XP network ungodly slow

[pushVTEC]

I have 3 computers networked together. One running cat 5e running xp pro, then two other computers running xp home via wireless. They are all connected to a netgear wgr614v2 router. Now the file transfers are TERRIBLY slow, like 1 k/s rates, but the internet is fine to all the computers going 300+k/s. I've tried to use netbeui as the protocol to use for file sharing but it didn't help at all and now i just have it set to tcp again. Is there something i can tweak/look at to improve the LAN transfer times?

 

[AkumaBao]

What's the signal strength on these wifi boxes, and what technology is it? (i.e. 802.11b 802.11g) Also what speeds are the wifi NICs set at, and is the router set for those speeds?

 

[pushVTEC]

using 802.11g, wifi nics are set to auto with full signal strength (54 mbps)

 

[InlineFive]

Try enabling NetBIOS under the TCP/IP parameters for that network connection.

 

[pushVTEC]

netbios is already enabled on all the computers. any other ideas? It's weird the internet works fine but computer to computer is slow as sin.

 

[ViperXX]

Like you my web browsing and downloads speeds off the internet were normal but local file transfers took forever for just a messily 10 MB file.
I tried all the protocols, all the reg hacks and I could not get my network file transfers to speed up. I was getting ready to pull my hair out. One day I read an article about how some hubs did not play nice with WindowsXP, they could cause slow network file transfers. The article went on to say that the user disconnected the hub from the network and connected a crossover cable from one computer directly to another. They transferred a large file across from one computer to another and they reported very fast transfer results.

Well I had a Linksys switch on my network not a hub but I figured what the hell I've tried everything else. So I made a crossover cable and connected two of my computers together and transferred a 600MB file from one computer to the other. It took less than a minute! I about fell out of my chair! I took my Linksys switch off the network and plugged in a wireless router that I had recently purchased which also has four Cat5 LAN ports. I plugged my computers into it and repeated the file transfer. Boom, less than a minute for 600MBs to transfer across the network.

Conclusion: The switch must have went bad.

Maybe this solution will work for you.

 

[spidey07]

switch could be bad.

But many times the cause of slow lan transfers is called a duplex mismatch - where one side of the link is operating in hald-duplex and the other side in full duplex. This will slow any network to an utter crawl.

Just make sure to always leave the network card settings at default, or double check they are set to "auto speed/auto duplex"

 

[howdyduty]

Duplex/Speed problems plague even the enterprise class switches. Verify and adjust. Let us know how it goes.

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: howdyduty
Duplex/Speed problems plague even the enterprise class switches. Verify and adjust. Let us know how it goes.

not if you leave them to auto.

The common problem is some guy doing "I'll force the nic to 100/full, that way it will perform well." Meanwhile the switch goes to 100/half because there is no negotiation and performance is 1 Mbs max.

So for anybody else reading - my hard fast, burned into their skulls policy is - "Force both sides of link in data center, everywhere else is auto...no exceptions. Complain to my guys about a "network problem" with your server and my guys find a duplex mismatch...50 lashings from your boss accompanied by the written operations policy."