Looking for a solid ethernet network card

lDreaml

Weaksauce
Joined
Jun 2, 2016
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I've been banging my head against this for the last 2 days and I'm honestly just flat-out tired of trying. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. My internet speed is touted at being 1.5Gbps. Whether or not that's true I don't know, but yeah I need a card that can accommodate that supposed speed.

Here is my prehistoric motherboard: https://www.newegg.ca/p/N82E16813131614

Canadian buyer willing to spend $100+.
 
I've been banging my head against this for the last 2 days and I'm honestly just flat-out tired of trying. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. My internet speed is touted at being 1.5Gbps. Whether or not that's true I don't know, but yeah I need a card that can accommodate that supposed speed.

Here is my prehistoric motherboard: https://www.newegg.ca/p/N82E16813131614

Canadian buyer willing to spend $100+.

You're not sure of your internet speed, and your not sure how to find out... but you believe you need a new network card for such speeds? Why? How did you come to this conclusion with no data or evidence for needing a new card? How do you know you're not already getting those speeds? You should find a bandwidth meter and find out as you may not need to spend any money.

Your onboard card supports 10/100/1000Mbps. Do you have at least a 1GB network? What is your connected speed? What type of router/switch? What is the spec of the Ethernet cable?
 
The advertised speed is 1.5Gbps. It's a modem-router combo from Bell linked above. The results from people's usage is mixed. Some achieve the 1.5, some don't. Not entirely sure what's up with all of that but since my onboard adapter maxes out at 1000Mbits I figured getting a new one to compensate for that possible 500Mbit upgrade was needed. I'm running Win7 64bit (just in case that info is needed).
 
1.5gbit is a very weird speed for an ISP to sell. 99% of people out there cap at 1gbit and those who can go higher will usually be sold at the next "whole number" up (2gbit, 5, 10). Are you sure it doesnt advertise "1.5gbit wifi" speeds? Cause there is a wireless AC standard that is 1.6gbit out there.

Either way, no one here can help you unless you provide details on your connection interfaces to your ISP hardware. There are just too many connectors for us to randomly guess what you use. Also, your probably looking at significantly higher than $100, especially in Canadian dollars.
Your MB and CPU are ancient (over 10 years old.......), so you will be needing a NIC that can offload just about every type of packet possible to the NIC hardware to get 1gbit or above. If your using fiber connection of some sort you will probably be looking at a NIC from Mellanox, or if you are on copper then you will probably be looking at a Chelsio NIC. Intel doesnt offload as much as the other enterprise brands on average.
 
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I apologize for the late response things are a little hectic over here at the moment. It is a fiber connection. I'm planning on using a higher end cat cable to connect directly to the modem. Whatever you recommend. I'll do whatever I need to to make this work properly so any and all suggestions are so greatly appreciated. Any specific NIC I should be looking for from Mellanox? I'm relatively ignorant when it comes to this stuff and don't want to make a mistake based on that ignorance.
 
I apologize for the late response things are a little hectic over here at the moment. It is a fiber connection. I'm planning on using a higher end cat cable to connect directly to the modem. Whatever you recommend. I'll do whatever I need to to make this work properly so any and all suggestions are so greatly appreciated. Any specific NIC I should be looking for from Mellanox? I'm relatively ignorant when it comes to this stuff and don't want to make a mistake based on that ignorance.

The only pictures of your home hub 3000 I could find show it has only copper RJ45 connections for LAN and it has DSL connections on it. I dont know if thats right but it does not sound like a ISP router they would give you with a fiber connection or to support even gigabit speed. If this is the case, nothing you do will get 1.5 gigabit speeds as the unit simply cannot support that speed with only 1gbit connectors on it.
 
That was my thought too but then I saw other subscribers of the service posting screenshots of them getting those speeds. I don't know what to make of any of this tbh, but if you have a suggestion for a network card that could match those speeds.. I mean, I'd be willing to throw money at it in the hopes that it might work.
 
It helps greatly but confuses me all the same. I'm trying to figure out what's inside the homehub 3000 modem-router box they're offering atm.
 
DonTC Thanks for the heads up. I kinda wish I was a bit more knowledgeable on the networking side of things so all of this stuff wouldn't sound like a foreign language to me. I get the general idea of it all, but yeah.
 
Your internet package is designed for a total of 1.5Gbps for all devices (with more focus on wireless devices, it seems). However, it appears your hub only has a gigabit switch. As such, it can only provide up to 1Gbit to any single wired device. Your motherboard already has what it needs.
 
ryan_975 I see.. Well I feel like a fool for paying extra now. Just one question though. How are some users posting speeds of 1.5Gbps on speed tests with the same service?
 
May not be a fool. While you can only get 1Gbps via the wired connection, you should still have 500Mbps available via the WiFi side of the modem. Should allow full 1Gbps to your desktop and have 500Mbps left over for streaming via a WiFi TV or other device.
 
ryan_975 I see.. Well I feel like a fool for paying extra now. Just one question though. How are some users posting speeds of 1.5Gbps on speed tests with the same service?

Hard to say without seeing the speed tests, but that router allows users to run a speedtest from inside of it. If you log directly into the router and run a speed test you should see the full 1.5 gbs.

ie. This guy runs a speed test in the router and gets ~1.3gbs and then on his pc at ~1gbs. These are the results that should be expected.
 
I could not find actual specs on this device. I did look too. From what I gleaned, I agree that it is using 10/100/1000 (1G) Ethernet ports on it. Well, the maximum bandwidth any one device on the network can achieve is 1G, but of course that will be less with overhead (frame, TCP). It is interesting that the ISP will allow higher bandwidth usage on the WAN side than the switch side can support.


It depends on the underlying fabric that's serving those ports and the WLAN. It could be more than capable of switching the full 1.5Gbps across everything
 
I recently did some connector and cable testing on 15 foot patch cables. I tested 18 variations for my job (I work for trueCABLE). Guess what? I could achieve stable 10GBASE-T link speeds with ALL of them. I mean stable, tested, no errors and heavily beat on tested. I used everything from our Cat5e UTP Riser to Cat6A shielded. All perform the SAME at short distances. Don't waste money on expensive patch cables. If you are going to buy a shielded cable because you have bad EMI/RFI in your environment then so be it, but don't spring for a higher category patch cable just because. Cat5e UTP will work great, at least at the 15 foot and less length and assuming the patch cable is terminated as well as I can terminate cable (I am beyond picky).

This is pretty commonly known- at shorter distances with little EMI, a to-spec CAT5e cable in good condition can support 10Gbit. The challenge comes when 10Gbit is otherwise expected and not achieved; for a consumer, the price delta for getting CAT6 or CAT6a is next to nil relative to the cost of the equipment involved, so generally speaking it is ill-advised to introduce an additional variable when working with 10Gbase-T.

For larger installations done by professionals, it can make sense from a cost and time perspective, of course.
 
If you really need a network card that's faster than 1.5Gbps, then I'd grab an Intel 10GbE controller. There are some lower priced models out there that may get close to your budget.
 
If you really need a network card that's faster than 1.5Gbps, then I'd grab an Intel 10GbE controller. There are some lower priced models out there that may get close to your budget.

For some reason I'd gotten the idea that Intel hadn't been supporting Nbase-T / Multi-gig, so I had to go and prove myself wrong. I'll also say that the Aquantia adapters have worked well in my experience.
 
For some reason I'd gotten the idea that Intel hadn't been supporting Nbase-T / Multi-gig, so I had to go and prove myself wrong. I'll also say that the Aquantia adapters have worked well in my experience.

I've had very little experience with them. Basically every 10GbE adapter I've worked with has been Intel or Broadcomm. The few Aquantia's I've dealt with came with gaming boards. Many of which I couldn't test because I don't have anything that supports 2.5GbE or 5GbE speeds. There have been a couple 10GbE Aquantia adapters and they were fine but that's about all I can say. In contrast, having worked in the IT industry the entire time 10GbE has existed, I've seen Intel and Broadcomm at their best and worst. So I know those adapters very well.
 
10Gbase-T, and 10Gbit in general, remains in a weird place. On the desktop, while Aquantia released their 10Gbit adapters first and those reached consumers first, the ones that only do 2.5Gbit and 5Gbit are now more common- and boards seem to be shipping with 2.5Gbit adapters from Realtek too.

In the commercial datacenter space, 10Gbase-T never really seemed to catch on. SFP+ has been popular and has seen some 'prosumer' adoption, and it's really the cheaper option today, but it's also on the way out for commercial infrastructure. Generally speaking, 40Gbit is also on its way out too- the commercial space is that far ahead. For example, Intel just celebrated their 400Gbit transceiver release, where they put all of the components on one ASIC, which simplifies the part from what Mellanox has been selling for five years.

And in the commercial desktop space, well, almost no one needs >1Gbit on the desk, still. And WiFi is at the point where it'll be faster and cheaper for the vast majority, making the likelihood of higher wired desktop speeds even less probable over time and really imperiling the future of 10Gbase-T overall.
 
Most NBaseT I've seen ports on network hardware and appliances are using the Aquantia chipsets now actually. Starting to see it a lot more in wifi infrastructure to feed the faster APs. Yes yes we all know wifi is generally shit, but with multiple radios and enough clients 1Gb isn't actually enough.

Intel makes nice NICs, but their chipsets are not found on the other end very much. Also their limited X550 NBaseT support is determined by OEM firmware (and OS sometimes) which is annoying. Broadcom and others are much more dominant inside the hardware on the other end of NICs.

I would pick up a new aquantia for $70 or less over a used intel 10GbE w/o NBaseT or non-chinaclone new X550 part for at least twice the price. The drivers and throughput on them are actually great.

Realtek...is realtek, no thanks.
 
I'm trying to sort through it in the "bypass hh3k" threads but this forum has the answers how people are able to get 1.5Gb/s to a single device. Short answer from what I'm seeing is its not possible by default. Long answer is you need to buy some pricey gear.

For ISP related stuff, DSLReports always has the answers.

https://www.dslreports.com/forum/sympat

**EDIT**

Yeah so its pretty advanced stuff. Basically you'd be swapping our the HH3K with your own router that has a fiber SFP port and doing a lot of configuration that you may or may not be comfortable with. Your own router should be able to bond two Gigabit ports together to a switch that will then output two Gigabit connections to your PC that you'll also need to bond together in Windows.

Definitely good luck.
 
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Short answer from what I'm seeing is its not possible by default. Long answer is you need to buy some pricey gear.

This is... relative. If the ISP were planning on actually providing 1.5Gbps from the RJ45 jack, they'd have put a multi-gig / Nbase-T or SFP+ NIC on it and marked and marketed it so. On your end, that means a NIC on a PC or a swithc or router that also has a multi-gig / Nbase-T or SFP+ NIC to make use of that speed.

Systems with those NICs are starting to become widely accessible, but building a network around that kind of speed is still a bit out of reach for most consumers. You're certainly not going to run down to your local electronics store, pick up whatever Netgear etc. router they have on the shelf, and be able to make use of those speeds.


Most likely, you'd have to build a router out of a PC and one of the common (several free) router distributions along with one or two faster NICs, and then use a (likely expensive) switch to get higher speeds to individual clients. Certainly a multi-project process for the uninitiated ;).
 
Yeah this became scary fast. I'm just going to accept my fate and be happy that I can download at 1Gbps... If I even reach that speed that is.
 
Yeah this became scary fast. I'm just going to accept my fate and be happy that I can download at 1Gbps... If I even reach that speed that is.

10Gbit is scary because there are few 'fire and forget' options.

1Gbit internet really isn't; but going faster can be troublesome because very little consumer-oriented hardware can take advantage of it and there are essentially no inexpensive options available yet.
 
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10Gbit is scary because there are few 'fire and forget' options.

1Gbit internet really isn't; but going faster can be troublesome because very little consumer-oriented hardware can take advantage of it and there are essentially no inexpensive options available yet.

For 10G that is true and not true, providers are buying packages for this now to provide to their customers, and it's getting to the point where it's almost consumer level and some are exploring this. Well, They've been looking into since docsis 3.1 and DAA promised full duplex, which is now docsis 4.0 , but it's being rolled out . But since all the white box hardware is rolling out, a 4 port router/switch with 10G ports and cumulus thrown on it is probably gonna happen soon with pre programmed stuff.
 
I've got gigabit network and 1 gig service, so why am I getting these high speeds?
it hit 1.9 gbps a few times as I was testing it.
1.7gbs Plex Server.jpg

these are my typical speeds on my machines,
speedtest-3-machines.jpg
 
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Ended up getting their modem. Maxing out at 300Mbps DL and 150Mbps UP on fast.com. Utterly disgusted with bell right now. I only have one desktop connected to the modem. Using a cat6 cable and have a 1Gbit ethernet card. Set it to 1gb full duplex in device manager. Tried every port, still the same abysmal results. Their tech support attempted to help over the phone for 2+ hours each time only to come up clueless. Even got a replacement modem 3 hours after initial instillation. This one is running even slower. Tech support said they'd look over my ticket over the weekend and will give me a call. I think bell is stalling to get me to be locked into paying them for this joke of a connection. And this all comes without even mentioning how the guy who drilled a hole in the side of my house to get the fiber cable in literally drilled an inch away from the outlet lifting the outlet face-plate off... Day 2 and I'm about to call them to cancel their service. What a huge mistake. All that came out of this was structural damage to my house.
 
some more tests i use that seem to max out my speed and affect everyone else in the household-
1) a steam game, valve really pushes it to you as fast as your connection can handle
2) a linux distro via torrent, again so many sources the bottleneck is always you
3) do this while plugged into one of the hard ports on your wifi device(but not actually using wifi), there is usually some switchports on the back, then you can rule wifi issues out

with these i usually get a speed that is similar and can confirm what i am actually getting... good luck seems like a nightmare.
 
purple_monster Launched steam and was instantly bombarded with updates. One game had a 10gb update and the peak speed I was downloading at was 41MB/s with the average being 32-40MB/s. 41MB/s is essentially 320Mbps. This is all through the use of one wired connection with all wifi devices disabled. Funny thing is tech support went from being shocked at my speeds to suddenly saying that's normal or high end speed for a single user. Not to mention the fact that every tech support agent doesn't speak English.

Edit: Second game to update is averaging 20-24MB/s.. This is almost the same I was getting on my last ISP with a 120Mbps connection.
 
purple_monster Launched steam and was instantly bombarded with updates. One game had a 10gb update and the peak speed I was downloading at was 41MB/s with the average being 32-40MB/s. 41MB/s is essentially 320Mbps. This is all through the use of one wired connection with all wifi devices disabled. Funny thing is tech support went from being shocked at my speeds to suddenly saying that's normal or high end speed for a single user. Not to mention the fact that every tech support agent doesn't speak English.

Edit: Second game to update is averaging 20-24MB/s.. This is almost the same I was getting on my last ISP with a 120Mbps connection.

i wish i was at home to show you a screenshot but that is the same speeds i get when downloading a game, so maybe that test isnt that great since i pay for 50meg internet, so maybe steam actually flattens out at that speed when i thought it was going as fast as my connections. sorry i cant be more help.
 
purple_monster No worries, bud. At least you speak English and offer real-world tests to help determine things rather than fake numbers that mean absolutely nothing to the end-user (like their tech support hangs onto).
 
On Fios Gb, I've found Steam to vary a bit. It's always over 300Mbps, but good days give 700+. The WAN is big & has a lot of variables...
 
I know ISP bashing is all the rage and whatnot but given the age of your rig are you sure that's not the problem? Have you done testing that leads you believe something on your end is not the problem. For example I've got a laptop here that can hit 800-900Mbps on a good day provided I disable the security software. If I don't disable the security sw it tops out at 300-400Mbps. Just because you can link up at 1000Mbps doesn't mean you'll see that kind of throughput.
 
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