Re: Looking for the cause of poor I/O performance
From: Erik Mouw <hidden>
Date: 2004-12-03 11:46:35
On Fri, Dec 03, 2004 at 06:30:51AM -0500, TJ wrote:
I'm cheap. I use a crossover so I didn't have to spring for the switch. The NICs are Intel 82540EM's. I got them for around $55 per. I didn't think that was too bad for gigabit. Of course, these controllers may be complete trash, I dunno.
You won't do any better than fast ethernet when you're using a crossover cable. Gigabit ethernet doesn't need crossover cables for direct connections, it uses all four wire pairs in cat5 cable and will automatically figure out if there's a direct connection and do the right thing (all mandatory by the gigE standard, so every NIC will support it). If you use a fast ethernet cross cable, the NICs will autonegotiate to 100 MB/s full-duplex. The Intel gigE NICs are very good: good hardware, good driver, good support. Gigabit ethernet switches are becoming rather cheap: 200 EUR buys you an 8 port switch. Erik -- +-- Erik Mouw -- www.harddisk-recovery.com -- +31 70 370 12 90 -- | Lab address: Delftechpark 26, 2628 XH, Delft, The Netherlands