BENCHMARKS.md

@@ -484,6 +484,45 @@ explain the slower windows.
 
 ## Concurrent reads
 
+### Results after in-place chunk decoding (2026-09-26, tank, `c5334b1`)
+
+Same machine, files and commands, re-run after chunked reads started
+decoding into reusable per-thread buffers straight into the (typed) output,
+with the calling thread decoding alongside the pool. Load average 1.78 at
+the start; it rose to 6-9 during the runs (the clawhdf5 runs' own threads,
+and it stayed around 5-6 through the h5py runs, so something else was
+active). **This run was noisier than the previous one: h5py's own contiguous
+figures are about 40% lower than in the run below, and ours dropped
+similarly, so compare ratios within a run rather than MB/s across runs.**
+h5py was re-run in the same session.
+
+Each read decoding on its calling thread (`--decode-threads 1`, like h5py):
+
+| layout | mode | threads | clawhdf5 MB/s (eff) | h5py threads MB/s (eff) | h5py processes MB/s (eff) | vs h5py processes |
+|---|---|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|
+| deflate | distinct | 1 | 670 (1.00) | 410 (1.00) | 397 (1.00) | 1.69x |
+| deflate | distinct | 4 | 2434 (0.91) | 406 (0.25) | 1470 (0.93) | 1.66x |
+| deflate | distinct | 8 | 3749 (0.70) | 406 (0.12) | 2398 (0.76) | 1.56x |
+| deflate | distinct | 16 | 4944 (0.46) | 390 (0.06) | 3135 (0.49) | 1.58x |
+| deflate | same | 1 | 211 (1.00) | 125 (1.00) | 124 (1.00) | 1.70x |
+| deflate | same | 16 | 1835 (0.54) | 122 (0.06) | 961 (0.48) | 1.91x |
+| contiguous | distinct | 1 | 6718 (1.00) | 5545 (1.00) | 5200 (1.00) | 1.29x |
+| contiguous | distinct | 16 | 11035 (0.10) | 4950 (0.06) | 10558 (0.13) | 1.05x |
+| contiguous | same | 1 | 14483 (1.00) | 2593 (1.00) | 2737 (1.00) | 5.29x |
+| contiguous | same | 16 | 132175 (0.57) | 2224 (0.05) | 14809 (0.34) | 8.93x |
+
+With the default rayon pool, deflate `distinct` reads 6143 MB/s from a single
+thread (15x h5py's 410 on one call) and 4556 MB/s at 16 threads (1.45x h5py
+processes); the other rows are within the noise of the table above.
+
+What changed: full reads of chunked datasets were 0.69x-0.76x of h5py
+processes at 16 threads in the run below, and are 1.58x here; with one
+thread they were 1.44x and are 1.69x. Minor page faults for the 16-thread
+run fell from about 4.6M to 0.2M (`/usr/bin/time -v`, provisional, loaded
+machine). clawhdf5 now reads faster than 16 h5py processes in every row of
+this benchmark except contiguous full reads at 16 threads, where both
+saturate memory bandwidth (1.05x).
+
 ### Results after the read fixes (2026-09-26, tank, `408f69e`)
 
 Same machine, files and commands as the first run below, re-run on an idle

docs/known-issues.md

@@ -26,9 +26,11 @@ performance" below.
 
 ## Concurrent and contiguous read performance (measured 2026-09-26)
 
-**Status:** open for chunked full reads at 16 threads until re-measured
+**Status:** fixed (2026-09-26). Re-measured on tank at `c5334b1`: full
-(the causes identified below are fixed as of 2026-09-26); the contiguous
+reads of chunked deflate data at 16 threads run at 4944 MB/s against 3135
-item is fixed (2026-09-26). Measured on
+for 16 h5py processes (1.58x; 0.69x-0.76x before), and contiguous reads
+are 1.29x h5py on one thread (`BENCHMARKS.md`, "Results after in-place
+chunk decoding"). The history below is kept for reference. Measured on
 tank with `concurrent_read` against h5py 3.16 / HDF5 2.0 (`BENCHMARKS.md`,
 "Concurrent reads"):
 - **Partly fixed 2026-09-26.** Full reads of chunked datasets from several threads