Network cable question 1

[eugenetyson]

Ok don't know too much about networking and the cables.

But I have a 802.11g wireless router. I bought a network hub for external hard drive.

External Hard Drive USB 2.0 to Network Hub to Wireless Router. The Wireless Router claims to be "54 mbps" but it's not, in theory it should do 540 mb in a 10 seconds. But it doesn't.

So I got out the Cat 6 cable and ran that from the router to the Apple Mac Book Pro, and it should go at 100 mbps as it's 100 base, right? But it doesn't. I started copying stuff to the External Hard Drive and it's going to take 3 days.

In fairness it's about 150 gb of stuff. But I thought it would be faster.

I have tried plugging the external drive directly to the Apple MacBook Pro, but it won't work because it needed to be "specially formatted" for the Network Hub that I bought for it, so I wouldn't have to keep hooking the external drive inbetween PC and MacBook, I saw it as a bit of convenience.

Anywho, what's the deal with the speed that it's operating at? It's clearly not transferring 54mbps or 100mbps as stated on the router and the cable, respectively.

Also, seems a bit weird, but when I have the AirPort turned off it goes a bit slower, with cable plugged in, surely it can't possibly transfer the data by wire and wireless simultaneously?

 

[ForumKB]

Hi eugenetyson, you will never be able to transfer data at the rate the connection is connected at, the flow between your two device needs to included everything like packet data and general communications between the devices as well as the data you are sending, every packet that is sent must be confirmed, it also isn't a direct connection to your HDD so it all has to be processed and shipped off to the drive (which will also slow things up if it's an IDE drive).

You may only be running at half duplex depending on the switch, this would mean only one end of the connection can send data at a time and they have to take it turn as they only use one pair of factor.

It's also in mega bits not mega bytes so you lan connection is running at around 12MB per second.

You can however run both connections as one to speed up communication, go into network connections, select both connections, right click and select 'Bridge Connections', make sure you aren't doing anything at the time as you'll loose the connection for a moment



Adrian Paris

Paris Engineering Ltd

http://www.ForumKB.com

Google search of just tech forums & articles
(very useful, honest!)

 

[ForumKB]

only use one pair of factor"

not sure what happend there . . .

"only use one pair of wires" is what that should have said

 

[eugenetyson]

Excellent. That's great advice, I shall do so. It's amazing the things you forget when it's been a while.

Splat for you.

 

[Wadoki]

I see your problem.... your using a MAC.

 

[eugenetyson]

Nothing wrong with MAC, I use Mac and PC both for personal and work, and I don't or never have had any issues really. I just wanted wireless storage and backup, which I have now, I just couldn't get my noggin around the transfer speed. I have now and I'm fine.

 

[Wadoki]

I was just kidding, I use both MAC and PC.

 

[Sympology]

You'll find a MAC is a pc... ;-)



Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[BadBigBen]

Stu you are right... P(ersonal)C(omputer) is not just a windows box... people tend to forget this little bit...

PS @ all: on tek-tips you should refrain from pouncing on other peoples choices in hardware/os, etc... it just is not professional like...


Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[acewarlock]

He was just joking, I got it as soon as I read it.




This is a Signature and not part of the answer, it appears on every reply.

This is an Analogy so don't take it personally as some have.

Why change the engine if all you need is to change the spark plugs.

 

[BadBigBen]

ace - I know...

but there may be others, that do not get the subtlety of the joke... like I did at first... LOL...

Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."