XP to Server 2008, software vendor recomends BASP

[bkelly13]

We have a Wyle G2 running Windows XP (telemetry system) sending data to a Dell Power Edge 2950 running Server 2008 as 32 bit OS (because the vendor is not yet ready for 64 bit) and IADS display system. The vendor application on the XP that is sending data to the Dell constantly complains about excessive send times to the Dell. Network utilization is about 1%. The software vendor says to install the communications suite developed by Broadcom, Dell and Intel. He did not say BASP specifically, but I think that was the intent.

Before I start making radical changes on the server, does anyone have any experience with BASP? A search returns many Dell hits and some threads about unix, and nothing on this site.

Thank you

Time is the medium we use to express our priorities
(Bryan Kelly, 2000)

 

[kmcferrin]

I have used it before on IBM hardware, and it's your standard teaming software.

One thing worth noting is that by itself it will not increase your transmit times. It has several different types of teams that you can define, but generally they are of the "Smart Load Balancing and Failover" variety. This lets you specify multiple NICs on the server in a team, and outbound traffic from the server will be load balanced across the NICs. But all inbound traffic to the server will still be on a single NIC.

There are options for other forms of load balancing but they all require that the ports on the switch be configured with LACP/Etherchannel/something in order for inbound traffic to be distributed across multiple NICs. Since it sounds like your issue is related to inbound traffic, you probably want to go that route.

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[Stevehewitt]

Meh - I say they are talking crap.

Do some speed tests (fat packet pings) to check latency between server and client. Also see if the problem is resolved by connecting from client to server with just a single, decent, enterprise grade switch.

BASP is teaming software - doesn't up your speed or anything (other than server side.) If network utlization is 1% on server with a 1gig pipe then giving it another gig won't help.

Try it by all means, but personally I think the vendor is lying, or your network overall may have latency issues. (e.g. too many broadcasts)

Good luck


Steve.

"They have the internet on computers now!" - Homer Simpson