Would a switch fix the problem

[isaidi]

I have posted earlier about bandwidth hogs.

I have a LAN with 6 computers

Computer A ---| |
Computer B----| 8 port |
Computer C----| HUB |
Computer D----| |
Computer E----| |
Computer F----| |
|
|
--------------------
| Cable Modem |
-----------------------

**Computer F is running Windows XP Internet Connection Sharing W/ Firewall enabled

** All Machines Running Windows XP Pro


Consider this!

Computer B,C,D,E,F downloading at approx 20kbs from speedtest.eastlink.ca

If Computer A starts downloading, transfer rate for all computers cut down to 1kbs, however computer A still maintains approx 15-20kbs.

Note also latency on all computers is in the 1000ms-2000ms range... however computer A gets about 500ms average pings.



I thought Computer A is configured some speacial way but i couldn't find anything.

I couldn't find any information the says how bandwidth is divided.
I tried installing QoS, however it doesn't seem to be full supported by Win XP ICS.


Is it possible am getting alot of collesions when computer A comes online??
should i upgrade to a switch?

how can i verify that?
can i check if the collisions are actually the cuase of the prob... ?

The collision light on the hub does flicker. but i guess it is expected to get some collisions. what would be too high of a flicker rate??

need help!

[C.M. Weaver]

The hub is your bottleneck. As soon as you have more than one machine talking on your hubbed network you will get a collision. While computer A is talking, computers B-F must wait their turn to speak on the network until A is done. Computers B-F will attempt connections until they take control of the wire to communicate.

Once you put a switch in you will see that all those machines will get equal bandwidth across the switch. You can't effectively tell how many collisions are taking place by the light on the hub alone. The only true measure would be to place a sniffer on the network and grab statistics of the network.

Keep in mind that if any of those computers are running FTP downloads at a high rate then all other traffic will take a back seat. The only effective way to keep bandwidth hogs using FTP is to run a QoS enabled switch where you can give priority to certain types of traffic.

[macyh]

ICS is not efficient in the way it handles CPU or LAN operations.

An inexpensive switch would help. A good broadband router would also be a very good idea, it would improve speed and security.