Data Transfer Woes
 

Mornin Guys,

got a small problem for you. I'll explain:

I have a slackware box at work, it's configured to be part of a windows network. The Slack box has Net access and Internet access. All seems to be working perfectly. I can ping any box on my network i wish, and all within good timings. My other box, a windows xp pro box, is also on the same network, same subnet, same domain. I use the Slack box as an FTP resource for all my data, cd images etc etc. I do my downloading and work on the win pc and then back it all up to my trusty slack box. Here's the prob.... When downloading from net or internet both my boxes work fine, hitting 300 to 400 k a second. However when i transfer data between them, i get limited to 30k???? What the hell is up with this? Both machines seem capable of the speed, bu t not between each other. Is there sometimes a reason for this behaviour??? I've never seen anything like it.

I know i'm not capped bandwidth wise. Both machines are on the same switch, all at 100mb. Any idea's???

My problems in this regard have been related to autonegotiation and duplex issues. My suggestion is to start by forcing half duplex and 10 mbit operation, making sure autonegotiation is turned off. Then change one thing at a time. I have absolutely no idea how a person sets these parameters on a windows box. With linux there is mii-tool which allows (for most cards) changing parameters, or there are bootup options.

bah sounds like the ftp program being used has a software set cap speed. Just look in the ftp options area.

Well, i do know that the switches ARE set to half duplex. Christ knows why, but we don't do the switch programming. It does'nt however get around the fact that both machines CAN achieve speeds of up to 300 k. These are pulling from an off-site machine at 200k easily. However the two boxes are 4 feet from each other and on the SAME switch next door to my office, and only achieving 50k. I left a 3GB transfer going at 5pm last night, and when i get in this morning at 9am there's still 30 mins left???

The FTP program's i used are as follows :

Server side = Proftpd (Slack 9 distro)

Client side = Cuteftp Pro (Demo, but still pulls 300k from offsite)

Anyone???

Are your NIC's also set to half duplex, or are they set to autonegotiate? Until you know this, you cannot rule out my diagnosis. I have a half duplex 10 mbit hub, and if the NIC's are set to autonegotiate, they will tell each other that full duplex is fine, but as the hub cannot handle it, many timeouts occur. I have found that auto-negotiation outside the LAN will typically work correctly, but that incompatible settings/hardware can be problematic locally.

Again, on linux, you can check and change most NIC settings with mii-tool. You can perhaps further diagnose the problem with "netstat -s" which will categorize the fate of your packets.

Do you have the same problem in both directions? I have found that may acheive high transfer rates from a 10mbit half duplex machine to an autonegotiate machine, but not vice versa.