988023] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
> [ 2164.731019] nfs: server smeagol not responding, timed out
>
> There is still enough available bandwidth on the wireless connection to 
> surf the web and do email.  And on her machine, everything but nautilus 
> works fine as long as there are no gnome file dialogs involved.  My 
> machine doesn't even hiccup, except for taking a long time to do an ls 
> on the nfs mount point.  I did see the same problem on my machine under 
> linuxMint and Ubuntu, but not under Suse or Fedora.
>
> The Question:
> My wife is opposed to me doing much to her machine that will impact her 
> work flow, so putting her on Suse or Fedora is out of the question.  I 
> don't own the house or I'd just run cat5 to her box.  Is there a better 
> way to tune NFS over wireless networks that will eliminate this problem 
> on ubuntu based boxen?  Am I baking up the wrong tree with NFS over 
> wireless in the first place?  If so, what should I be using?
>
> On a side note, there seems to be something in our flooring that causes 
> A LOT of loos between the second and first floor.  I wonder if there is 
> some sort of anti static conductive coating on the laminate flooring 
> that the owners put down.
>
> Will
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