Direct connection through a switch

[seangreen]

Hello everyone, I'm pretty new so bear with me please.

I have a FreeNAS installation installed working and connected to my computer. However I am lacking the speed desired from a 1000mb connection. Instead I am only getting 11MB transfer speed.

I am in a sticky situation with my network as I am on a school campus network. I have the mac address of the NAS registered with the school's dhcp service. That is how I was able to get an ip address assigned to the NAS initially.

The router in my room goes to a switch, which connects to the devices in my room. (NAS, TV, Computer, Xbox)

I'd like to try and figure out how to be able to connect to the NAS as directly as possible so that I can increase my speeds.

The NAS and computer each have 1 ethernet port so I can't have a dedicated one.

I'd be happy to provide any extra information if needed, just not sure what else I need right now. As far as I know every device and cable supports speeds up to 1000mb so that should not be the bottleneck. I think the bottle neck is that the NAS is connected to the schools network and my computer is having to go through the network to access the NAS, therefore I'd like to bypass that since there is a direct physical connection to the NAS via the switch I have.

Any help would be much appreciated!

 

[joeschmuck]

This is an easy answer. Yes, your network is being slowed down to the slowest connection you have and that is likely your schools network. You can install a 1Gbit network switch on yor school network connection and then plug your NAS and any other connections in there and have direct access to your NAS.

 

[seangreen]

This is an easy answer. Yes, your network is being slowed down to the slowest connection you have and that is likely your schools network. You can install a 1Gbit network switch on yor school network connection and then plug your NAS and any other connections in there and have direct access to your NAS.

So as far as I know that's what is already happening. I have a connection from the network AP in my room, this then goes to my switch which i plug all my devices into.

Are you saying to put another switch somewhere in that line?

 

[joeschmuck]

If you have a network switch installed and you know it's a 1Gbit switch, then you have a different problem.

In FreeNAS shell type "ifconfig" and post the output. Look to see if it states you have a proper connection speed. It should have 1Gbit Ethernet or similar. If it's not then replace the Ethernet cable on the NAS. This speed is totally dependant on the NAS NIC, Ethernet Cable, and Switch it's plugged into. Let's assume this is good and it's 1Gbit, then your problem is elsewhere in your network hardware, not FreeNAS. Most TV's would be 100Mbit, your computer could be either based on it's hardware. If you know that all your hardware is 1Gbit speed then replace the Ethernet cables one at a time.

 

[seangreen]

If you have a network switch installed and you know it's a 1Gbit switch, then you have a different problem.

In FreeNAS shell type "ifconfig" and post the output. Look to see if it states you have a proper connection speed. It should have 1Gbit Ethernet or similar. If it's not then replace the Ethernet cable on the NAS. This speed is totally dependant on the NAS NIC, Ethernet Cable, and Switch it's plugged into. Let's assume this is good and it's 1Gbit, then your problem is elsewhere in your network hardware, not FreeNAS. Most TV's would be 100Mbit, your computer could be either based on it's hardware. If you know that all your hardware is 1Gbit speed then replace the Ethernet cables one at a time.

This is my output from ifconfig:

re0: flags=8943<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,PROMISC,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
options=82099<RXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,VLAN_HWCSUM,WOL_MAGIC,LINKSTATE>
ether 90:2b:34:68:c7:c5
hwaddr 90:2b:34:68:c7:c5
inet 35.11.236.169 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 35.11.236.255
nd6 options=9<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED>
media: Ethernet autoselect (1000baseT <full-duplex>)
status: active
lo0: flags=8049<UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 16384
options=600003<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,RXCSUM_IPV6,TXCSUM_IPV6>
inet6 ::1 prefixlen 128
inet6 fe80::1%lo0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x2
inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 0xff000000
nd6 options=21<PERFORMNUD,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>
groups: lo
bridge0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
ether 02:90:7a:c9:86:00
nd6 options=1<PERFORMNUD>
groups: bridge
id 00:00:00:00:00:00 priority 32768 hellotime 2 fwddelay 15
maxage 20 holdcnt 6 proto rstp maxaddr 2000 timeout 1200
root id 00:00:00:00:00:00 priority 32768 ifcost 0 port 0
member: epair0a flags=143<LEARNING,DISCOVER,AUTOEDGE,AUTOPTP>
ifmaxaddr 0 port 4 priority 128 path cost 2000
member: re0 flags=143<LEARNING,DISCOVER,AUTOEDGE,AUTOPTP>
ifmaxaddr 0 port 1 priority 128 path cost 20000
epair0a: flags=8943<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,PROMISC,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
options=8<VLAN_MTU>
ether 02:08:50:00:04:0a
hwaddr 02:08:50:00:04:0a
nd6 options=1<PERFORMNUD>
media: Ethernet 10Gbase-T (10Gbase-T <full-duplex>)
status: active
groups: epair

from what I can tell I should have the speed from the hardware.

I'm wondering if finding a specific ip to connect through would help the situation at all.

The switch is a 5 port NETGEAR plug in play (GS305). The computer's mobo supports 1000mb speeds as well.

I will try replacing some cables soon. I'll report back when able. Thanks for all the help so far joeschmuck!

 

[joeschmuck]

I agree, you are at 1Gbit for FreeNAS. You can also check the computer LAN/NIC connection to ensure it is the same, of course using the OS specific commands.

 

[rogerh]

What protocol are you using for transferring files? Have you checked the speed files can be written or read on the FreeNAS box, and on your computer? What is the hardware involved at each end? It may not be an ethernet problem.

 

[seangreen]

I agree, you are at 1Gbit for FreeNAS. You can also check the computer LAN/NIC connection to ensure it is the same, of course using the OS specific commands.

About to start with cables, but my computer has the same stats via ifconfig so shouldn't be that side of the LAN hardware.

What protocol are you using for transferring files? Have you checked the speed files can be written or read on the FreeNAS box, and on your computer? What is the hardware involved at each end? It may not be an ethernet problem.

I'm using SMB to transfer currently. I just tried with AFS and still had the same speed limit of 11MB/s which is my usually upload limit on my schools network. The NAS can write 55MB at 181MB/s and read 55MB at 68MB/s. Not crazy speeds I'll be honest but still should be faster than what I'm getting. My computer can saturate USB3 cables so not worried about the speeds there. My cables are all either CAT5 or CAT6 as well

I should also note that I don't have a static IP set for the NAS yet. Could this be a possible cause of the lowered speeds?

 

[seangreen]

So I've just determined that the problem is the computer is going through the schools network to the NAS. I did a traceroute to the box and there is not a direct connection through the switch. Does anyone have any ideas how I would go about setting up that direct connection?

 

[garm]

You need to set up a proper router in your room. The only device facing the school network should be the router and everything else should get their IP from that device.

 

[seangreen]

You need to set up a proper router in your room. The only device facing the school network should be the router and everything else should get their IP from that device.

I was beginning to that that was my only option left as well. Do you think I could make it work with a VLAN at all? Or could I use a managed switch?

 

[rogerh]

So I've just determined that the problem is the computer is going through the schools network to the NAS. I did a traceroute to the box and there is not a direct connection through the switch. Does anyone have any ideas how I would go about setting up that direct connection?

This should not happen if the computer and FreeNAS box are on the same subnet. Indeed, neither them nor the switch need to be connected to the school network for transfers between the two to work. What is the IP and subnet mask of each of your computer and FreeNAS box?

 

[kdragon75]

This should not happen if the computer and FreeNAS box are on the same subnet. Indeed, neither them nor the switch need to be connected to the school network for transfers between the two to work. What is the IP and subnet mask of each of your computer and FreeNAS box?

They may be using pvlans or Private VLANs and requiring al traffic travers an IPS before routing back to any hosts.

 

[rogerh]

They may be using pvlans or Private VLANs and requiring al traffic travers an IPS before routing back to any hosts.

In which case, disconnect the wire to the school network, put both the computer and FreeNAS box on fixed IP addresses on the same subnet (eg 192.168.1.2/24 and 192.168.1.3/24) and plug them into the switch. Max speed transfers should occur between them, although no other network connections would be possible until things were put back to normal.

 

[seangreen]

This should not happen if the computer and FreeNAS box are on the same subnet. Indeed, neither them nor the switch need to be connected to the school network for transfers between the two to work. What is the IP and subnet mask of each of your computer and FreeNAS box?

The IP of my NAS is 35.11.236.169/24 and the IP of my computer is 35.11.237.10/24

In which case, disconnect the wire to the school network, put both the computer and FreeNAS box on fixed IP addresses on the same subnet (eg 192.168.1.2/24 and 192.168.1.3/24) and plug them into the switch. Max speed transfers should occur between them, although no other network connections would be possible until things were put back to normal.

Just tried taking my computer off the network and setting the NAS and computer to the IP addresses suggested. That did indeed work to bring the transfer speeds up to 100MB/s which is much better than before.

However, my question now is getting a router to create my own network the only way to get this working with my computer still connected to the internet?

 

[kdragon75]

35.11.236.169/24
35.11.237.10/24
or if you look at it in binary it makes more sense:
11111111.11111111.11111111.00000000 <- /24 subnet mask
00100011.00001011.11101100.10101001 <- Your NAS
00100011.00001011.11101101.00001010 <- Your PC
If you apply that mask to find out what network each one is in
00100011.00001011.11101100.00000000 <- Your NAS Network
00100011.00001011.11101101.00000000 <- Your PC Network
Now you can clearly see that if you have 24 network bits, the NAS and the PC are in different IP networks and cannot talk without a router.

Welcome to basic IP networking.

Edit: The COULD talk and that means your campus network was doing the routing between the two networks. Im guessing they have some rate limiting to prevent plugging up the network. That or they just have old ass routers ;)

 

[rogerh]

By far the simplest suggestion is to fit a second NIC to the computer so as far as the school is concerned you just have one computer. Then the NAS and the new NIC could be on a private network that does not overlap with any of the school ones. If it is a Windows computer it may be fairly easy to get Windows to allow your FreeNAS machine to connect to resources on the Internet via some NAT arrangement.

If you can't do this, the next best thing is to talk to the school's sysadmins. They could allocate you IPs on the same subnet if they wanted to, which would solve your problem. You really ought to clear the use of the switch with them, as there are limits to the number of cascaded switches. But otherwise, without a switch, you would need two connections to the school network. But if they are both on the same subnet even the school network might well work quicker for you.

(Sorry, won't be able to continue this conversation tonight.)

 

[kdragon75]

Hmm Mount Laurel NJ... Anyway, there giving you a public IP. You NEED a router. Without, there is a chance that all of you stuff on that switch is public to the internet. Not good and your school is wasting public IPs for dorm rooms...

 

[short-stack]

Hmm Mount Laurel NJ... Anyway, there giving you a public IP. You NEED a router. Without, there is a chance that all of you stuff on that switch is public to the internet. Not good and your school is wasting public IPs for dorm rooms...

Most schools have IPs to spare, I know of a few that use entire /16s as huge honeypots.

The problem you're more likely to run in to, is most schools do not like you extending their network. It likely is even part of the Acceptable Use Policy. You should check that out before you go buying a router/switch to put in your room.

 

[kdragon75]

Most schools have IPs to spare, I know of a few that use entire /16s as huge honeypots.

The problem you're more likely to run in to, is most schools do not like you extending their network. It likely is even part of the Acceptable Use Policy. You should check that out before you go buying a router/switch to put in your room.

Is the dorm network part of the hunny pot?