Release Notes

Roadrunner SMB™ 1.2

Release date: July 29, 2026
Availability: AWS Marketplace

Version 1.2 adds the Eval Kit - a self-contained, single-AZ evaluation deployment - first-class FSLogix® profile-container support with a faster file-open path, multi-region deployments within a single AWS® account, a redesigned Admin UI, and a roll-up of cold-start and Active Directory® convergence fixes so nodes report ready only when they can actually serve traffic.

Highlights

Try Roadrunner SMB in 15 to 20 minutes with the Eval Kit. The new Eval Kit is a self-contained, single-AZ CloudFormation® deployment that stands up its own VPC and Active Directory, runs a headless First-Time Setup, and self-uninstalls on a timer after 30 days, removing the resources it created. Evaluators can reach a working SMB share without bringing their own Active Directory or designing a VPC first, making evaluations fast, easy and safe. See the Eval Kit Quick Start.

Built for FSLogix and VDI. Roadrunner SMB 1.2 supports FSLogix profile containers as a first-class workload, with the file-open path tuned specifically for the metadata-heavy pattern FSLogix logins generate - keeping the open path well ahead of login-storm demand and delivering responsive small-file performance for Windows® Explorer.

What's in 1.2

Eval Kit - self-contained single-AZ evaluation. A single-AZ CloudFormation deployment with its own VPC and Active Directory and headless First-Time Setup, typically ready in 15 to 20 minutes, that self-uninstalls automatically after 30 days. Evaluators can try Roadrunner SMB without bringing their own AD or VPC design. Teardown removes the compute, storage, load balancing, and directory services the kit created. See Errata below if you reinstall the Eval Kit in the same Region.
First-class FSLogix support with an optimized open path. FSLogix profile containers are supported and tested for VDI and virtual-desktop deployments. The file-open path is tuned for the metadata-heavy behavior of profile logins: a measured FSLogix login issues only a modest number of opens across its login-and-settle window, and the optimized open path stays well ahead of that demand - so the open path is not the login-storm bottleneck. The same improvement delivers excellent small-file performance for Windows Explorer, with responsive profile-load and directory-listing behavior.
Multi-region deployments per account (new deployments). CloudFormation templates now create IAM roles with a regional suffix (rrsmb-<env>-<region>-*), so you can run one appliance per AWS Region in the same account. Existing 1.1 stacks that upgrade the container image only keep account-global role names until redeployed from a fresh 1.2 template. A manual stack update that adopts the new role names replaces IAM roles (brief disruption).
Redesigned Admin UI. A cluster-wide Dashboard overview as the landing page, a dedicated Metrics page for live throughput and latency charts, a Documentation sidebar link, and more reliable responsive navigation.
Clearer live metrics under load. Cluster-aggregated pipeline throughput, DynamoDB® read/write and throttle visibility, cache hit rate, and percentile latency overlays, so operators see cluster-wide behavior instead of a single noisy node.
More reliable cold-start and cluster convergence. Follower nodes restore Active Directory trust from shared state with real verification before serving, cluster readiness is gated so converging nodes aren't recycled prematurely, and boot-time EFS DNS and mount races are bounded rather than reported as "healthy" before a node can serve.
More reliable domain administrator login. Domain admin authentication now relies solely on direct Active Directory authentication (Kerberos / machine-keytab LDAP), avoiding clustered winbind/idmap conditions that could surface as an incorrect password.
More stable share materialization. Clearer in-flight versus failed states, safer reconciler behavior, and correct cache invalidation when share directories are created or renamed, so listings and permissions stay consistent across nodes.
Fewer unnecessary service restarts. winbindd and smbd restart only when configuration or credentials actually change.
Stress tested and performance tuned. Exercised under multi-client continuous stress and Windows login-scale stress testing, in addition to the existing smoke, smbtorture ACL, ACL-cache, and share-materialization gates.

Updating from 1.1

Container-only rolling updates (automatic or manual image change) apply 1.2 application fixes without changing IAM role names and without enabling multi-region in place.

To get multi-region IAM naming and the Eval Kit templates, deploy from the 1.2 CloudFormation launchers as a new stack, or plan a controlled stack update that adopts the new templates and role names. A stack update that adopts the new role names replaces IAM roles and causes a brief disruption.

Review release notes before production updates when your change-control process requires it.

Compatibility

Cluster size 1-4 (default 2) - unchanged
Active Directory, EFS, and Marketplace billing - unchanged
New deployments: one appliance per AWS Region per account (regional IAM role names)
Existing 1.1 stacks upgraded by image only: still one appliance per account until redeployed from 1.2 templates
EFS-backed shares may differ from native NTFS® on some inheritance edge cases - see Known Limitations
Host AMI may update via ASG independently of the container image

Errata

Eval Kit reinstall in the same Region. Uninstalling the Eval Kit (manual delete or the 30-day self-uninstall) is intended to remove the kit's CloudWatch log groups. In some cases two fixed-name groups can remain in the Region after the stack is gone:

/rrsmb/eval/<region>/cfn-lambda
/rrsmb/eval/<region>/lambda

A later Eval Kit install in that same Region then fails at create time with a CloudFormation name-conflict validation error on those log groups. One Eval Kit per Region is supported; this only affects uninstall-then-reinstall in the same Region (not a first-time install).

Workaround: Before reinstalling the Eval Kit in a Region where a previous kit ran, delete any straggler groups, then launch again:

aws logs delete-log-group --region <region> \
  --log-group-name "/rrsmb/eval/<region>/cfn-lambda"
aws logs delete-log-group --region <region> \
  --log-group-name "/rrsmb/eval/<region>/lambda"

Ignore ResourceNotFoundException if a group is already gone. Then redeploy the Eval Kit as usual.

Admin UI Dashboard / Metrics charts may stop updating or show a partial series under load. During heavy data-plane traffic, Read/Write latency and related pipeline charts can briefly freeze, show "Waiting for series...", or jump to a shorter window. A page refresh restores the charts.

Workaround: Refresh the browser page if a chart stops updating or looks incomplete. A fix for the client-side poll/merge race is in progress for a subsequent update.