Fedora 40 fresh install unresponsive during file backup restore

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Hi, fresh install of Fedora 40, all updated.
Logical drive volume made of 3 physical drives: 2SSD+NVME LUKS encrypted, single volume btrfs. Installed with automatic partitioning tool in anaconda, 16GB RAM.

When I transfer my backup file, with copy/paste or rsync, the system becomes unresponsive in few seconds. Backup is made of several thousand of files and gigabytes. Speed transfer collapses and all windows blocked with system message “Force Closure Window or Wait” as if RAM was full.
Don’t know if it has anything to do with the issue, just noticed the CACHE skyrocket during file transfer, system is unresponsive in a similar way to lack of memory RAM. I know system maximize the use of memory and that’s fine, but something goes wrong here and the system becomes non resposive.

Hope there’s a solution, this makes the machine unusable as my backup file can’t be restored.
Thanks

luca@fedora:~$ sudo inxi -F
System:
  Host: fedora Kernel: 6.10.5-200.fc40.x86_64 arch: x86_64 bits: 64
  Console: pty pts/1 Distro: Fedora Linux 40 (Workstation Edition)
Machine:
  Type: Desktop System: ASUS product: All Series v: N/A serial: N/A
  Mobo: ASUSTeK model: H81M-PLUS v: Rev X.0x serial: 151159713505247
    UEFI: American Megatrends v: 2205 date: 05/26/2015
CPU:
  Info: quad core model: Intel Core i7-4790K bits: 64 type: MT MCP cache:
    L2: 1024 KiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1649 min/max: 800/4400 cores: 1: 800 2: 800 3: 4400
    4: 800 5: 800 6: 800 7: 800 8: 3998
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor Integrated Graphics
    driver: i915 v: kernel
  Display: server: X.Org v: 24.1.2 with: Xwayland v: 24.1.2 driver:
    dri: crocus gpu: i915 resolution: 2560x1440~75Hz
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 vendor: intel mesa v: 24.1.6 renderer: Mesa Intel HD
    Graphics 4600 (HSW GT2)
  API: EGL Message: EGL data requires eglinfo. Check --recommends.
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor HD Audio
    driver: snd_hda_intel
  Device-2: Intel 8 Series/C220 Series High Definition Audio
    driver: snd_hda_intel
  Device-3: BEHRINGER GmbH UMC404HD 192k driver: snd-usb-audio type: USB
  API: ALSA v: k6.10.5-200.fc40.x86_64 status: kernel-api
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8211/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet
    driver: r8169
  IF: enp3s0 state: down mac: 2c:56:dc:d3:41:51
  Device-2: Realtek 802.11ac NIC driver: rtw_8821cu type: USB
  IF: wlp0s20u3u4 state: up mac: 5a:90:3c:2b:1c:5d
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Cambridge Silicon Radio Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode) driver: btusb
    type: USB
  Report: btmgmt ID: hci0 state: up address: 00:1A:7D:DA:71:03 bt-v: 4.0
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 4.31 TiB used: 2.07 TiB (47.9%)
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Crucial model: CT500P2SSD8 size: 465.76 GiB
  ID-2: /dev/sda vendor: SanDisk model: SDSSDA120G size: 111.79 GiB
  ID-3: /dev/sdb vendor: SanDisk model: SSD PLUS 120 GB size: 111.8 GiB
  ID-4: /dev/sdc vendor: Western Digital model: WD40EFZX-68AWUN0
    size: 3.64 TiB
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 687.71 GiB used: 230.37 GiB (33.5%) fs: btrfs dev: /dev/dm-2
  ID-2: /boot size: 973.4 MiB used: 365.1 MiB (37.5%) fs: ext4
    dev: /dev/sdb2
  ID-3: /boot/efi size: 598.8 MiB used: 19 MiB (3.2%) fs: vfat
    dev: /dev/sdb1
  ID-4: /home size: 687.71 GiB used: 230.37 GiB (33.5%) fs: btrfs
    dev: /dev/dm-2
Swap:
  ID-1: swap-1 type: zram size: 8 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) dev: /dev/zram0
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 42.0 C mobo: N/A
  Fan Speeds (rpm): N/A
Info:
  Memory: total: 16 GiB available: 15.48 GiB used: 2.62 GiB (16.9%)
    igpu: 64 MiB
  Processes: 328 Uptime: 18m Shell: Sudo inxi: 3.3.34

before copy/paste

luca@fedora:~$ free
               total        used        free      shared  buff/cache   available
Mem:        16232528     2835032    11294200      520984     2928572    13397496
Swap:        8388604           0     8388604

after more or less 10 seconds copy/paste

luca@fedora:~$ free
               total        used        free      shared  buff/cache   available
Mem:        16232528     3453124     3954288      521088     9659940    12779404
Swap:        8388604           0     8388604
2

Additional information. System reinstalled on a single SDD btrfs, no volume group, and it works ok. Same RAM cache behaviour, but no system unresponsiveness during data transfer.
I would have loved to merge the capacity of my 3 storage drives instead of managing separately, but system works now.
Any clue on reasons why a LUKS+BTRFS grouping volumes makes this behaviour. SATA controller is AHCI.
Thanks again.

3

Hi there.

Did you by any chance test the same rsync command, but with target disk being a physical volume instead of LVM (e.g. a USB-connected SSD)? That could narrow down the possible causes of the issue.

Assuming that /dev/nvme0n1, /dev/sda and /dev/sdb are making up the logical volume, I wonder if the benefits outweigh the drawbacks, given that dev/nvme0n1 aready weights around 68% in the size of the logical volume.

4

Hi, thanks

Good idea, but no I didn’t.

Well, BIOS doesn’t boot from nvme drive, so need to have one SSD SATA for system and a second for data. Plus had a spare SSD. That’s where the logic of a volume group was coming from. Also this workstation has 4TB storage HDD for archive, offline in the inxi before.

I was looking for a simplified management of the drive units and wanted to get familiar with btrfs volume groups. Anyway, system works now, thanks.

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