lawn2 said:
File transfer is sloooow on my workgroup. at 10mps it should only
take a few seconds to xfer < 50k between machines. at best, the
process takes several minutes. this has been a long term prob.
As best can be determined there's this for a response:
1) This isn't about the ISP connection, just the local workgroup
or LAN if you prefer. Only one mach/server is connected to the
internet, all others are denied ISP access. OS: xpPro/sp2
embedded.
2) The subnet mask is 255.x.x.x: IP 192.168.x.x. About 6
machines on a 8 connecter hub (RJ45) or switch box.
3) There are several makes of LAN cards installed at the same
speed all of which worked quite well without this issue under W9x.
4) "tracert", I've no idea what is meant by that let alone how to
get it.
Notes: I didn't exactly expect a point on solution from the start
and allowed that more info would be need, however, I needed to
start somewhere. Given your general tone it's best that you tone
down some on your bedside manner, it leaves a lot to be desired.
If that presents a prob. then I suggest that U pass this on to
someone else and I'll consider that U were having a bad day.
I'll start bottom up...
Not having a bad day - great day. Your interpretation is mistaken.
You picked up a 'tone' from typed text without any sign of
emotion/inflection. What you read was this...
<personal attack>Would help if you explained your setup...[followed by
examples of what would help us to help you]</personal attack>
When what was actually put out there...
<suggestive and constructive request>Would help if you explained your
setup... [followed by examples of what would help us to help
you]</suggestive and constructive request>
From the points you have given - what I can surmise is this:
You do not know much about your network - which leads to the question of why
you are troubleshooting it and not the person who assembled it originally
and/or keeps it updated now? Albeit that networking is not really that
complicated of a subject - it can get much more than an individual who does
not work with it often can handle fairly quickly - especially in a business
environment - and can cause slowdowns (in a business environment) that cost
time/money.
You are on a local network using what is most likely a HUB and not a switch.
I suggest replacing that with a switch as soon as possible if that turns out
to be a correct assumption. A powered switch will handle traffic much
better than a hub will. Think of a switch like a hub with intelligence and
traffic management built into it. Also - it is not costly, since you
mentioned 10mbps originally - it would increase the overall speed at which
your internal network could perform (as it would be difficult to locate a
pure 10mbps switch that was *new* these days.) It also would be an *easy*
replacement - as a pure switch (do not get a router) can be put in place of
a hub with no configuration changes other than removing the old hardware and
putting in the new. Even if it turns out you have a switch and not a hub -
I would consider this hardware upgrade for the mere reason 10mpbs was ever
mentioned. *grin*
Just because something 'worked great in Win9x' does not mean it will work
great when you start changing the Operating System. Your reply seems to
imply that the machines themselves have not changed over time ("... several
makes of LAN cards installed at the same speed all of which worked quite
well without this issue under W9x ...") - which could mean old and possibly
faulty equipment or unsupported hardware drivers in a newer OS.
However - assuming that the machines might be new and that is a
mis-interpretation on my part - it *still* could be hardware drivers. You
should ensure that the latest hardware drivers for the motherboard chipset
and network cards are installed on all machines - from the manufacturer's of
said products - not Microsoft. Just get the hardware information from the
machines using something like belarc advisor (
www.belarc.com) and visit the
hardware manufacturers support web pages (usually
www.<nameofmanufacturer>.com or you can Google for their home page) and find
the latest driver for your operating system/hardware combination.
Tracert is a basic network test - one above PING really. You would open a
command prompt on a machine (Start button --> RUN --> CMD --> OK) and type
in:
tracert 192.168.x.x
Where you substitute in the proper IP for a machine other than the one you
are utilizing on the same network.
It will report back something like:
1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.237
Which would be good - one hop to the machine. Not passing through much of
anything.
You also need to be sure that the Windows XP Firewall is either disabled
(fairly safe since these mahcines are 'denied ISP access') or configured to
allow File and Print sharing as an exception. At that point - you should
test the setup by mapping a drive on one system and copying a few 1MB+ files
over to it.
For example - assuming you have a common user account (like "localadmin"
with the same password) on all the machines and you are logged into
192.168.1.3 with that account - try the following (assuming 192.168.1.4 is a
valid computer, powered on, with the same common account.)
Start button --> RUN --> \\192.168.1.4\c$ --> OK
What that *should* do is map the local C drive of the remote machine...
Now drag/drop a file (word, text, picture, whatever) to it... How is the
transfer to?
Drag/drop it the other direction... How is the transfer from it?
(You could even Map the connection as a drive letter - that would be fine.)
You might even try this on a machine:
Start button --> RUN --> netsh diag gui --> OK
That will bring up a page where you cna do a network diagnostics scan and
find out all sorts of information about the setup on that particular machine
that could be of use in solving your trouble.
BTW - are you obtaining the 'internal IP' from the server? Or something
else? In other words - you say the machines have the IPs in the 192.168.x.x
network - but are they static IPs are are they getting them automatically at
power on? If they get it automatically - what is passing out those
addresses?
