How to measure/monitor network performance
 

Hi

On SLES 9, what are good ways to measure network performance? I have several platforms with 1-6 Gigabit Ethernet adapters, all running SLES. I want to generate traffic into these systems, and generate traffic leaving these systems, and see (preferably in a GUI or a scrolling test window) how well the network is performing. For instance, I know that a Gigabit Ethernet adapter is capable of 125 MB/s, theoretically; I want to see how close to 125 MB/s I am getting.

I value your thoughts.

Thanks
tl

If Iperf ain't it maybe check http://www.slac.stanford.edu/xorg/nmtf/nmtf-tools.html, http://www.csm.ornl.gov/~dunigan/netperf/netlinks.html, Freshmeat or Sourceforge.

Great ideas; many thanks!

iperf is just what I was looking for to generate a load and test the performance; thanks!

Any suggestions for a good tool to monitor an exsiting network load? I'm going to be doing some tests on systems with multiple Gigabit Ethernet adapters, both with and without bonding. Any suggestions?

Thanks again
tl

Network Performance
 

Not sure how much you have to spend, but a company called NetQoS deals soley with network performance management issues. Even if you are not interested in the tools, they have some very informative articles and papers that you can download for free. Hope this helps.

I use mrtg together with routers2.cgi to monitor network performance as well as server stats. Can be a bit fiddly to set up but free and worth the learning curve. Mainly SNMP based but you can also add your own scripts to get virtually anything you want to graph. Shout if you want any more info.