Fio

wikipedia:fio is a flexible io performance tester. See following examples to learn how to test your storage devices.

fio examples

fio Random read

fio --randrepeat=1 --size=5G --ioengine=libaio --direct=1 --gtod_reduce=1 --bs=4k --iodepth=64 --readwrite=randread --name=MY_TEST --filename=TEST_TO_DELETE && rm TEST_TO_DELETE

fio Sequential Write

fio --randrepeat=1 --size=5G --ioengine=libaio --direct=1 --gtod_reduce=1 --bs=4k --iodepth=64 --readwrite=write --name=MY_TEST --filename=TEST_TO_DELETE && rm TEST_TO_DELETE

fio Random Write

fio --randrepeat=1 --size=5G --ioengine=libaio --direct=1 --gtod_reduce=1 --bs=4k --iodepth=64 --readwrite=randwrite --name=MY_TEST --filename=TEST_TO_DELETE && rm TEST_TO_DELETE

--randrepeat=1

--size=5G

--ioengine=libaio

--direct=1

--gtod_reduce=1

--bs=4k

--iodepth=64

--readwrite=randwrite

--name=MY_TEST

--filename=TEST_TO_DELETE

cat random-write-test.fio 
; random write of 1G of data

[random-write]
rw=randwrite
size=1G
directory=/tmp/fio-testing/data

$ mdir /tmp/fio-testing && fio random-write-test.fio

Run status group 0 (all jobs):
  WRITE: bw=83.2MiB/s (87.3MB/s), 83.2MiB/s-83.2MiB/s (87.3MB/s-87.3MB/s), io=10.0GiB (10.7GB), run=123009-123009msec

Disk stats (read/write):
  sdd: ios=0/348004, merge=0/292322, ticks=0/156728, in_queue=183700, util=95.38%

Use direct=0 or direct=1 and compare results.

Sequential Write (not random)

cat write-test-sequential.fio 
; Sequential write of 1G of data

[write]
rw=write
size=10G
directory=/tmp/fio-testing

100% Read 4k

fio --filename=/dev/sdXXXX#### --direct=1 --rw=randrw --refill_buffers --norandommap --randrepeat=0 --ioengine=libaio --bs=4k --rwmixread=100 --iodepth=16 --numjobs=16 --runtime=60 --group_reporting --name=4ktest

100% Write 4k

fio --filename=/dev/sdXXXX#### --direct=1 --rw=randrw --refill_buffers --norandommap --randrepeat=0 --ioengine=libaio --bs=4k --rwmixread=0 --iodepth=16 --numjobs=16 --runtime=60 --group_reporting --name=4ktest

Example output:

.../...
Run status group 0 (all jobs):
  WRITE: bw=596KiB/s (611kB/s), 596KiB/s-596KiB/s (611kB/s-611kB/s), io=35.6MiB (37.3MB), run=61170-61170msec

Disk stats (read/write):
  sdc: ios=16/9115, merge=0/0, ticks=668/8173832, in_queue=8178340, util=99.90%

• Performing a Random Write Test:

sudo fio --name=randwrite --ioengine=libaio --iodepth=1 --rw=randwrite --bs=4k --direct=0 --size=512M --numjobs=2 --runtime=240 --group_reporting

• Read Write Performance Test:

sudo fio --randrepeat=1 --ioengine=libaio --direct=1 --gtod_reduce=1 --name=test --filename=random_read_write.fio --bs=4k --iodepth=64 --size=4G --readwrite=randrw --rwmixread=75

Activities

1. Read fio output explained article: https://tobert.github.io/post/2014-04-17-fio-output-explained.html
2. Benchmark disk performance using fio
3. Use direct=0 or direct=1 option and compare results. Review memory usage using free command
4. review --fallocate=none option

See also

• IO performance: iotop, iostat, sar -d, fio, nmon, vmstat -d, dd, nmon, stress
• Block devices: HDD, SSD, Intel Optane, block size
• sysbench
• Benchmarking tools

https://www.linux.com/tutorials/inspecting-disk-io-performance-fio/

https://www.storagereview.com/node/3520

https://www.storagereview.com/node/3520

https://dotlayer.com/how-to-use-fio-to-measure-disk-performance-in-linux/