Hi to all. I'm not unfamiliar with how to submit help requests but, before proceeding, I'd like to understand if I'm the only one experiencing this, as it's happening in a configuration that has worked perfectly smooth since 2023, when I first installed it on my new Linux Mint machine.
I have checked Google's status dashboard and everything seems in order. I have checked my network speed and connection and all is good. I have tried downloading files from Google Drive web interface (drive.google.com) and they come down at the expected speed.
If I try to download them through my rclone mount or directly through the command line, via rClone Browser, speed is cut to less than a tenth of what it should be.
Is it happening just to me? I am using a custom user-agent, in order to avoid screening by Google (it happened years ago) but even removing that from the configuration didn't change a thing.
Edit: forgot to mention, I use a personal ClientID. Checked that too in console.gloud.google.com and it's valid and in working order. I tested uploading and speeds are even worse (measureable in Kbit/s on a gigabit upload line).
This was not an official request for help. Since in the past it happened that Google decided not to play along, I thought about asking if it was widespread.
After posting I have tested on a completely different machine (Windows this time) and the results remained the same.
If nobody is experiencing this, I'll surely post all relevant details (although... Same thing on two machines, with two different OSs, that previously worked, what should I do: post twice?).
A couple of hours ago, I noticed that my private media server, which mounts an encrypted Google Drive folder using rclone, was no longer able to play a video as smoothly as usual.
Later, I performed an rclone copy of a 2.86 GB video file from my Google Drive remote to a local folder on my Windows 11 laptop. After a few seconds, the transfer speed dropped from >20 MB/s to less than 8 MB/s. The average speed for the whole transfer was barely 6 MB/s, with severe fluctuations. At one point, the speed remained around 2 MB/s for a noticeable amount of time.
I then performed several additional tests:
Copying the same file from a non-encrypted folder in the same Google Drive ā similar poor performance.
Copying the same file from the same Google Drive using an Android 16 smartphone with Termux ā similar poor performance.
Copying from two other, different Google Drive accounts ā similar poor performance.
Copying from an encrypted Dropbox remote ā good performance, with an average speed of >20 MB/s.
Using rclone 1.74.0 instead of 1.75.0 with the original Google Drive remote ā similar poor performance.
Very slow upload and download speeds with both Google Drive mount and Google Drive through the command line (using the rclone command via rclone Browser)
Run the command 'rclone version' and share the full output of the command.
rclone v1.75.0
os/version: linuxmint 22.1 (64 bit)
os/kernel: 6.8.0-138-generic (x86_64)
os/type: linux
os/arch: amd64
go/version: go1.26.5
go/linking: static
go/tags: none
Which cloud storage system are you using? (eg Google Drive)
Google Drive
The command you were trying to run (eg rclone copy /tmp remote:tmp)
I try copying a file from Google Drive to a local disk, using a mount with the following configuration for its service:
[Unit]
Description=RClone Service
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target
[Service]
Type=notify
Environment=RCLONE_CONFIG=/home/ashlar/.config/rclone/rclone.conf
KillMode=none
RestartSec=5
ExecStart=/usr/bin/rclone mount gdrive: /home/ashlar/gdrive \
--allow-other \
--dir-cache-time 5000h \
--log-file /home/ashlar/.Logs/rclone.log \
--log-level NOTICE \
--poll-interval 10s \
--umask 002 \
--user-agent CustomUA \
--cache-dir=/home/ashlar/.rCache \
--bwlimit 90M \
--drive-pacer-min-sleep 5ms \
--drive-pacer-burst 200 \
--drive-chunk-size 512M \
--buffer-size=256M \
--vfs-cache-mode full \
--vfs-cache-max-size 300G \
--vfs-cache-max-age 30m \
--vfs-cache-poll-interval 30s
ExecStop=/bin/fusermount -uz /home/ashlar/gdrive
Restart=on-failure
User=ashlar
Group=ashlar
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
Please run 'rclone config redacted' and share the full output. If you get command not found, please make sure to update rclone.
'''
[gdrive]
type = drive
client_id = XXX
client_secret = XXX
scope = drive
token = XXX
team_drive =
### Double check the config for sensitive info before posting publicly
'''
A log from the command that you were trying to run with the -vv flag
As an aside, there really should be an option to obfuscate folders and files names. I tried my best at anonymizing them but still... The log above shows me trying to copy a file from Google Drive to a local disk, waiting a little bit and then stopping the transfer, as it was proceeding at about 3 or 4 Mbps on a 2.5Gbps dowload line (it's 1G upload, as mentioned in the first post).
Yes, same here. Been running a gdrive encrypted rclone mount for years with same settings, without these issues. Last couple of days there have been severe slowdowns.
I usually get 20-40MB/s read speed from the mount but they are down in the 0.5-5MB/s range making it pretty unusable.
I hope normal operation is restored within the next few days. Having such a noticeable slowdown in speed for so many hours every day is not really acceptable in the long term.