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Gigabit question - home network

Discussion in 'Community Broadband & Computers' started by Mike-and-Kim, Feb 13, 2011.

  1. Mike-and-Kim

    Mike-and-Kim Member

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    I recently added a Gigabit card to a computer that previously was running at about 70-80% of the old 100M LAN input.

    I have a 100M router (Linksys WRT54GL), a single Gigabit 8 port (cheap D-link I think) switch and a few 100M switches (Trendnet TPE-S44 w/ POE). There is also an old Linksys router hanging of one of the switches that has been converted to a switch following some instructions I found online.

    I plugged the computer into the Gigabit switch, with one of the 100M switches plugged into the Gigabit switch. On the computer the new card shows up, but it is still running at about 70% of 100M (I've checked and this is a 1Gigabit card I bought from Newegg).

    Do I need to upgrade the router and the rest of the switches to get some margin back into my network?

    Thanks, Mike
     
  2. Mike-and-Kim

    Mike-and-Kim Member

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  3. flynnibus

    flynnibus Well-Known Member Forum Staff

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    I'd first try to understand why you have 70mbit of traffic pretty regular rather then try to get around it.

    Is it local traffic? between what? They would both have to be off the gig switch to not saturate the rest of the net.

    Looking at your current net flows to understand the traffic would be the first step.

    Check your network connection status to see what the card negotiated. If still 100m, check the config to ensure it's not forced in some way. Gig over twisted pair also requires better cabling then 100BT, so what may have been marginal before wouldn't sustain 1000BaseT.. but if you are only dealing with short patch cables that shouldn't really be an issue unless they are realllly old junk.

    Check the properties in windows on the cards' config.. even default it if possible.. and then move onto studying the source/dest of this traffic. There probably should be some easy tools for that.. but I'd just use wireshark and use the 'view conversations' report to see source/dest flows.
     
  4. IRideYZFR6

    IRideYZFR6 Linux Guru

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    Agree with flynnibus above. Some additional info to look at;

    You need at least cat 5e to run 1000mb (1000base-t), but would recommend cat 6a (1000basetx) cabling between the gig card and gig switch. Look at your switch and your nic properties and force both to 1000/full.

    My question is the same as his, why are you pushing a continuous traffic above 50mb? Is this comp a proxy, file server, mail server, onion router?

    Also even if you get 1000mb/full between the gig switch and the nic, you still have a bottle neck on your internet facing modem. I have the max right now with FIOS at 35mb/35mb and it would bottle neck at the modem if I tried to push that much traffic on a continuous basis.
     
  5. Mike-and-Kim

    Mike-and-Kim Member

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    Thanks, I really appreciate the help and ideas.

    The traffic is coming from HD video surveillance cameras (video servers). I have the bandwidth displayed on the camera live view page, so I know they are running at around 5-15Mbs. It seems to add up roughly (maybe about 10% less) to what I see on the task manager network tab in windows. Wireshark looks neat, I'll try that also soon.

    I drew up a simplified diagram (attached).

    The various server ip addresses are all mapped to ports on the router, e.g. 192.168.1.51 is mapped to port 10051 on the router. I also have it set to port 10051 on the corresponding server.

    I don't know if having ports would force it through the router for some reason? I keep those ports disabled most of the time on the router.

    All of the cables are new Belden (mostly Cat5e), except for one cable that I made. I'll double check tonight to see if the Beldens have all the wires present. All lengths are less than 50ft.

    Mike
     

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  6. Mike-and-Kim

    Mike-and-Kim Member

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    Thanks, I'll try to look at the NIC properties more closely tonight. I don't even know what an onion router is :)

    Most of the traffic is on the LAN, does not go to the outside world.
     
  7. IRideYZFR6

    IRideYZFR6 Linux Guru

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    Fix'n to ask you how much you pay for internet service :)

    If once you hardset the switch (if a managable switch) and/or nic to 1000/full and if it doesn't work or you start seeing packets drop I would look at your cabling between the 1000mb nic and gig switch.

    What model number on the D-Link?
     
  8. Mike-and-Kim

    Mike-and-Kim Member

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    D-Link is a DGS-2208. Not sure yet if I have any options with that.

    Just home for lunch and the NIC is set to auto-negotiate. Will try setting to 1G tonight.
     
  9. Mike-and-Kim

    Mike-and-Kim Member

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    Yep it was the cabling. Somehow an old 4 wire cable snuck in there. I need to determine how to appropriately destroy these...

    Tried a simple connection of router > 1G > computer and forcing the NIC and it just wasn't getting anywhere.

    Now I'm sitting at around 6-7%, many thanks for the help and advice. There is a beer in the fridge here with your name on it for each of you.

    Mike
     

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