Slow transfers on lan w/Explorer but fast w/PCAnywhere?

[Frank Dreyfus]

Hi,

My home LAN has two XP machines. Both run well and experience good
transfer rates when dl'ing from the internet.

But file copies from one PC to the other are extremely slow!

Using Windows Explorer, and watching the Networking graph in
Taskmanager, I'm lucky to get up to 1% network utilization. Both nics
are 10/100 full duplex. So 1% utilization equates to around 1 mbps.

But if I use the PCAnywhere file transfer feature (which apparently
does not use Explorer), I get 15 to 30% utilization and sometimes peaks
as high as 50%.

Why is there such a large disparity in transfer rates between these two
methods?

I don't think it would be due to nic settings since transfer rates are
good except in the situation described.

I have watched this frequently and my observations are rather
consistent.

Thanks for your ideas,

Frank

 

[Guest]

Are you using a switch, hub or cross over cable?

Are you usig TCP/IP or some other protocol?

 

[Guest]

I have the same issue with several clients. XP Pro to XP
Pro and/or Windows 2000 Server. Copying and printing is
extrememly slow and can time-out. No luck with any fix
suggested by MS via TechNet. I have tried disabling SMBs,
Security sigs, adjusting NIC adapter timings etc.

My gut feel is that it has something to do with security
checking of each packet that XP is sending. (Challenge-
Response?)

I tested with CA Brightstor Backup and a 140mb database
file backs up in <60sec vs a file copy at +8mins. The
file copy was attemtped using Explorer and a CMD window.

As this issue affects many people, I hope Microsoft pay
some serious attention to resolving it.

If anyone has solved it, please let MS and the Usergroup
know how.

Thanks

ClydeW

 

[Frank Dreyfus]

Are you using a switch, hub or cross over cable?

Are you usig TCP/IP or some other protocol?
--

Hi,

Yes, a switch and TCP/IP.

I don't think the switch is an issue. I swapped it out yesterday and
still have the same problem. Plus, it works fine using PCAnywhere and
works fine when either PC goes to the internet.

Thanks for your help,

Frank

 

[Frank Dreyfus]

If you find the solution please let me know (e-mail address removed)

And the same to you <s>.

Both my PC's are WinXP so I don't think the direction would matter. But
in truth I've only tried moving files in one direction.

Thanks, Frank

 

[Frank Dreyfus]

Hi,

Well I think I've solved the problem. Unfortunately, I don't know if
my solution will apply to many others.

In my case, both PC's are using "VIA Rhine II Fast Ehternet Adapters".
They're both integrated into the chipset on the motherboards. (Both
Soyo boards).

I downloaded the LAN drivers from the Soyo website and applied them to
both.

Before the install of the new drivers, Device Manager on both PC's
showed two drivers for the NIC:
fetnd5b.sys and another that I don't recall.

But after the change, the only driver shown is fetnd5b.sys. I think
it's actually the same version before and after. I guess the second
driver conflicted with fetnd5b.sys.

Anyway, a file copy with Explorer is now just as fast as with
PCAnywhere. So that seems to have fixed the problem.

Hope that helps,

Frank