samba - Feb 2007 - First time linux and samba user having 100% cpu usage by smbd.

I am running RedHat Enterprise Linux 4 update 2 on a HP ML110 G4 with 2
x 500GB SATA drives in RAID1 using the onboard HP SATA RAID.  

I have installed both the .rpm for SAMBA that came with RedHat
Enterprise Linux 4 and subsequently uninstalled and then installed the
current 3.0.24.

The problem that I am experiencing is that this server is to be used for
backup.  Two other windows servers on the network backup to a SAMBA
share through windows backup but after about 2GB on any transfer to the
SAMBA share the SMBD process (or processes) pause, SMB transfer stops
for about 5 seconds and then SMB transfer returns showing the process in
top as taking 99.9% and the transfer speed to in the backup goes down
severely (1/20th the speed of before the pause).

 

I am so very new to SAMBA and Linux in general that I can't say I have a
great idea even how to troubleshoot this...

I have verified that the symptoms occur when a backup is initiated from
two different windows servers (server 2k3) so I don't believe it is a
client related problem.  I have also tried copying a large file (4GB)
from the SAMBA share to a windows computer and this gave consistent
transfer speed.  Copying another (same file, different name) file from
the same windows computer to the SAMBA share resulted in the same pause
and wild running SMBD process as well as very cyclical transfer rates.

 

Are there log files that would be of assistance in troubleshooting this?

Any direction in where to look would help.

 

Thank you,

 

-Bryan