Reaching Gigabit Speeds

[papaJohnMiller]

Greetings All,

I just started working for a medium sized company. They recently purchased a Dell PowerEdge T310 server with a dual gigabit ethernet NIC adapters. Accessing the database on the server itself is very fast. The program I'm using to speed test takes about 6 seconds. However, when I run the same program from my desktop off the server, it takes between seven and eight minutes. This is not surprising since the whole office is a miss mash of differing standards. The router and switches are 10/100 BASE-T. The cables are all CAT 5, and the switch on my desk is only 10 BASE-T.

We are looking at upgrading the router, switches and cables to make everything consistent, but I wanted to make sure that this was going to speed things up significantly before we make the plunge. I disconnected the ethernet cables from the server and ran one cable straight from the server into my laptop which has a gigabit connection. After rebooting both machines, I ran my little program and it still takes between 3 to 4 minutes to complete. Obviously, I was hoping for much better.

Am I missing something obvious? It sure seems like I should be able to access the database a whole lot faster. Any help is much appreciated.

Thanks,
John Miller

 

[VinceWhirlwind]

What kind of utilisation did you get on your network interface when you were directly connected to the server?

Try a file copy between the server and your laptop when you are directly connected - now what utilisation do you get?

 

[papaJohnMiller]

Vince,

Thanks for the response. I'm not sure what you mean by the term "utilisation."

Also, is the purpose of doing a "file copy" between the server and my laptop to distinguish a problem concerning hardware vs a problem with the database?

I won't be able to do more testing on the server until this weekend, but I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

Do you have other things I should be testing this weekend when I can do the testing on the server?

Thanks,
John

 

[VinceWhirlwind]

Utilisation means what speed is it passing data at. It should tell you how many Kb/s.

If you get a different utilisation when doing a simple file copy, then obviously a non-network related factor is also at play.

 

[atcom]

You shouldn't have to upgrade your router, and hopefully your cable is OK - if it's Cat5E then it'll run gigabit.

The first item you should change is the switch. Spend a couple hundred bucks for a gigabit switch and see if that significantly improves your experience.

-----------------------------------
Telephone & computer wiring/Cat 5E/Cat 6/Fibre Optic cabling in Calgary, AB

 

[technome]

Run TCP Optimiser on your laptop...

http://www.speedguide.net/downloads.php

Make sure your MTU size is correct on the Internet router

If small network, after purchasing a switch, disable flow control on at the switch for all ports. For now, try it disable in your NIC properties.
Make sure you get a managed switch !!!

Download Malwarebytes on to the laptop, check for malware.

After you get the switch, check each port for errors, at 100 full duplex or higher, you should get a very few, if any, errors on each port. If any port has a high number, either the wire, wks NIC needs updating/replacing or a nasty program is running on wks.

If you want a good GB switch cheap, Dell 5224, purchased about 10 of these off Ebay, make sure all ports are Gb.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p5197.m570.l1313&_nkw=dell+5224&_sacat=0

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Chernobyl disaster..a must see pictorial

http://www.kiddofspeed.com/default.htm