100M : Network Card query

[The Yank]

I am having serious problems on my BB so spent an hour on the phone yesterday trying to get it sorted (unsuccessfully).

I have a 100MBPS card but was told by the phone rep that with that I should only get around 70% or 70/80 MBPS and said I should upgrade to 1GBPS. Is this true?

I'm guessing I will need to upgrade to receive the upgrade when available but that 70% thing gets me.

[rhyds]

The short answer is that TCP/IP network connections have "overheads" which use up about 20% of the available bandwidth. Therefore at full chat your 100mbit network card will only be able to provide 80mbit actual data throughput.

[The Yank]

Originally Posted by rhyds

The short answer is that TCP/IP network connections have "overheads" which use up about 20% of the available bandwidth. Therefore at full chat your 100mbit network card will only be able to provide 80mbit actual data throughput.

thanks - I never realized that before.

[General Maximus]

yeah, without going into too much detail the data packets you receive and send are divided into sections. Obviously a large porion of it is the actual data you want (e.g. this forum page) but along with that is other info such as the source and destination ip address so that when the packet is travelling along the network each router it comes to know where it has got to forward it to for the next hop. That is just some of the info and that obviously takes up some space.

I assume the problems you are having are speed related. Have you got a pc or a laptop? If you have got a pc you are going to have to get a usb nic, if you have got a pc you can go for the same or get a pci card which you can pop into your pc which is far much better in the mong term. Something like this would be good.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-Link-TG-3...ds=gigabit+nic

[The Yank]

Originally Posted by General Maximus

yeah, without going into too much detail the data packets you receive and send are divided into sections. Obviously a large porion of it is the actual data you want (e.g. this forum page) but along with that is other info such as the source and destination ip address so that when the packet is travelling along the network each router it comes to know where it has got to forward it to for the next hop. That is just some of the info and that obviously takes up some space.

I assume the problems you are having are speed related. Have you got a pc or a laptop? If you have got a pc you are going to have to get a usb nic, if you have got a pc you can go for the same or get a pci card which you can pop into your pc which is far much better in the mong term. Something like this would be good.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-Link-TG-3...ds=gigabit+nic

Have both

Just had engineer around for ages + couldn't resolve on either. He even took my laptop to the street box but still had the speed issues though he swears everything is ok at the box (can't be).

He is getting his boss to come out and have a look though it sounds to me like a VM issue.

[rhyds]

What speeds are you getting, and what speeds are you expecting?

[General Maximus]

I would assume that both your pc and laptop aren't old enough to both have 100mbit nics, one of them must be gigabit? Dito what rhyds said. What speed are you provisioned for? (i.e. are you on the 100/6 tier, 152/12 etc?)

[The Yank]

Originally Posted by General Maximus

I would assume that both your pc and laptop aren't old enough to both have 100mbit nics, one of them must be gigabit? Dito what rhyds said. What speed are you provisioned for? (i.e. are you on the 100/6 tier, 152/12 etc?)

pc has 100MBPS card
Laptop ? but I'd guess 1GB

get between 5MB and 30 MB on speedtest though s/b 100 or 120

[General Maximus]

damn, that isn't good even if your nic is only 100mbits. For the price though, and given the way things are going speed wise, I would defo invest in a gigabit network card for your pc whilst at the same time making sure VM do something to improve your connection.

Getting a new nic, ensuring that you are using cat5e patch cables and using a router (presumably you have got a shub) with gigabit ports all eliminate potential bottlenecks and stops VM from using them as an excuse.

[Jumping]

This is usually the time where we ask whats your power level looks like and if you could setup something like thinkbroaband quality monitor.

You can check the power levels from the superhub on the status page before you login to it.

Saying that if you already have engineers and senior at that coming out hopefully they will sort out what ever the problem on your line is.

[qasdfdsaq]

Originally Posted by rhyds

The short answer is that TCP/IP network connections have "overheads" which use up about 20% of the available bandwidth. Therefore at full chat your 100mbit network card will only be able to provide 80mbit actual data throughput.

The real answer is that is bollocks, TCP/IP overheads will cause you to lose up to 2% of the available bandwidth. If you are losing 20% something is seriously screwed up with your connection and has nothing to do with TCP/IP ---------- Post added at 06:40 ---------- Previous post was at 06:38 ----------

Originally Posted by The Yank

pc has 100MBPS card Laptop ? but I'd guess 1GB get between 5MB and 30 MB on speedtest though s/b 100 or 120

There is no such thing as a 100MBPS card, nor is there any such thing as a 1GB card. You must be mixing up MBPS and Mbps. Nonetheless, you should be getting 95Mbps+ on a 100Mbps card.

If multiple devices are getting such low speeds chances are you have a dodgy VM connection or congestion, which is not uncommon. Particularly if speeds are higher at off-peak times of day.

[Kushan]

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

There is no such thing as a 100MBPS card, nor is there any such thing as a 1GB card. You must be mixing up MBPS and Mbps. Nonetheless, you should be getting 95Mbps+ on a 100Mbps card.

We all knew what he meant, there's no need to get pedantic about it. Not everyone is aware of the difference between Mb's and MB's.

That said...

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

The real answer is that is bollocks, TCP/IP overheads will cause you to lose up to 2% of the available bandwidth. If you are losing 20% something is seriously screwed up with your connection and has nothing to do with TCP/IP

I agree with this. On a 100mbit interface, you should be able to hit 90+ easily and peak at around 94Mbps, give or take. That's what I used to get when I was still using a DIR-615 (which only has 100Mbps ports) on a 100Mbps connection and is quite a common.

The is absolutely definitely an issue somewhere and I doubt it's the network card.

[rhyds]

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

The real answer is that is bollocks, TCP/IP overheads will cause you to lose up to 2% of the available bandwidth. If you are losing 20% something is seriously screwed up with your connection and has nothing to do with TCP/IP

I was basing my answer on some speed testing I did for my uni thesis about 10 years ago comparing 10/100mbit ethernet with wireless and a 14mbit powerline link using iperf.

[The Yank]

Originally Posted by Jumping

This is usually the time where we ask whats your power level looks like and if you could setup something like thinkbroaband quality monitor.

You can check the power levels from the superhub on the status page before you login to it.

Saying that if you already have engineers and senior at that coming out hopefully they will sort out what ever the problem on your line is.

no sign of the senior engineer yet ( no call either)

this mornings test:

[General Maximus]

it shouldn't be that bad att 2am. I am assuming you are on 120/12 because the only other tier below that is 100/6 (100/10 got upgraded aged to 120/12 ages ago).

As nobody has come round yet can you post your power levels to satisfy curiosity.