Network issues for HDHomerun usage

[Ted@TNT]

Does anyone know if a board with dual ethernet can be connected to a network in parallel to spread the load? Will any part of the OS handle this management? I've got dual cables already running to that location, and thought it may be a benefit to connect it, but I've never enabled the second port.

Thanks,

* split to its own topic *

[teknubic]

Originally Posted by Ted@TNT

Does anyone know if a board with dual ethernet can be connected to a network in parallel to spread the load? Will any part of the OS handle this management? I've got dual cables already running to that location, and thought it may be a benefit to connect it, but I've never enabled the second port.

Thanks,

You might try posting that in a

[Ted@TNT]

Originally Posted by teknubic

You might try posting that in a

Sorry, perhaps I left out the operative term - HD Homerun. I am running, on my network, two HD Homeruns and I want to know if using both ethernet together can be done to reduce latency/increase performance of the HD Homeruns in conjunction with SageTV.

There, I think I got it in there now!

[MeInMaui]

Ted,

You would have to work out some DHCP issues (The second network would require a second DHCP server), but I suspect you could get it to work. However, I would suggest an alternative. I believe the HDHR ethernet port is a 100Mbit connection. If you connect the two HDHR's to a good gigabit switch and connect through the switch to a gigabit nic in your computer, then I think that would give you a very robust solution.

Aloha,
Mike

[Ted@TNT]

Mike,

Thanks, I'll go that route!

I hadn't thought about the port on the HDHR being 100MB - makes sense. I actually just installed my home GB network - CAT6 cable through the attic from every room. CAT6 Jacks, CAT6 patch panel, and CAT6 16-port switch. SageTV server, as well as most other PC's in the house, already had GB NICs. I had just never looked into activating both NIC's at once.

I also suppose I didn't really need DUAL Gigabit, but I thought - since I have it available, why not?

Thanks,

[garyellis]

Help me understand something...I am getting confused on the function of the gigabyte switch.

I have a 10/100Mb router. I connect a gigabyte switch to it. I connect my HTPC using a gigabyte NIC to the gigabyte switch and I also connect each of my MVP's to the gigabyte switch as well as both ports on my HDHR.

Given the HDHR and the MVP's are only 100Mb and the router is 100Mb, am I really buying anything with the gigabyte switch? I would think that the whole network may be limited by the slowest path.

Always willing to learn though.... comments?

Gary Ellis

[Ted@TNT]

Originally Posted by garyellis

I have a 10/100Mb router. I connect a gigabyte switch to it. I connect my HTPC using a gigabyte NIC to the gigabyte switch and I also connect each of my MVP's to the gigabyte switch as well as both ports on my HDHR.

Given the HDHR and the MVP's are only 100Mb and the router is 100Mb, am I really buying anything with the gigabyte switch? I would think that the whole network may be limited by the slowest path.
Gary Ellis

Gary,

It is true that each of your auxilliary components are only 100MB speed, and that they cannot perform any faster by themselves. SInce they all pass through the switch, the switch limits the SUM of all of them. So, If all these things are coming from your HTPC and you HTPC supports GB speed on its NIC, then the switch could handle up to that. If however your switch were 100MB, and if the sum of the parts were greater than 100MB all coming from your HTPC, then the router would restrict it to 100MB

In my case, I had a 100MB network originally. I had 100MB router and cabling despite the capabilities of the HTPC. Given that my switch was old and not running as fast as it could, other network traffic, etc., I actually saw funny artifacts in the HDHR stream. I know that it only uses less than 20MB per channel, or under 40MB total, but once an underperforming network and overhead are taken into consideration, it was not cutting it. I could have simply changed the switch and probably been fine, but I chose to upgrade all the cabling to CAT6 as well. (CAT5 cable will perform at CAT6 speeds generally, especially if the lengths aren't too long). The funny artifacts were instantly gone.

Hope this helps.

[hemicuda]

ignorant me. I should have ran 6 here before the sheetrock went up, but I already had a spool of 5e. getting the 5e out from under the staples will be a real hassle if I can't get Gbit to work on it. A couple of the runs are pushing 80-90ft.

[garyellis]

So, I think what you said was that if I have 2 MVP's and 2 ports on the HDHR coming into a GB switch, then because its a GB switch, it can work on these (4) 100Mb things at once under 1 GB VS. if it came to a 100Mb router or switch, which would have to work on them serially because the sum is greater than the whole?

Not sure if I said it right, but that made sense to me....if I got it correct...

As for the cabling...I ran cat 5e cable many years ago..most runs are 70 to 90feet. It may be time to run cat 6 cable...Do you think that buys me anything?

Also, It would be very good if the new HD extenders came with GB ports...

Thanks for the help,

Gary Ellis

[Morgan111]

A gigabit switch can theoretically handle up to a sum of 1 gigabit for each port connected (not total switch traffic). if a server with a 100Mb NIC is connected to the switch, then the switch will limit the traffic to that server at 100Mb.

I have 5e run with the longest being 60 ft. The longest run did fine on some gigabit tests. If I personnally was to run cables again and didn't have a big spool of 5e around I would run cat6 just to be safe. Who know how far down the road terrabit networks are!

[Ted@TNT]

I had a 60' and a 75' run that were CAT5 (not even 5e!) and when connected to the GB network, they were functioning at the GB speed. I replaced them because it wasn't too difficult, but they were working. Those of you with 5e will probably be fine - if I had originally used 5e I wouldn't have bothered upgrading at all.

As it stands now, I'm probably ready for 100GB already!

[valnar]

Most CAT5e cable is 350Mhz, which can do gigabit fine. No need to upgrade to CAT6. If you have some really old (or cheap) CAT5e cable that is only 150Mhz, then it is not spec'ed for gigabit speed.

-Robert

[jkohn]

So, I think what you said was that if I have 2 MVP's and 2 ports on the HDHR coming into a GB switch, then because its a GB switch, it can work on these (4) 100Mb things at once under 1 GB...

Actually 3 not 4, the HDHR has two tuners but only one network jack.

[garyellis]

Yep..you're right....I was thinking tuners...

Ok, so how do I test which cable I have? Or better yet, how do I test the through put of the switch?..I think it is Cat 5e..But, I installed it about 5 or 6 years ago...

Gary Ellis

[jkohn]

My cables are several years old and I'm pretty sure they're cat5e at best. the longest run is about 50-60ft. GB ethernet is working just fine.

[garyellis]

So, I guess the question is...how do you know GB is working fine? how do you measure it?

Gary Ellis

[Ted@TNT]

Originally Posted by garyellis

Yep..you're right....I was thinking tuners...

Ok, so how do I test which cable I have? Or better yet, how do I test the through put of the switch?..I think it is Cat 5e..But, I installed it about 5 or 6 years ago...

Gary Ellis

It should be printed on the cable itself - all my cable says CAT5 or CAT5e - 350MHz or CAT6.

[Ted@TNT]

You could time large file transfers - but be forgiving. Overhead and packet loss and the actual speed of the PC's can all affect it.

Also, don't get confused by Gigabit/Gigabyte conversion. 1 Gigabit is only about 125 Megabytes! If you move a 1 GB (GigaBYTE) file, theoretically the network should be able to transfer it at speeds UP TO 1 Gb (GigaBIT) per second - which would be about 8 seconds. Then, consider overhead, error-correction, handshaking, etc. 15 seconds would probably be a good time, depending on the speed of the PC's/drives/NIC's, etc. 100Mb cable would take closer to two minutes to move this - if my math is correct!

[blade]

Originally Posted by Ted@TNT

You could time large file transfers - but be forgiving. Overhead and packet loss and the actual speed of the PC's can all affect it.

Don't forget about disk throughput. My disks only do around 52MB/sec sustained transfer. That's only around 0.4 gigabits so disk throughput could be the limiting factor when moving a large file.

[garyellis]

But, even if it is 30 second or 45 seconds, then I know the range vs. if it takes 2 or 3 minutes...

But, what I can't figure out is, "what do I transfer a file to?" I only have 1 device that has Gigabyte speed and that is my HTPC. If I send a file to another PC that only has 100MB nics, then that doesn't prove anything.

That's a lot of what this discussion was about. If I have only 100MB nics or HDHR ports or 100MB routersor 100MB MVP's, then what good is a gigabyte switch?

Still confused, but love the discussion...As always, thanks...

Gary Ellis