yes this is normal.

in the following i refer to SMB1 and SMB2 on a windows maschine.

Seperate shares are treated as seperate "filesystems" from the client. thus even if the source and Destination (or parts of it) reside on the same Hardware this is not transparent for the client.

a) if you copy from SHARE1 to SHARE2

you always read the data from SHARE1 to your Client and write the data from your Client to SHARE2

b) if you cut from SHARE1 to SHARE2

you always read the data from SHARE1 to your Client and write the data from your Client to SHARE2

c) if you copy data from SHARE1 to SHARE1/Subfolder

you also read the data from SHARE1 to your Client and write the data from your Client to SHARE1/Subfolder

d) if you cut data from SHARE1 to SHARE1/Subfolder

this will only result in relinking. thus no "payload" is transferred and you can "copy/paste" large amounts of data without generating much Network traffic.

SMB3 introduces Server side copies which handles a,b,c in another way. In this case the copy is not executed over the Network but between "SMBServer" and the "Filesystem" (other terminologies may apply in different products)

Strategies to avoid Network traffic:

1) set a "supershare" on a higher Level and "cut" the data which results in a relink. Be aware of permissions, which are not reset when using "cut" under the same share.

2) do "local" copies on the Server side (syncIQ)

3) use Clients "directly" connected to your Server (does not avoid but Speed up)

4) use smb3 with Server side copies and Software which supports that.

Edit: added "Strategies to avoid Network traffic", for clarification

http://www.snia.org/sites/default/files/SNIA_SMB3_final.pdf

this is a presentation about SMB3. Page 33ff talks about Server Side Copies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFSjXoHg_Z4

this is a nice video explaining the different behaviors

if you want to use SMB3 you don't only need OneFS 8 but also a Client which is capable. I believe this is any samba4.1 Client and Windows 8 / Windows Server 2012.

On Isilon Side i believe you don't have to configure your share(s) with anything Special but you must NOT configure the Shares with continuous-availability.

But since i have not configured smb3 features with isilon until now maybe someone else want to jump in?

I believe you covered everything