3C905B-TX (nfs/netperf problem)

[Takashi Ichihara]

  Hi

  I have encountered a problem of network performance of Linux using 
3C905B-TX card. Could someone help me ?

  I have  installed Linux RH 5.1 and also Solaris2.6 on a  Dell 
Precision 410 PC (Dual pentium II at 400MHz, PCI 3C905B-TX fast 
ethernet card, IDE Hard disk) and having network performance 
problem in Linux. The current kernel is 2.1.109 and I'm using 
latest 3c59x.c (v0.99E) source from http://cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov/
linux/drivers/3c59x.c.

(1)  In configuring the  PC(Linux) as NFS client, the NFS read (read 
file from NFS mounted disk to local disk) performance is reasonable, 
while the NFS write (Write file from local disk to NFS mounted disk) 
performance seems to be very slow. (about 200 KB/s on 100Mbps 
connection)  In the same pc, if I boot the Solaris 2.6, the NFS 
performance for read and write seems to be reasonable.

    OS                             NFS read      NFS write
 --------------------------------------------------------------  
   Linux (2.1.109 + 3c59x.c 0.99E)  2-3 MB/s     150-250 kB/s
   Solaris 2.6                      2-3 MB/s      2-3 MB/s


(2)   The "netperf" of the PC booting Linux to Alpha Workstation connected 
by 100BaseTX via CISCO 2916 is only 0.15 Mbps, while if I boot Solaris 2.6
of the pc, the netperf from the same pc to the same alpha shows 94.03 Mbps.
 
Netperf from same pc to alpha WS (% netperf -H alpha-Work-station)
  
  Linux (2.1.109 (3c59x.c v0.99E))
     TCP STREAM TEST to rikalp.phy.bnl.gov
     Recv   Send    Send
     Socket Socket  Message  Elapsed
     Size   Size    Size     Time     Throughput
     bytes  bytes   bytes    secs.    10^6bits/sec
     32768  65535  65535    12.66       0.15            <--- 0.15 Mbps


  Solaris 2.6 (same pc of above)
     TCP STREAM TEST to rikalp.phy.bnl.gov
     Recv   Send    Send
     Socket Socket  Message  Elapsed
     Size   Size    Size     Time     Throughput
     bytes  bytes   bytes    secs.    10^6bits/sec
     32768   8192   8192    9.99       94.03		<--- 94 Mbps


(3) Since this Ethternet card (3C905B-TX) is connected at 100Mbs to the 
CISCO Switch (CISCO PORT LED shows that this is 100 Mbps coneection), 
the kernel messge in /var/log/messages shows that autoselect/10basT.  
It is ok ?

   Jul 20 14:17:27 p01 kernel: 3c59x.c:v0.99 4/7/98 Donald Becker  
   http://cesdis.gsfc.nasa.gov/linux/drivers/vortex.html
   Jul 20 14:17:27 p01 kernel: loading device 'eth0'...
   Jul 20 14:17:27 p01 kernel: eth0: 3Com 3c905B Cyclone 100baseTx at 
   0xdc00, 00:c0:4f:79:48:3a, IRQ 11
   Jul 20 14:17:27 p01 kernel:   8K byte-wide RAM 5:3 Rx:Tx split, 
   autoselect/10baseT interface.
   Jul 20 14:17:27 p01 kernel:   Enabling bus-master transmits and 
   whole-frame receives.
   Jul 20 14:17:30 p01 sshd[331]: log: Server listening on port 22.
  
  How can I resolve problem of 3c905B-TX interface under Linux ?  Thank 
you for the suggestions.

					Takashi Ichihara