Bad net IO performance probably due to misconfiguration 4244

Wolfgang Draxinger

Make sure DMA transfers are enabled on both machines. Check the CPU consumption for SYS as well as USER. On some systems, SYS is not included in total CPU use and would indicate driver-kernel overhead.

Secondly, pumping everything through tar+bzip2 means that you will be CPU bound unless you have reasonably fast CPU's on both sides (2GHz or better). If you don't have fast CPU's on BOTH sides, you'll be limited by the speed of the slower CPU - in your case the dual P2 machine. Try using straight tar (without the -j) and see if you do any better.

Alternatively, bypbutt user space tools all together and use kernel tools (NFS etc) to transfer the files. You'll probably saturate your hard drive transfer on the lappy before you run out of network bandwidth. In my experience, lappy hdd's can manage about 5-7MB-sec sustained transfer (best case scenario), but as you say, your network should be able to handle at least twice that.

HTH,

James -- Rule of Creative Research: (1) Never draw what you can copy. (2) Never copy what you can trace. (3) Never trace what you can cut out and paste down.