Home networking problem... slow transfer speeds

[IBdaMac]

For some reason my 100mb/s connection only transfers at like 1mb/s. It's a direct connection so the only thing I can think is that
the 450mhz machine I have can't go much faster. It seems like it should go faster than that. Is it normal to have a speed that slow?
Is there anything I can do to make it go faster? I'm a beginner when it comes to networking so any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[cipher00]

Some more specifics might help. You have a direct connection to......the net? another machine? A description of your hardware layout would help us figure out where the problem might lurk....

 

[IBdaMac]

Good point...Sorry about that...

I just have my 2000+ XP machine hooked directly up to another machine. The other machine is a 450mhz k6-2 processor with 256mb of ram.
When just transfering files I only get a speed of about 1mb/s. I don't even have it going through a router or hub. Just messing around with
two computers and getting slow transfer speeds.

 

[alrox]

most likely a duplex mismatch. set both nics to 100/full instead of auto-negotiate and see if that fixes it.

 

[Mucman]

duplex mismatch, poorly crimped cable, slow smb protocol...

 

[IBdaMac]

Well I've set both computers to 100mb/s full and still I'm only topping out at around 1mb/s. I'm pretty new to networking, but I do know
quite a bit about computers and it seems like even with a 5400rpm hd, 450mhz k6-2, 256mb pc100 it should still get more than 1mb/s.
As far as the slow smb protocol, I'm not really sure what that means . Any more help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[dguy6789]

try a new cable. most likley if its not those reasons, you got a bad cable., a 450 mhz could extremely easily reach 100mbps, if there were a card as fast as it is, it could do 3.6GB/s.

 

[OracleOfDelphi]

Are you using a normal Network cable or are you using a crossover cable? When directly connecting two NIC's you ned to use a crossover cable.
Check to make sure. A crossover is not the same as a regualr network cable.

 

[IBdaMac]

Yeah I'm using a crossover of course, and it's brand spanking new. There are no kinks in the line and it says a 100.0mb/s connection.
I no matter which way I transfer files over the line it still only gets to 1mb/s or so. I'm really confused.

Also, I noticed that when I do send a big 700mb iso or movie the network utilization never gets above 25%. What in gods name would cause this??

 

[spidey07]

see if the IRQ of your NIC is being shared with something else?

450 Mhz processor should be able to get 50-60% utilization. Also if you say your network utilization is 25% then that is 25 Mbs, not 1.

 

[IBdaMac]

Yeah but I also said that it never gets above 25%, it jumps up and down a lot but usually spends most the time in the lower half.
Maybe I was wrong with the 1mb/s but I know it's a hell of a lot lower than 100mb/s when it takes like 3 mins to send a 250mb movie.

I also checked the irq's of the nic's in each computer and neither of them are sharing it with anything else. The 450mhz is just one I threw
together from computers that people give me to rebuild and I just keep the old mobo's and stuff. Anyway the mobo is from an hp machine
and all the parts must be oem so do you think it's just the computer? It looks like that's the only thing that anyone can conclude.

 

[IBdaMac]

Still waiting for anyone else's help on this issue.