[plug] gigabit lan

[Brad Campbell]

Kev wrote:

> So, I am now getting better than 100Mbit, but not quite what I 
> expected.  Are my expectations too high?  Tomorrow I think I'll have 
> some play time, so I'll get mii-tool also and have a play and see what I 
> can find out.

Just some meaningless data points for you.

I added an additional GB switch into my network last night to get GB to my Mac Mini..

3 machines. One athlon server (2600XP), one athlon client (2800XP) and a dual core Mac Mini.

Between two athlon boxes with the skge driver I get about 350Mb/s. Between one of the athlons and 
the Mac Mini with the Sky2 driver I get about 250Mb/s.

I think at one point I did see as much as 750Mb/s between the two athlons but that was a) a long 
time ago and my memory is now hazy, b) on completely unloaded and idle boxes and c) using a 
crossover cable. The server now is quite a busy machine and there are about 7 devices on the network.

I used iperf -s on the server and iperf -c on the clients. No other switches/tweaks.

Running a simultaneous test from both the Mac and the athlon client to the server seemed to give me 
about 270Mb/s from the athlon and 180Mb/s from the Mac..

I'm using 2 cheap 5-port GB switches that store&forward.

I was getting about 95Mb/s from the Mac when it was on a 100BaseT port.

(all measurements in Mega BITS)

I was hoping for more, but given all the athlons are VIA chipsets with the NIC's sitting on the PCI 
bus, and the hardware is now 4 years old I guess I can't complain that much. Disappointed with the 
performance of the Mac Mini though.

Brad
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