On Wed, 13 Nov 1996 22:30:50 +0000, you wrote:
>Our Vision network uses both solutions. A 64kb/s line to the small
>branch surgery which uses the Reachout software for 5 PCs, and a 2Mb/s
>cable link (courtesy of the local cable contractor) to approx 20 at the
>other main site. The Reachout solution is probably a bit quicker at
>present but we're in process of upgrading our previously installed
>network from thin ethernet to UTP5 to see if that helps.
>Reliability has been pretty good with both solutions so you pays your
>money...(as always)
Assuming you are staying with standard 10Mbs ethernet, then the speed
shouldn't be affected moving from thin ethernet to category 5. If
anything it'll get slightly slower (in the order of milliseconds) due
to propogation delay in the hub.
However, moving to cat5 does give you more alternatives. If you
really do have a bandwidth bottleneck you can move to a 100Mbs on or
workstations; or you can have 100Mbs between your file server and an
ethernet switch which then provides an effective network to each
machine. So they all have 10Mbs to play with.
If you do want to improve performance on a moderately sized network,
and want to work within a sensible budget then splitting the network
into two segments (have two network cards in the file server) is the
most sensible option. A fast PCI network card will cost you in the
region of £150.
Best wishes
James
--
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Tel: 01303 264803 Fax: 01303 261644 24-hr support: 0701 0702 016
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