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[SOLVED] Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

Linux Kernel, Network, and Services configuration.
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KingBongo
Posts: 56
Joined: 2010-10-14 13:39

[SOLVED] Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#1 Post by KingBongo »

Hi. I am having an issue I don't completely understand. I suspect it has something to do with the old PATA interface. Here is my setup:

1a. Server Pentium 4 with PATA bus. Debian Jessie CLI install.
1b. Gigabit ethernet network card connected to said PATA bus.
1c. SATA card connected to said PATA bus. To that is connected one 8TB HDD (actually two but one is for backups only and mostly dormant).

2. Another computer with Gigabit ethernet.

3. Ethernet Gigabit router in between 1. and 2.,, everything connected via ethernet.

Here is the deal: When transferring files from the second computer to the server the transfer speed tops out at about 11.7 MB/s. I understand PATA is rather slow and that the Gigabit ethernet card and the SATA card should have to share the bandwidth of the PATA bus, but it shouldn't be that slow, should it?

Here is some additional information:
A. File transfer is performed via the FTP protocol since that should be the fastest one.
B. I don't know the exact specification of the PATA bus in the server, but I suspect it is PATA/100 since all read/write operations always topped out just below 100 MB/s when benchmarking different HDDs.

In my world the transfer speed between computer and server should max out just below 50 MB/s, say 45 MB/s. Why isn't it so?
Last edited by KingBongo on 2017-04-21 06:25, edited 1 time in total.

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phenest
Posts: 1702
Joined: 2010-03-09 09:38
Location: The Matrix

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#2 Post by phenest »

KingBongo wrote:1b. Gigabit ethernet network card connected to said PATA bus.
Do you mean PCI rather than PATA?

Please post the output of these:

Code: Select all

uname -a
lspci -k
ASRock H77 Pro4-M i7 3770K - 32GB RAM - Pioneer BDR-209D

KingBongo
Posts: 56
Joined: 2010-10-14 13:39

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#3 Post by KingBongo »

Yes, of course I mean PCI, thank you :) Just for my understanding: the PCI sockets are connected to the PATA bus, aren't they?

Here are the outputs of what you are asking for:

Code: Select all

xxxxxx@xxxxxx-server:~$ uname -a
Linux xxxxxx-server 3.16.0-4-686-pae #1 SMP Debian 3.16.39-1+deb8u2 (2017-03-07) i686 GNU/Linux

Code: Select all

xxxxxx@xxxxxx-server:~$ lspci -k
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 82845G/GL[Brookdale-G]/GE/PE DRAM Controller/Host-Hub Interface (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: agpgart-intel
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82845G/GL[Brookdale-G]/GE/PE Host-to-AGP Bridge (rev 01)
00:1d.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 01)
	Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Device 00c5
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.1 USB controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 01)
	Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Device 00c5
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.2 USB controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 01)
	Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Device 00c5
	Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.7 USB controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-M) USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 01)
	Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Device 00c5
	Kernel driver in use: ehci-pci
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev 81)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL (ICH4/ICH4-L) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 01)
	Kernel driver in use: lpc_ich
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801DB (ICH4) IDE Controller (rev 01)
	Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Device 00c5
	Kernel driver in use: ata_piix
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV11 [GeForce2 MX200] (rev b2)
	Subsystem: CardExpert Technology Device 0001
	Kernel driver in use: nouveau
05:04.0 RAID bus controller: Promise Technology, Inc. PDC40719 [FastTrak TX4300/TX4310] (rev 02)
	Subsystem: Promise Technology, Inc. PDC40719 [FastTrak TX4300/TX4310]
	Kernel driver in use: sata_promise
05:08.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB PRO/100 VE (LOM) Ethernet Controller (rev 81)
	Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation Device 0091
	Kernel driver in use: e100
05:0a.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8169 PCI Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 10)
	Subsystem: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8169/8110 Family PCI Gigabit Ethernet NIC
	Kernel driver in use: r8169

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pylkko
Posts: 1802
Joined: 2014-11-06 19:02

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#4 Post by pylkko »

do you have firmware-realtek?

Code: Select all

sudo apt policy firmware-realtek
According to
https://packages.debian.org/en/jessie/firmware-realtek

your card needs it. But some ethernet cards work at 100 mbps without firmware and require firmware for gigabit.
11.7 MB/s is almost exactly 100 mpbs

or maybe you are not using a cat-6 (or as good) cable(s)?

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phenest
Posts: 1702
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Location: The Matrix

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#5 Post by phenest »

KingBongo wrote:Yes, of course I mean PCI, thank you :) Just for my understanding: the PCI sockets are connected to the PATA bus, aren't they?
PCI are slots, not sockets. And PATA is for hard drives. 2 different things.

Your lspci output shows 2 ethernet controllers. Which one is the cable plugged into?
ASRock H77 Pro4-M i7 3770K - 32GB RAM - Pioneer BDR-209D

KingBongo
Posts: 56
Joined: 2010-10-14 13:39

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#6 Post by KingBongo »

pylkko:
Now I have firmware-realtek, thank you. In my stupidity I thought that installing "firmware-linux" would automatically install the needed stuff for most anything, but apparently not so. However, not even a reboot of the server made any difference speed-wise.

I think I might have a junk ethernet cable, worth checking out. However, the distances we are talking about are really short, about 2-3 meters respectively and the cables are not much longer than that. Can bad cables really make up such a big difference?

phenest:
Ahhh, thank you, now I learned something new. The ethernet cable is plugged into the Gigabit card, just like it should.

EDIT: I noticed from Wikipedia that my P4 probably has PCI with 133 MB/s maximum transfer speed because it is the standard configuration for PCI. If that is true it rimes reasonably well with the maximum speed of just under 100 MB/s for several SATA HDDs I tested. What do you guys think?

Cefiar
Posts: 18
Joined: 2017-03-25 22:50

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#7 Post by Cefiar »

With cables:

100Mbit (100BASE-TX) will work with the 4 main wires (2 pairs) in the cable present (1,2,3,6).

Gigabit/1000Mbit (1000BASE-T) needs all 8 wires (4 pairs) present.

If your cable has a broken wire, it could lead to it syncing at a slower speed, depending on the devices on both ends of the cable.

You can use the mii-tool program to tell you what speed the link is running at.

eg: mii-tool eth0

Output example: eth0: negotiated 1000baseT-FD flow-control, link ok

KingBongo
Posts: 56
Joined: 2010-10-14 13:39

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#8 Post by KingBongo »

Cefiar:
Here is the output from mii-tool,

Code: Select all

xxxxxx@xxxxxx-server:~$ sudo mii-tool eth1
eth1: negotiated 1000baseT-HD flow-control, link ok
Gigabit link seems to be ok. So why is the file transfer running so sloooow? I really cannot believe that a non-CAT6 cable should cause such a big deviation from maximum speed over these short distances.

EDIT:
Maybe I need some firmware for the other computer I am transferring the files from? Here is the output from mii-tool,

Code: Select all

xxxxxx@xxxxxx-fitlet ~ $ sudo mii-tool eth1
eth1: negotiated 100baseTx-FD flow-control, link ok
Is the Gigabit link really up? Doesn't seem like it.

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pylkko
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Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#9 Post by pylkko »

The figure that you cite is so close to 100 mbps that I would suspect that there is something wrong in the network setup rather than a bottleneck of some sort. Also the output you offer above suggests the same. You don't need cat6 for Gigabit but you certainly need cat5e or cat5 at least. You should provide a lspci of the devices on the other computer. It looks like one has a Gigabit connection to the router but the other not.

KingBongo
Posts: 56
Joined: 2010-10-14 13:39

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#10 Post by KingBongo »

pylkko:
I think so too, but were is the "error"? Actually, I recently got a new router and there was no change in speed whatsoever.

Here is the output from the other computer (it is a fitlet pc),

Code: Select all

xxxxxx@xxxxxx-fitlet ~ $ lspci -k
00:00.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1566
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1566
00:01.0 VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Mullins [Radeon R6 Graphics] (rev 02)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Device 0123
	Kernel driver in use: radeon
00:01.1 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Kabini HDMI/DP Audio
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Kabini HDMI/DP Audio
	Kernel driver in use: snd_hda_intel
00:02.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 156b
00:02.2 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Family 16h Processor Functions 5:1
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:02.4 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Family 16h Processor Functions 5:1
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:02.5 PCI bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Family 16h Processor Functions 5:1
	Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:08.0 Encryption controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1537
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1537
	Kernel driver in use: AMD Cryptographic Coprocessor
00:10.0 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB XHCI Controller (rev 11)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB XHCI Controller
	Kernel driver in use: xhci_hcd
00:11.0 SATA controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH SATA Controller [AHCI mode] (rev 40)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH SATA Controller [AHCI mode]
	Kernel driver in use: ahci
00:12.0 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB EHCI Controller (rev 39)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB EHCI Controller
	Kernel driver in use: ehci-pci
00:13.0 USB controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB EHCI Controller (rev 39)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH USB EHCI Controller
	Kernel driver in use: ehci-pci
00:14.0 SMBus: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH SMBus Controller (rev 42)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH SMBus Controller
	Kernel driver in use: piix4_smbus
00:14.2 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH Azalia Controller (rev 02)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH Azalia Controller
	Kernel driver in use: snd_hda_intel
00:14.3 ISA bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH LPC Bridge (rev 11)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH LPC Bridge
00:14.7 SD Host controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH SD Flash Controller (rev 01)
	Subsystem: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] FCH SD Flash Controller
	Kernel driver in use: sdhci-pci
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1580
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1581
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1582
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1583
	Kernel driver in use: k10temp
00:18.4 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1584
00:18.5 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD] Device 1585
01:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Wireless 7260 (rev 73)
	Subsystem: Intel Corporation Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260
	Kernel driver in use: iwlwifi
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation I211 Gigabit Network Connection (rev 03)
	Subsystem: Intel Corporation Device 0000
	Kernel driver in use: igb
03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation I211 Gigabit Network Connection (rev 03)
	Subsystem: Intel Corporation Device 0000
	Kernel driver in use: igb

KingBongo
Posts: 56
Joined: 2010-10-14 13:39

Re: Network maxes out at 11.7 MB/s, why?

#11 Post by KingBongo »

I FOUND IT! It was a faulty network cable, but you already knew that, didn't you? :) File transfers now max out at around 46 MB/s, pretty close to what I predicted myself.

Thank you guys!

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