Hi, I've seen the mails in the mail archive concerning a slow-down problem with reiser4. Seems like I've got the same problem. My kernel is 2.6.14-mm2 (gentoo) and my default disk scheduler is anticipatory, but I've also tried cqf and I'd say that it depends on the application for which scheduler might be a bis faster. But they're both very slow and my load is very high.
I've found out, that resizing the columns in evolution is also for me a good proof of this problem as it really creates a lot of hard disk activity. So I've done the same strace call as Craig Shelley: bauerbob ~ # echo anticipatory > /sys/block/hda/queue/scheduler bauerbob ~ # strace -T -p 6336 2>&1 | grep fsync fsync(52) = 0 <1.812899> fsync(52) = 0 <0.734160> fsync(52) = 0 <0.427722> fsync(52) = 0 <0.839306> fsync(52) = 0 <0.304873> fsync(52) = 0 <0.236160> fsync(60) = 0 <0.469446> fsync(60) = 0 <0.460405> fsync(60) = 0 <0.468343> fsync(61) = 0 <0.745482> fsync(61) = 0 <0.869358> fsync(64) = 0 <1.500842> bauerbob ~ # echo cfq > /sys/block/hda/queue/scheduler bauerbob ~ # strace -T -p 6336 2>&1 | grep fsync fsync(52) = 0 <3.131074> fsync(52) = 0 <0.806179> fsync(52) = 0 <0.341460> fsync(52) = 0 <0.212601> fsync(52) = 0 <0.251179> fsync(52) = 0 <0.614537> fsync(52) = 0 <0.246023> fsync(52) = 0 <0.238064> fsync(52) = 0 <0.386216> fsync(52) = 0 <0.205596> fsync(52) = 0 <0.250840> fsync(52) = 0 <0.246623> fsync(52) = 0 <0.242773> PID 6336 is evolution. Please let me know how I can help you. Best regards, Thorsten
