mjoshi@hpldsla.HP.COM (03/23/89)
I am reviewing the performance of 802.3/Ethernet LANs, and the following questions arose: Is there a UNIX based tool to measure the Load (in say, bits/sec) on the network at any given time. Although, I am able to compute the traffic factor for the artificial load generated by my applications, I am not able to assess the load factor or percentage of LAN bandwidth that is already being consumed by other systems on the LAN. Also does anyone have a performance curve for the distribution of throughput at the ethernet as well as TCP/IP level as the load varies, for a fixed message size? I found Cabrera (et al)'s article on User Process Communication Performance (IEEE Transactions on s/w Engg, Vol. 14, No1, Jan 1988 very informative although the illustrated curves give throughput v/s message size for fixed loads. Has anyone evaluated Ethernet/802.3 cards (for Intel/Motorola architectures in the Dos/Unix/Xenix environments) like 3-COM, Interlan, Excelan or Western Digital in terms of data buffering, speed, memory requirements, cost-effectiveness and so on. I would very much appreciate if someone has data to spare on this. Manoj Joshi. manoj@hpldas5 Telnet: 857-7099
RLN101@URIACC.BITNET (Marshall Feldman) (03/27/89)
I believe Michigan State tested a number of ethernet boards and decided the Western Digital was most cost-effective. There also was a review in a recent issue of *PC* magazine.