Gigabit performance?

[jonathonball]

Right now I'm running two machines, my desktop (in sig) and a server (bottom of post). I use my server to compress video files into divx, download files, host ftp, host an old school bbs (online), fold, and anything else that requires lots of processing or time and minimal babysitting.

The problem is actually interfacing with the machine. It takes 8-10 minutes to move a 7-8 gigabyte file from one machine to the next. I would like to cut this at least in half.

I have several options...

(1) This one I'm considering most strongly. Buy a gigabit router such as the D-Link DIR-655. How much would this increase my wired network performance?

(2) Buy a DVD-Burner for the server and move my 500gb storage drive into that machine.

Server:
Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (939)
ASUS A8V-WM SE
2 x 80gb IDE hard drives
52x CD-RW Lite-On
GeForce 6100
Integrated 10/100 NIC

Desktop (in sig, plus)
250gb SATA system HD
500gb SATA storage HD

 

[Deiz]

You'd need a gigabit NIC for the server, for starters.

After that, I think the hard drives in your server will become the bottleneck - But you'll still see much faster transfers than you're currently getting.

10 minutes for 8 gigabytes is 13.6MB/s, technically faster than peak theoretical performance of Fast Ethernets, so I think your estimate's a little optimistic.

In any case, I've no idea what the read/write limitations are on your two 80GB drives, but gigabit will doubtlessly be faster than 100 megabit, even if the drives are bottlenecking you.

 

[Madwand]

Aye, a gigabit switch/router will do nothing for you unless you get a gigabit NIC as well.

A gigabit router per se would be overkill, as you wouldn't use the routing functionality when communicating between the two machines on the same network. After the NIC, only a gigabit switch is needed. A D-Link DGS-2205 or similar would do the job well.

A PCIe NIC would be preferable if possible, as these tend to have newer designs and also not suffer from PCI bottlenecks / load / implementation issues (VIA doesn't have the greatest reputation for PCI performance). However, these tend to be expensive, and you certainly can get away with inexpensive PCI GbE NICs, as the odds of you hitting the performance level where the differences between NICs is apparent are low -- as mentioned, you'll hit drive bottlenecks certainly, and also likely hit OS tuning / performance issues.

 

[jonathonball]

so I think your estimate's a little optimistic.

yeah, i figure.. that was just a rough off the top of my head estimate. when i do network file transfers with this setup I lean towards the set and forget approach.

Aye, a gigabit switch/router will do nothing for you unless you get a gigabit NIC as well..

no problem.. so if i really want to make this work like i imagine, i'll need not only the new router and nic cards, i'll also need a faster hard drive in the server. will cat5 work or will i need cat6... and will the gigabit router be compatible with my 10/100 cable modem?

sorry if i'm nubbing my way through this... i just don't want to do it half-ass.

 

[sdotbrucato]

yeah, i figure.. that was just a rough off the top of my head estimate. when i do network file transfers with this setup I lean towards the set and forget approach.



no problem.. so if i really want to make this work like i imagine, i'll need not only the new router and nic cards, i'll also need a faster hard drive in the server. will cat5 work or will i need cat6... and will the gigabit router be compatible with my 10/100 cable modem?

sorry if i'm nubbing my way through this... i just don't want to do it half-ass.

Getting a faster HDD will be a more costly expense then probably what is needed. But yes you will need atleast a gigabit nic for each machine and a gigabit router, or switch (switch may be cheaper). You will need atleast Cat5e, but Cat6 is always better, and the cost shouldn't be too much.

Yes both a router and a switch will work with your cable modem.

 

[Madwand]

If you already have a router that's working well for you, then there's no need to get an expensive gigabit router -- you could just add a gigabit switch between the router and the computers.

While there's a chance that a faster harddrive on the server would lead to faster transfer speeds over gigabit, the odds are against that -- most people hit around 30 MB/s even when they have drives which can do up to say 70 MB/s, because of the issues with the OS, its tuning, and Windows file transfers.

Note that this is not a hard limit, and Windows file transfers can go much faster -- it's just not achieved very often, and it's better to start off with reasonable expectations than practically unachievable ideal performance.

 

[Keiichi]

Since you're going to need to buy gigabit NICs anyway, just get the NICs and do a direct connection between the two. Then you will need to make sure that all of your client/server traffic goes through those interfaces. There is no need to get a new router.