Kwan, Thanks for the reply, see comments inline. On Wednesday 01 May 2002 12:15 pm, you wrote: > On Wed, 1 May 2002, Ken Thompson wrote: > > Hello all, > > I'm working with a 6 computer network that is doing some very wierd > > things..... > > First a bit of history: > > Current O/S's Win98, WinME, Win XP, Linux Mandrake 8.1. > > The original network was smaller and set up using Novell. NIC's on the > > older computers are DEC Chip combo's, some even have the 25 pin AUWI > > (?sp) port and were all using 50 ohm coax connections. > > Have you tried disconnecting all machines then adding them individually? > If there's a bad card it could be flooding your network with junk and > causing retransmits. Do you have a Fluke handy to test the cables? I've > seen *lots* of cable that has been incorrectly paired. I.e., the > "technician" assumed that since it was a straight through connection the > order of the wires didn't matter. You might also try putting a sniffer > in place to see if it's just traffic causing the problem.
Yes, but before I "overhauled" the network. At that time it made no difference. I plan to replace the switch with a known good hub and if needed connect 2 machines at a time with known good cables. > > The owner hired a "network specialist" to set it up to use "Windows > > Networking". This fellow put in a LinkSys 8 port switch, and ran CAT 5 > > cable around the baseboards of the office, installed all available > > network protocols (NetBui, TCP, Netbios/IPX &etc.)... > > When the network is dormant, do you still see lots of traffic? Is this a > 10/100 switch? I.e., is it an actual switch or a hub? The switch has 2 rows of lights, green to show acctivity and yellow that shows either collisions or a 100mb/s connection, they are both lit all the time. I think this is showing collision traffic but there is no way to be sure with what I had on hand at the time. It's a switch, LinkSys 8 port (don't remember the model off hand but it's new and small) > > TCP/IP was set up using DHCP on > > all machines and no IP ranges set. Some of the machines, then, were > > found using NetBUI, some on IPX/SPX and some with TCP/IP. I found this > > out by removing each protocol in turn except for TCP/IP. OK, but it > > worked and he was kinda happy except the network was SLOW, A factory > > re-furbed Micron PIII 800 with onboard NIC was used as the "file server" > > and all the network programs data paths set to it. > > Aiieee!! This is the consummate Windows "enjuneer" -- enable everything > and pray that it works. > > > Most of the machines on the network could log on to each other in an > > accecptable time (3-4 seconds) but the Micron would take over 1minuet to > > log on to any other machine (open Network Neighborhood and wait). But > > other machines found the Micron OK and could pull files off it as fast as > > any other. About now you're asking what has this got to do with a > > Mandrake Mailing List ! ! > > Try using a PCI NIC in the micron? If the card is failing and storming > the network you could notice this behaviour. That's one of the suggestions I made right off the bat, but the owner is concerned about warranty problems. Talked with Micron tech support and the said " the card works, we can't support your network"..... > > > Read on folks, it get's better.. > > Dumb me, I said "I can fix that and use a Linux box as a file server"... > > First I removed all un-needed protocols and set up static IP address for > > each system. No speed improvement ! !. The rest of the network seemed > > usable but the Micron was still very slow, my reaction was naturally to > > blame the Micron. I brougt it to my service department and performed a > > complete O/S teardown and re-install (Win98se), set it up on my network > > and tested it hard using the same program he uses PLUS some very large > > file transferes (1Gb and over), It worked like a charm -fast- reliable > > &etc. Put it back in service and got him back to work. At this point the > > network seemed perfect, no hang ups and speed was good. > > Still sounds like cabling... Can you browse TCP/IP at reasonable speed? > I.e., try enabling apache on the Linux box and putting a few large files > up for download. I can do that and see. I'm going to replace one cable at a time with known good cables and try to isolate the bad one (if any).... > > Next thing was to put together a Linux box to use as a file server. > > Used a Super 7 MoBo, K6-2 350 CPU 3.2Gb HDD and 196Mb mem, installed > > Mandrake 8.1 on it. > > KDE is available but I start it in RL 3 and don't log in as anyone, just > > let the screen blank and forget it.. He has no security concerns (read > > don't want to be bothered) so MSEC is set to "poor". The Mandrake machine > > is not on the internet and they only go online with the others to get > > credit reports and then off right away, total time for each instance less > > than 10 min. Again I set the box up on my network and ran it "'till it > > dropped" NO problemo...... Durn thing was perfect......... > > Put the Linux box in service, changed the data path's to it and walked > > out very self satisfied... > > > > > > The next day I was "hangin' out" and one of the systems locked, the > > salesman tried to reboot it and it said "can't find boot record on IDE0" > > EH? Wot's this? > > Sounds coincidental... > > > I looked at it and Nope nuthin', ran "FDISK" and there was NO partition > > defined. Brought the machine to my service department and diagnosed it > > with bad memory, (it wouldn't even trigger the video until I replaced the > > mem mdule) replaced the mem module, re-installed WinME, ran the same > > tests as with the other ones and put it back in service. Whew, things > > were working good. (I was a bit dis-satisfied because I still couldn't > > accout for the missing partition) > > > > The owner calls me 3 days later saying he can't get his "backup" to > > transfer over the network, it says "network resource not available" about > > 75% through the transfer (about 30Mb file size). > > I thought " he just don't remember how I showed him to do it" and went > > out to see what had gone wrong. > > NOW the whole network is slow, the Micron being the slowest but not > > substantially so. Can't pull a large file from any given machine to any > > other and have some file corruption on the Linux box (I can see the file > > name but the program can't run the executible or unzip one it needs) > > I have looked at everything I can think of trying to figure out what in > > the world went wrong, I'm leaning towards interference on the cables but > > really don't know what to think at this point. > > Have you replaced the cables? With only 6 machines the switch shouldn't be > a problem, but have you swapped it out just in case? Unless you're doing > lots of transfers, even a regular hub should work fine. Also, check to make > sure that a cable wasn't inadvertently placed in the uplink port. I did check for that and it's OK, going to try cable replacement next. I'm also going to put in a known good hub and see if it makes any difference... > > After a complete re-make of the network, running fine for about a week, > > it's worse than it was when I started. > > Ideas, anyone???? > > I've noticed lots of weirdness with Samba and WinME shares. Win98, 98SE, > NT, Win2K machines all connected fine, but whenever I network browsed > with WinME the systems would crawl so badly that the machine appeared to > be hung. It seems to be a recurring problem and I've tried everything > from setting the entire network to full/half duplex, twiddling with > oplocks in Samba, disabling network virus scans, replacing NICs. If I > assign drive letters to network mounts and access the windows shares > *only* through the mapped drive, it does seem to improve. TCP/IP seems > fine but SMB completely drags down the machine. Could be the problem as the machine that had the HDD prob was running ME all along.. Might take it out while testing and see what if any difference it makes.. -- Ken Thompson, North West Antique Autos Payette, Idaho Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.nwaa.com Sales and brokering of antique autos and parts. Linux- Coming Soon To A Desktop Near You Registered Linux User #183936
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