[olug] victory and defeat w/Linux router @work

[Miller, Scott L (Omaha Networks)]

Charles wrote:
> Off of the second port coming out the 2600 is the 
> cable to our switch, which is a netgear 16port, everything 
> on this switch is fast as heck....we ran about 100M of cat6 
> a couple weeks ago to our main building....it meets up with 
> another netgear switch, i think its a 24port.  then daisied 
> from that is another 2 24port netgears.

First thing, Fast Ethernet has a "diameter limit" and a 
"daisy chain limit".  The diameter limit is based on how long
it takes for a signal to get from one end of the network to
the other.  I believe the daisy chain limit is closely tied
to this "diameter" thing, but couldn't find a reference 
quickly before replying.  But, you might be at or past the
limits if what you've got is this:
   router---switch---switch---switch---switch

What you should aim for is something like this:

	router--------switch------switch
                     |  |
            switch---    ---switch

The other thing to check is to make sure all the uplink
ports are hard set to 100Mbps Full Duplex.  If any of them
don't autonegotiate properly, even 100/half greatly affects
the apparent network speed.

-Scott