Here at home I run a little network and I have a few little niggles that keep cropping up that I think can be put down to my network cards but I am not sure.
Omitting all of the AD, DNS, DHCP, Level 2 management and all that stuff, basically I have a windows-based server box which has a few shares that are accessible from any of 10 client PCs. At any one time, the server has a load of around 300kbps but at "busy" times this can sit at 1-2mbps for sustained periods - all of this is no problem at all.
The real problem comes whenever peak/burst speeds are required (biggish data transfers). I expected my gigabit lan to have a sustained throughput of somewhere in the region of 30-40mpbs worst case (my drives can sustain high 70s/low 80s individually but I have a striped set array and a mirror in operation). However, I only actually get peaks of around 18mpbs and a sustained average of closer to 13-14mpbs.
I have tried a lot of things, including moving to a (well configured) linux/samba based configuration but it just doesnt seem to make much difference - is this down to my network cards? In the server machine I have a pair of D-Link DGE-530Ts which I expected to run fine. I swapped one of these with a Netgear GA-311 to no noticeable difference.
I am at the end of my list of things it could be. I dont really want to splash out on something like an Intel Pro/1000 for each of my machines that needs the throughput because it will mount up!
What cards are a good tradeoff between actual throughput and cost? Have I missed a setting or something that is causing a bottleneck? I am using a Netgear 8-port gigabit switch and although removing it didnt make any difference could it have its own small part to play? I dont know, I am totally lost as to why everything is so slow!
Omitting all of the AD, DNS, DHCP, Level 2 management and all that stuff, basically I have a windows-based server box which has a few shares that are accessible from any of 10 client PCs. At any one time, the server has a load of around 300kbps but at "busy" times this can sit at 1-2mbps for sustained periods - all of this is no problem at all.
The real problem comes whenever peak/burst speeds are required (biggish data transfers). I expected my gigabit lan to have a sustained throughput of somewhere in the region of 30-40mpbs worst case (my drives can sustain high 70s/low 80s individually but I have a striped set array and a mirror in operation). However, I only actually get peaks of around 18mpbs and a sustained average of closer to 13-14mpbs.
I have tried a lot of things, including moving to a (well configured) linux/samba based configuration but it just doesnt seem to make much difference - is this down to my network cards? In the server machine I have a pair of D-Link DGE-530Ts which I expected to run fine. I swapped one of these with a Netgear GA-311 to no noticeable difference.
I am at the end of my list of things it could be. I dont really want to splash out on something like an Intel Pro/1000 for each of my machines that needs the throughput because it will mount up!
What cards are a good tradeoff between actual throughput and cost? Have I missed a setting or something that is causing a bottleneck? I am using a Netgear 8-port gigabit switch and although removing it didnt make any difference could it have its own small part to play? I dont know, I am totally lost as to why everything is so slow!
Very few broadcasts and even without any other PCs connected to the switch (so just one client and the server) the rates are the same. I found that different drivers under linux made a marginal difference but I have heard a few tales of similar where people have simply moved to hugely expensive cards and it has solved the problem. 
