Networking Question/Problem (1 Viewer)

[SW220]

Hi Everyone!

I have a network at home connecting a total of four computers.

They are all connected to a netgear hub.

However, when transferring things across the network it can be really, really slow.

Hence, my questions are:

1) How do I check the speed of my network card?

2) I think my network card is rated at 10/100 - what exactly does that mean?

3) I think my hub is only rated at 10mbps - could that be what is causing the slowness?

4) Is there a way to actually check what speed the network is running at? Like, at the moment i've got the two little computers on my taskbar, and is says: 'network connected - 100mbps' - is that what it is actually running at, or is that what the software (windows xp pro) has set it as, and therefore thinks it is running at that? (i hope that made sense)

Any help with the above questinos would be appreciated!

TIA!

 

[sunny]

However, when transferring things across the network it can be really, really slow.

Is the network busy at the time? How slow is slow? The bandwidth a hub can handle is common between all the computers connected to it, so if the network is busy (eg, copying files on other computers too) it can become quite slow overall. To solve this problem you need a device called a switch. It looks just like a hub, but the internals are different, and the bandwidth isn't shared, with each computer connected getting the full bandwidth, loosely speaking.

1) How do I check the speed of my network card?

2) I think my network card is rated at 10/100 - what exactly does that mean?

That it is capable of 10Mbps or 100Mbps speeds, depending on the network it is connected to.

3) I think my hub is only rated at 10mbps - could that be what is causing the slowness?

Yes, this causes the entire network (even if the network cards are capable of 100Mbps) to be at 10Mbps. Being a hub makes it worse, since you are sharing only 10Mbps between the computers connected.

4) Is there a way to actually check what speed the network is running at? Like, at the moment i've got the two little computers on my taskbar, and is says: 'network connected - 100mbps' - is that what it is actually running at, or is that what the software (windows xp pro) has set it as, and therefore thinks it is running at that? (i hope that made sense)

What you've described there is right. In most modern computers and network cards, they automatically detect the network's set up and use the highest available speed. So if Windows is telling you its 100Mbps, it probably is.

 

[SW220]

Thanks for your reply sunny!

I think ill buy a switch then!