Optimizing the navigation of GraphicConverter with a NAS

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macvf
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Joined: Fri Dec 30, 2016 11:14 am
Location: Toulon
Country: France
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Optimizing the navigation of GraphicConverter with a NAS

Post by macvf »

We often receive questions about slowness observed in the GraphicConverter Browser when accessing images located on a NAS (Network Attached Storage). Image access speed will never be as fast as with an internal disk or an external disk connected via USB 2 or 3, however it is possible to speed up access to images on a network or NAS disk by around 30 % by following the recommendations below.

The speed and smoothness of navigation in images stored on a NAS depends on:
• material characteristics:
 the NAS Ethernet network interface,
 Mac's Ethernet network interface,
 the Ethernet switch interconnecting the NAS and the Mac.

• software features:
 the communication protocol used on the Ethernet network,
 cache operated by GraphicConverter.

We recommend that you:
• Connect your Mac to your NAS via a wired Ethernet Gigabit ethernet connection (1000BASE-T) and do not use a Wifi connection.

• Make sure that the switch is also in Gigabit ethernet (1000BASE-T) especially if you are using the switch of an internet router or an internet box (often used in France).

• Configure your NAS to use the SMB network protocol (2 and / or 3) and not to use (deactivate) the AFP protocol.

• Adjust in Browser> Cache preferences of GraphicConverter:
 The size of the cache on the largest possible value.
 The number of tasks to create thumbnails in parallel on a value between 5 and 7. Tests will allow you to adjust this value according to the reactivity that you will observe which also depend on your NAS.

For the French users the detailed settings of a Synology NAS and a QNAP NAS, as well as those of GraphicConverter are specified in the task sheet Optimiser la navigation de GraphicConverter avec un NAS in the v6.2 GraphicConverter reference manual to be published with the next release of GraphicConverter 11.2.
Philippe

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FStop11
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Joined: Thu Jan 18, 2024 4:02 pm
Country: Deutschland

Re: Optimizing the navigation of GraphicConverter with a NAS

Post by FStop11 »

I think this requirements should be reviewed:

For a regular process Gigabit Ethernet looks OK, especially for private use.

For any professional / serious use, handling thousands of pictures, fast batch processes and so on, a 10GbE connection should be established. This means a Mac either equipped with a 10 GbE option (like a Studio or a mini with that option) or a Thunderbolt adapter, a Switch with 10 GbE and a NAS with a 10GbE port natively or as an add-on.

I use this adapter for my MacBook Pro: QNAP QNA-T310G1S Thunderbolt3 10GbE SFP+
and this switch: Zyxel XGS1250-12
plus this 10 GbE adapter E10G22-T1-Mini
for my Synology 1522+. I run my pictures on a RAID 1 with 2x SSD NVME 4TB, and get a speed of approx. 500MB/s write and 1.000MB/s read.

With Gigabit there was still a certain delay. Now it is like working on a local drive on the Mac.
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