On Jan 3, 2014, at 1:59 PM, Macs R We <[email protected]> wrote: > On Jan 3, 2014, at 10:14 AM, "Dinse, Gregg (NIH/NIEHS) [V]" > <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> Can I use both ethernet ports on my Mac Pro to make local network backups >> faster, or at least to keep local network backups from slowing down internet >> use? > > Maybe the second, but the first is much more doubtful. > > Networking tends to use connection-based routing. You use the best way to > get to a target address, not all possible ways. There are ways to "bond" two > paths together that are available on higher-end routers, but the Mac won't do > this by default and may not even have the geek-level commands to specify it > at all. In fact, the Mac determines "best" way by port order in the Networks > panel, not by speed -- if you have Airport higher than Ethernet, it will > connect everything over Airport and leave ethernet totally idle. > > For example, turn on both your Airport and your ethernet port and stream > music or a movie. Disconnect the "preferred" port (as per port order). > Watch the stream abort, even though there is a perfectly good recovery path > available.
Thanks for the response. I always figured that MacOSX would choose the fastest of multiple network options. I guess it's good that one can re-order the options if there is some reason to prefer a particular slower choice. I have never "ordered" my options, but hopefully the default (if no user changes have been made) is to order them according to speed. Thanks, Gregg _______________________________________________ MacOSX-talk mailing list [email protected] http://www.omnigroup.com/mailman/listinfo/macosx-talk
