Hi,
I have been trying to do change a few parameters to improve performance (https://docs.opnsense.org/troubleshooting/performance.html).
After adding the following tunables like:
net.isr.bindthreads = 1
net.isr.maxthreads = -1
net.inet.rss.enabled = 1
and reboot, nothing happens. When searching with sysctl -a, for example, still net.inet.rss.enabled shows 0.
There are not any other equals parameters conflicting. I already tried to change the loader.conf.local, which also did not work.
Any ideas about what am I doing wrong?
Thanks a lot.
How did you set the tuneables? Did you add them under "System: Settings: Tunables"?
Yes. I did under System: Settings: Tunables, but nothing happens.
We are running last version, completely updated.
I already tried with /boot/loader.conf.local and did not work.
That is virtually impossible. Did you apply the settings after creating the variables?
BTW: You should not edit configuration files by hand, as they will be overwritten by the OpnSense config. IDK if /boot/loader.conf.local is being honored. There is a folder /boot/loader.conf.d where files can be put.
That you can check: When you apply the tuneables settings, they should turn up in /boot/loader.conf ("fgrep net.isr.bindthreads /boot/loader.conf").
There's one isr setting that I believe really enables the rest, see attached image too.
net.isr.dispatch: deferred
Quote from: jonny5 on October 24, 2025, 11:02:00 PMThere's one isr setting that I believe really enables the rest, see attached image too.
net.isr.dispatch: deferred
Interesting. I'd figure "net.inet.rss.enabled" would be the... enabler. I have "direct" (the default), and actual dispatch is mostly "hybrid":
root@fw:/home/user # sysctl net.isr
net.isr.numthreads: 16
net.isr.maxprot: 16
net.isr.defaultqlimit: 256
net.isr.maxqlimit: 10240
net.isr.bindthreads: 1
net.isr.maxthreads: 16
net.isr.dispatch: direct
root@fw:/home/user # sysctl net.inet | grep rss
net.inet.rss.bucket_mapping: 0:0 1:1 2:2 3:3 4:4 5:5 6:6 7:7
net.inet.rss.enabled: 1
net.inet.rss.debug: 0
net.inet.rss.basecpu: 0
net.inet.rss.buckets: 8
net.inet.rss.maxcpus: 64
net.inet.rss.ncpus: 16
net.inet.rss.maxbits: 7
net.inet.rss.mask: 7
net.inet.rss.bits: 3
net.inet.rss.hashalgo: 2
root@fw:/home/user # netstat -Q
Configuration:
Setting Current Limit
Thread count 16 16
Default queue limit 256 10240
Dispatch policy direct n/a
Threads bound to CPUs enabled n/a
Protocols:
Name Proto QLimit Policy Dispatch Flags
ip 1 1024 cpu hybrid C--
igmp 2 256 source default ---
rtsock 3 256 source default ---
arp 4 256 source default ---
ether 5 256 cpu direct C--
ip6 6 1024 cpu hybrid C--
ip_direct 9 256 cpu hybrid C--
ip6_direct 10 256 cpu hybrid C--
[...]
I believe the dispatch takes a bit of time to settle, but it's been a while since I set it up.