Online speed?

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ric

Is it possible to calculate the maximum download speed of a
PII/266 MHz system with a 66 MHz front side buss?

Would it be possible to obtain all of a 4 Mbps cable modem
speed offered by a cable ISP? Using NIC, not USB.

What are the other limiting factors?

Thanks...
 
Is it possible to calculate the maximum download speed of a
PII/266 MHz system with a 66 MHz front side buss?

Would it be possible to obtain all of a 4 Mbps cable modem
speed offered by a cable ISP? Using NIC, not USB.
Click to expand...

No, because the internet and the (server?) you're connecting
to will almost always be a greater bottleneck, not deliver
the 4Mbps.

Otherwise, a PII/266 can maintain full download speed at
4Mbps, BUT, if that's things like mixed content webpages
with lots of java or flash animations, that may make it
choke a bit on rendering the page.

What are the other limiting factors?
Click to expand...


Hard drive speed and ample system memory. Use of a UDMA HDD
rather than an (even older) PIO mode drive. Other generic
factors include higher priority processes running on the
system. The question is more what you're doing with this
data as it downloads, rather than that the CPU can handle
it. With that low a margin things like navigating the
Windows GUI or loading apps will be a larger percentage of
the CPU time. Even so, it would matter more in a
hypothetical 4Mbps scenario than typical internet surfing
download speeds.

For reference, a P2/266 box could be configured with a
Gigabit NIC and (as with cable internet over lan) maintain ~
30MBps (that's megaBYTES) providing a sufficiently newer
hard drive and ATA66 or higher, perhaps jumbo frames/etc (in
other words, optimizing the system in other ways prudent to
the task, the CPU would be up to the task).
 
No, because the internet and the (server?) you're connecting
to will almost always be a greater bottleneck, not deliver
the 4Mbps.

Otherwise, a PII/266 can maintain full download speed at
4Mbps, BUT, if that's things like mixed content webpages
with lots of java or flash animations, that may make it
choke a bit on rendering the page.




Hard drive speed and ample system memory. Use of a UDMA HDD
rather than an (even older) PIO mode drive.
Click to expand...

Come on.Name the year or the last time you saw(If ever) one of
those.Even my win95 first PC had UDMA capable drives ;-)




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kony said:
No, because the internet and the (server?) you're connecting
to will almost always be a greater bottleneck, not deliver
the 4Mbps.
Click to expand...

The reason I ask is that others on my HSI ISP are seeing
about 4 Mbps at test sites, but using the same sites I'm
only seeing about 2.1-2.2 Mbps. Not that big of a deal,
but I was wondering where the bottleneck was with this
old machine.
Hard drive speed and ample system memory. Use of a UDMA HDD
rather than an (even older) PIO mode drive.
Click to expand...

It has a 5.75 GB IDE HD, and 192 MB (a 64 MB and a 128 MB stick) of RAM
For reference, a P2/266 box could be configured with a
Gigabit NIC and (as with cable internet over lan) maintain ~
30MBps (that's megaBYTES) providing a sufficiently newer
hard drive and ATA66 or higher, perhaps jumbo frames/etc (in
other words, optimizing the system in other ways prudent to
the task, the CPU would be up to the task).
Click to expand...

Currently using an older 3Com 10 Mb Ethernet NIC (3C900-TPO)
Old Epox MB, 66 MHz FSB, i440LX chipset.
 
4Mbps is .5 MBytes/sec. Your system bus is 500 times as fast. Your hard drive, depending on its age is anywhere from 10 to 100 times as fast. Processor usage for a file download is minimal. The speed that a web server will feed you pages is much less than the cable bandwidth. I had a 266 Mhz Pentium 2 with 1.5 Mbps DSL and the only way I could saturate the bandwidth was to do two or more simultaneous download. The Pentium 2 could easily render pages as fast as a server would send them to me.
 
Come on.Name the year or the last time you saw(If ever) one of
those.Even my win95 first PC had UDMA capable drives ;-)
Click to expand...

True, though when dealing with hardware this old it might be
mix-n-match, the mechanical parts might've already failed
and thus be the variable.
 
The reason I ask is that others on my HSI ISP are seeing
about 4 Mbps at test sites, but using the same sites I'm
only seeing about 2.1-2.2 Mbps. Not that big of a deal,
but I was wondering where the bottleneck was with this
old machine.
Click to expand...

Not knowing if there are other significant variables (like
time-of-day you're testing or poor physical cable
(electrical) connections) I couldn't draw any conclusions.

You might also have encountered a period with a particular
router was down and the traffic was diverted, or perhaps you
do have other things running that take up a lot of the CPU's
time, but when the intention is an isolated test then I
doubt that's the case.


It has a 5.75 GB IDE HD, and 192 MB (a 64 MB and a 128 MB stick) of RAM


Currently using an older 3Com 10 Mb Ethernet NIC (3C900-TPO)
Old Epox MB, 66 MHz FSB, i440LX chipset.
Click to expand...

You might benchmark the other parameters of the system like
CPU, memory, and HDD performance to verify it's working
properly. Some things (like having HDD running in PIO mode,
more common when Windows simply isn't using UDMA for
whatever reason) could also decrease available CPU time.
 
kony said:
Not knowing if there are other significant variables (like
time-of-day you're testing or poor physical cable
(electrical) connections) I couldn't draw any conclusions.
Click to expand...

Time of day for testing seems to have no impact. I get 2.1-2.2 Mbps
no matter when I test. As for wiring, etc., swapping the computer
with my neighbor's PIII w/256 MB ram, brings the speed up to 4 Mbps.
That's why I figured it was my hardware.
You might benchmark the other parameters of the system like
CPU, memory, and HDD performance to verify it's working
properly. Some things (like having HDD running in PIO mode,
more common when Windows simply isn't using UDMA for
whatever reason) could also decrease available CPU time.
Click to expand...

Software suggestions for such testing?
 
Time of day for testing seems to have no impact. I get 2.1-2.2 Mbps
no matter when I test. As for wiring, etc., swapping the computer
with my neighbor's PIII w/256 MB ram, brings the speed up to 4 Mbps.
That's why I figured it was my hardware.


Software suggestions for such testing?
Click to expand...

Could be a setting so try TCP optimizer,
http://www.speedguide.net/downloads.php
and it's a good site for general connection tweaks etc.
HTH :)
 
Time of day for testing seems to have no impact. I get 2.1-2.2 Mbps
no matter when I test. As for wiring, etc., swapping the computer
with my neighbor's PIII w/256 MB ram, brings the speed up to 4 Mbps.
That's why I figured it was my hardware.


Software suggestions for such testing?
Click to expand...

HDTach for HDD performance (note CPU utilization for a quick
impresson of whether it's using UDMA mode too).

Sisoft Sandra is a crude synthetic benchmark for memory and
CPU, but still sufficient to determine if it's operating
within expected parameters. You might also try a newer
network adapter, and if there are other devices sharing an
IRQ, take necessary measures like moving cards in slots or
changing bios settings or disabling unneeded features.

There are many typical things, I suggest you vist some
broadband oriented web forums and look at their typical user
problems and solutions, ignoring for the moment that you
have the PII/266.

Then again, maintaining 2.1Mbps is plenty fast enough for
web surfing, most (if not all) of the popular websites can't
deliver pages that fast due to the load on their end and
general internet congestion.
 
kony said:
HDTach for HDD performance (note CPU utilization for a quick
impresson of whether it's using UDMA mode too).

Sisoft Sandra is a crude synthetic benchmark for memory and
CPU, but still sufficient to determine if it's operating
within expected parameters. You might also try a newer
network adapter, and if there are other devices sharing an
IRQ, take necessary measures like moving cards in slots or
changing bios settings or disabling unneeded features.
Click to expand...

Will do. Thanks.
There are many typical things, I suggest you vist some
broadband oriented web forums and look at their typical user
problems and solutions, ignoring for the moment that you
have the PII/266.
Click to expand...

I have visited "broadband reports", but not really lurked.
Then again, maintaining 2.1Mbps is plenty fast enough for
web surfing, most (if not all) of the popular websites can't
deliver pages that fast due to the load on their end and
general internet congestion.
Click to expand...

As I said, it's not a big problem. But...I get curious. :)
 
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