Toshiba Canvio External HDD <80kb/s transfer speed

tg550 · 07-26-2022, 06:57 AM

The system:

Code:

Distributor ID:	Ubuntu
Description:	Ubuntu 20.04.4 LTS
Release:	20.04
Codename:	focal
with kernel: 5.4.0-122-lowlatency

Laptop Dell XPS 13 9343

Toshiba Canvio 1TB HDD with USB 3.0 capabilities (Although my old laptop doesn't support USB 3.0)

The problem:

I recently bought a brand new Canvio 1TB External HDD. At first, I was copying things from my laptop with the normal expected speeds, but then at 7% capacity something happened and the speed dropped to ~80kb/s.

I had also, that day, been copying some large files from a Dropbox account to my laptop and accidentally ran out of space. The download stopped, I cleaned the files up and then when I tried copying to the Canvio, the slow transfer speeds ensued.

I've since tested the drive on my friends Lenovo running windows 10 and the transfer speeds are fine.

I've been scouring the internet for solutions and so far nothing concrete. There was one guy who updated his BIOS in 2018 on linux mint and this helped a bit but as a newb I don't want to be messing around with that unless its a guaranteed fix. Link here (https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=271364)

Here's my current BIOS although there was a lot of info and I'm not sure what is the most relevant thing to copy

Code:

BIOS Information
	Vendor: Dell Inc.
	Version: A09
	Release Date: 08/29/2016
	Address: 0xF0000
	Runtime Size: 64 kB
	ROM Size: 12288 kB

I've also read somewhere that the write cache should be enabled but when i try to check it on the external drive i get told I don't have permission despite using

Code:

sudo chown -R tom /media/tom/"TOSHIBA EXT"

I'm not sure what to do about that, or even if it would help anyway.

I've also tried a speed test with hdparm

Code:

/dev/sdb:
 Timing buffered disk reads:  14 MB in  3.00 seconds =   4.67 MB/sec

Also this one

Code:

/dev/sdb:
 Timing cached reads:   16218 MB in  1.99 seconds = 8140.21 MB/sec

And of course I've tried switching everything on and off again...

Any have an ideas of what I can do?

business_kid · 07-27-2022, 06:10 AM

//hello, tg550 & welcome to LQ

I'd like to see the outoput of

Code:

sudo hdparm -Tt /dev/whatever-it-is

If your /etc/fstab uses uuids, as I suspect, run this in a terminal

Code:

ls -l /dev/disk/by-uuid

that should give you something like '/dev/sdb1' where sdb is the drive. You don't need the partition, iirc.

Please explain how you can say it was fine in windows, when for sure windows doesn't read linux (Or anyone else's) disk formats. How is it formatted?

Lastly, post the output of

Code:

 sudo df -h

tg550 · 07-27-2022, 12:15 PM

Thanks for your response business_kid, I appreciate it.

The drive is NTFS formatted.

The output from hdparm -tT I posted already at the end of question, I called it 'speed test'. I ran it again today and got the following

Code:

sudo hdparm -t /dev/sdb
/dev/sdb:
Timing buffered disk reads: 416 MB in  3.01 seconds = 138.28 MB/sec

sudo hdparm -T /dev/sdb
/dev/sdb:
 Timing cached reads:   15334 MB in  1.99 seconds = 7695.26 MB/sec

Further Output, would you mind explaining what you're looking for here please? I see the permissions for each drive but what do they correspond to?

Code:

(base) tom@toms-comp:~$ ls -l /dev/disk/by-uuid
total 0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 10 Jul 27 18:49 1FB4-1E57 -> ../../sda1
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 10 Jul 27 18:49 c62df8d8-8616-4126-82da-f02b3423e3be -> ../../sda2
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 10 Jul 27 19:02 F444938644934A6E -> ../../sdb1

And this one, what exactly are you looking for?

Code:

sudo df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
udev            3,9G     0  3,9G   0% /dev
tmpfs           785M  2,2M  783M   1% /run
/dev/sda2       234G  197G   25G  90% /
tmpfs           3,9G   51M  3,8G   2% /dev/shm
tmpfs           5,0M  4,0K  5,0M   1% /run/lock
tmpfs           3,9G     0  3,9G   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
/dev/loop2      128K  128K     0 100% /snap/bare/5
/dev/loop0      301M  301M     0 100% /snap/acestreamplayer/12
/dev/loop1      265M  265M     0 100% /snap/acestreamplayer/11
/dev/loop3       56M   56M     0 100% /snap/core18/2409
/dev/loop4      114M  114M     0 100% /snap/core/13425
/dev/loop7      164M  164M     0 100% /snap/firefox/1589
/dev/loop5       83M   83M     0 100% /snap/discord/137
/dev/loop6       62M   62M     0 100% /snap/core20/1581
/dev/loop8       56M   56M     0 100% /snap/core18/2538
/dev/loop10     128K  128K     0 100% /snap/cncra/63
/dev/loop12     278M  278M     0 100% /snap/gimp/380
/dev/loop13      83M   83M     0 100% /snap/discord/132
/dev/loop11     8,4M  8,4M     0 100% /snap/evince/1016
/dev/loop14     8,4M  8,4M     0 100% /snap/evince/1017
/dev/loop16     114M  114M     0 100% /snap/core/13308
/dev/loop17     162M  162M     0 100% /snap/firefox/1551
/dev/loop15     768K  768K     0 100% /snap/gnome-characters/761
/dev/loop18     128K  128K     0 100% /snap/cncra/61
/dev/loop19     640K  640K     0 100% /snap/gnome-logs/106
/dev/loop20     141M  141M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-26-1604/104
/dev/loop21     915M  915M     0 100% /snap/libreoffice/256
/dev/loop24     348M  348M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform-runtime/311
/dev/loop22     392M  392M     0 100% /snap/gimp/383
/dev/loop23     251M  251M     0 100% /snap/zoom-client/170
/dev/loop25     141M  141M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-26-1604/102
/dev/loop27     163M  163M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/145
/dev/loop26     2,7M  2,7M     0 100% /snap/gnome-calculator/920
/dev/loop28     100M  100M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform-3-stable/14
/dev/loop29     457M  457M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform/122
/dev/loop30     2,7M  2,7M     0 100% /snap/gnome-system-monitor/174
/dev/loop32     2,7M  2,7M     0 100% /snap/gnome-system-monitor/178
/dev/loop31     347M  347M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform-runtime/310
/dev/loop33     165M  165M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-28-1804/161
/dev/loop34     219M  219M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-34-1804/77
/dev/loop35     219M  219M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-34-1804/72
/dev/loop36     255M  255M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-38-2004/106
/dev/loop37     135M  135M     0 100% /snap/g-calendar/3
/dev/loop38     291M  291M     0 100% /snap/kde-frameworks-5-qt-5-14-core18/4
/dev/loop39     8,9M  8,9M     0 100% /snap/pdfmixtool/864
/dev/loop40     768K  768K     0 100% /snap/gnome-characters/741
/dev/loop41     100M  100M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform-3-stable/11
/dev/loop42     640K  640K     0 100% /snap/gnome-logs/112
/dev/loop43     256K  256K     0 100% /snap/gtk2-common-themes/13
/dev/loop44     913M  913M     0 100% /snap/libreoffice/257
/dev/loop45     304M  304M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform-5-stable/16
/dev/loop46     457M  457M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform/125
/dev/loop48     256K  256K     0 100% /snap/gtk2-common-themes/9
/dev/loop47     401M  401M     0 100% /snap/gnome-3-38-2004/112
/dev/loop49     2,5M  2,5M     0 100% /snap/gnome-calculator/884
/dev/loop50      92M   92M     0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1535
/dev/loop51     304M  304M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform-5-stable/18
/dev/loop52     296M  296M     0 100% /snap/vlc/2344
/dev/loop53      82M   82M     0 100% /snap/gtk-common-themes/1534
/dev/loop54     457M  457M     0 100% /snap/wine-platform/128
/dev/loop55     250M  250M     0 100% /snap/zoom-client/168
/dev/loop57     261M  261M     0 100% /snap/kde-frameworks-5-core18/32
/dev/loop56     296M  296M     0 100% /snap/vlc/2288
/dev/loop58     8,9M  8,9M     0 100% /snap/pdfmixtool/862
/dev/sda1       511M  5,3M  506M   2% /boot/efi
tmpfs           785M   16K  785M   1% /run/user/121
/dev/loop59      62M   62M     0 100% /snap/core20/1587
tmpfs           785M   40K  785M   1% /run/user/1000
/dev/sdb1       932G   70G  863G   8% /media/usb0

computersavvy · 07-27-2022, 06:40 PM

Toshiba site shows that drive is preformatted as ntfs.
They also do not give any real data on the drive other than size and their advertised transfer rates which are actually the USB transfer rates for both usb3 and usb2.

It may be that toshiba has taken the same route as WD and Seagate with making all their consumer drives with the SMR technology which is known to slow down drive write speeds drastically once a small amount of data has been written. WD and Seagate still use the CMR write tech on their industrial drives for NAS and servers. I only use CMR tech drives in all my PCs, even though the cost is higher.

We may be able to get more info on the exact specs for that drive if we had the model number, which can be easily found with `smartctl -a /dev/sdd` (assuming of course that the drive is identified as /dev/sdd)

tg550 · 07-30-2022, 04:07 AM

For some reason my replies are not being approved so here's the output from smartctl again. Also it should be noted that the drive is only 7% full.

Code:

smartctl 7.1 2019-12-30 r5022 [x86_64-linux-5.4.0-122-lowlatency] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-19, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Toshiba 2.5" HDD MQ04UBF... (USB 3.0)
Device Model:     TOSHIBA MQ04UBF100
Serial Number:    Y0B4T12HT
LU WWN Device Id: 0 000000 000000000
Firmware Version: JU003U
User Capacity:    1.000.204.886.016 bytes [1,00 TB]
Sector Sizes:     512 bytes logical, 4096 bytes physical
Rotation Rate:    5400 rpm
Form Factor:      2.5 inches
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   ACS-3 T13/2161-D revision 5
SATA Version is:  SATA 3.3, 3.0 Gb/s (current: 3.0 Gb/s)
Local Time is:    Sat Jul 30 11:05:53 2022 CEST
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status:  (0x00)	Offline data collection activity
					was never started.
					Auto Offline Data Collection: Disabled.
Self-test execution status:      (   0)	The previous self-test routine completed
					without error or no self-test has ever 
					been run.
Total time to complete Offline 
data collection: 		(  120) seconds.
Offline data collection
capabilities: 			 (0x5b) SMART execute Offline immediate.
					Auto Offline data collection on/off support.
					Suspend Offline collection upon new
					command.
					Offline surface scan supported.
					Self-test supported.
					No Conveyance Self-test supported.
					Selective Self-test supported.
SMART capabilities:            (0x0003)	Saves SMART data before entering
					power-saving mode.
					Supports SMART auto save timer.
Error logging capability:        (0x01)	Error logging supported.
					General Purpose Logging supported.
Short self-test routine 
recommended polling time: 	 (   2) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time: 	 ( 168) minutes.
SCT capabilities: 	       (0x003d)	SCT Status supported.
					SCT Error Recovery Control supported.
					SCT Feature Control supported.
					SCT Data Table supported.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 16
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME          FLAG     VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE      UPDATED  WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
  1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate     0x000b   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  2 Throughput_Performance  0x0005   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Offline      -       0
  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0027   100   100   001    Pre-fail  Always       -       2489
  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       38
  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x000b   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  8 Seek_Time_Performance   0x0005   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Offline      -       0
  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       10
 10 Spin_Retry_Count        0x0033   100   100   030    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
 12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       22
191 G-Sense_Error_Rate      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       8
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       76
194 Temperature_Celsius     0x0022   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       23 (Min/Max 20/46)
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0030   100   100   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
220 Disk_Shift              0x0002   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
222 Loaded_Hours            0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       1
223 Load_Retry_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
224 Load_Friction           0x0022   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
226 Load-in_Time            0x0026   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       191
240 Head_Flying_Hours       0x0001   100   100   001    Pre-fail  Offline      -       0

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
No self-tests have been logged.  [To run self-tests, use: smartctl -t]

SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 1
 SPAN  MIN_LBA  MAX_LBA  CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
    1        0        0  Not_testing
    2        0        0  Not_testing
    3        0        0  Not_testing
    4        0        0  Not_testing
    5        0        0  Not_testing
Selective self-test flags (0x0):
  After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.
If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute delay.

tg550 · 07-30-2022, 04:19 AM

Also I see now it is using the SMR.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/to...mr-list-slower

My model looks like the MQ04. So I guess the next questions are;

1. Is it definitely this tech that is causing such a drastic slow down even when the drive is only 7% full?

2. If so, is there a way to check/fix/work around it?

teckk · 07-30-2022, 08:37 AM

My 2 cents.

I have 4 of those canvio basic/advance drives. They come with a ntfs. I get better performace writing to them, if I mount them with:

Code:

mount -o async,flush /dev/sdb1 ~/mount/dir

I've stopped using ntfs-3g, because ntfs3 in the kernel works just fine now.

That also stops the waiting 5-10 seconds for the cache to write to drive, after the copy process has finished. It writes and it's done.

Write speed is also increased, on USB2 and USB3. I don't have any official test to show you. Watching gkrellm while the drive is being written to, the writing is even, and the write speed is somewhat faster, on USB2 and USB3.

computersavvy · 07-30-2022, 08:53 PM

I have not used one of those drives so cannot speak to the performance. Teckk apparently has and reports no issues though he gives some things he does that apparently improve performance.

The SMR tech identified here usually does not impact seriously on writes until the drive has much more data than you report, but as it fills beyond that point (25 - 50% full) you may begin to notice the slowdowns.

In answer to the workaround for the SMR tech. There is none. It is what it is and that is the way the device was made. You really should not see an impact from that until the device gets a lot more data written.

In answer to the write speed. I suggest you look at what Teckk said and consider how you are using the device. If auto-mounting then definitely you should be either manually mounting it with those options or use an fstab entry or udev rule to mount it with those options.

teckk · 07-31-2022, 07:25 AM

I've got 3 of those little toshiba drives (2GB), filled up. One has 30GB free space the other has 60GB. They haven't slowed down writing to them. Not now anyway.

With a kernel from around 5.9 to present (5.18), if I mounted them with

Code:

ntfs-3g /sdb1 /mount/point

Or use what is in the kernel now

Code:

mount /sdb1 /mount/point

Writing would be all over the place. In fact, I thought maybe that one drive was going bad. Or maybe the controller board was bad. I was just about to buy a new one and get my data off of it. Writing would start at 120MBps and then drop to 20, 40, 50 for a bit, and then jump up. Something was wrong.

Then I did a little research and found out about async and flush. I tried it. Problem gone.

gkrellm reports a fairly solid 28MBps write speed from a usb2 machine(old), and a fairly solid 140MBps from a usb3 machine.

I'm not so concerned with possibly a few MBps increase in write speed. The write stopped fluctuating and is even now.

Now, like linux has always done since I have been using it, if I write 10 large files to the drive at once, The first may write at a solid 140MBps (according to cp), the second file may drop to 90MBps, the third may write at 130MBps and so on. I do not know why that is.

And, I have several little cheap usb sticks (FAT). They don't write fast to begin with. But I have one (16GB), it would take 40 min to write it full. The write speed would be from 120KBps up to 5Mbps. The write speed would fluctuate continuously, and take forever to write.

I was mounting it with:

Code:

mount -t vfat /dev/sdb1 ~/a/b

I changed that to:

Code:

mount -o async,flush /dev/sdb1 ~/a/b

And the slow/drunk write problem went away. It now writes at around 5MBps fairly solid.

Something for anyone else to research if you wish. Or add a comment to, if you know more about this.

TorC · 07-31-2022, 08:37 AM

Personally, I avoid certain brands of storage devices with which I have seen problems seemingly engineered into them or otherwise stem from their innate state. Toshiba and SanDisk and Dlink are three I have learned to avoid.

Maybe it's just me. If so, call me a 'conspiracy theorist!' LOL.

Take it or leave it, but I would return and demand money back

teckk · 07-31-2022, 09:00 AM

I get them for backup, they are usually the cheapest thing going on newegg. A 2Gb can be had for around $48-$52 with free shipping, if you watch for the specials. I've got a 6-7 year old one. It still works ok. I leave them ntfs so that anything can mount them. They have worked ok for me, and they are small. And, no external power either. Just a USB cord. I haven't had any problem with them starving for voltage/current.

In case anyone wants a review. They work ok. But, I don't throw them around, I don't let them bake, I don't pull the usb cable in and out of them, I leave it in.

Let me see if I can read the back of one.

toshiba dtb420 2tb

https://www.toshiba-storage.com/prod...canvio-basics/

https://www.toshiba-storage.com/wp-c...A2R_190515.pdf (5.1MB)

tg550 · 08-01-2022, 02:08 PM

Thanks for help guys I appreciate it.

I will try teck's suggestion of manual mounting but first I need to switch off auto mounting and I've tried three different methods now and it won't work!

I tried using dconf-editor and switching it off manually, this didn't work, as soon as I plug the USB cable in it still automatically mounts.

So then I tried this method by disabling udisks.

https://askubuntu.com/questions/1062...-kubuntu-18-04

This had to the effect of automounting under a different name 'usb0' and now wI can't unmount without running a terminal command... sigh...

Any ideas what else I can do oh wisened brains of wisdom?

business_kid · 08-02-2022, 06:41 AM

I don't think you need to disable automounting.

simply put the options in /etc/fstab along with the drive details.

tg550 · 08-03-2022, 02:21 PM

Ok, I've never editted the fstab before but I've just read up on it. I'm gonna make a backup, just in case. But just to be clear; if I edit fstab do I just add this line teck suggested, with the relevant device name, in my case sdb instead of sdb1 and save the file? What is the last part ~a/b mean?

Code:

mount -o async,flush /dev/sdb1 ~/a/b

I'm a little hesitant in case I mess something up.

This is my current fstab

Code:

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
# / was on /dev/sda2 during installation
UUID=c62df8d8-8616-4126-82da-f02b3423e3be /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /boot/efi was on /dev/sda1 during installation
UUID=1FB4-1E57  /boot/efi       vfat    umask=0077      0       1
/swapfile                                 none            swap    sw              0       0

Thanks again

teckk · 08-03-2022, 03:57 PM

Quote:

What is the last part ~a/b mean?

A lazy example, I could have said mount /dev/sdb1 /mount/point