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[gsmyer]

Well I tested all connections using my Fluke cable tester after I ran the wiring and didn't find any problems. I suppose I can check it again. But then again, if I did in fact have a miswire or faulty jack, I wouldn't be receiving network connectivity to those machines, correct?

[AKFubar]

Another suggestion perhaps eliminate one of your computers in the other room and see if the speed improves.  Then connect and eliminate your laptop and see what happens.  Could be related to one or other of your PCs or NIC inside the PC?

I actually have found out that the 2 integrated LAN ports on my motherboard are different.  Although they are both gigabit one is PCI while the other is PCIE.  Technically the PCI port is limited in speed because of the bus although I have never confirmed this, this is what ASUS says.  Just wondering if there is a characteristic of one of your PCs and NIC that is different?

[gsmyer]

That's a good point about the two NICs. I will give that a try and see what happens. Also is there a defrag utility for the NAS drives?

[gunrunnerjohn]

No defrag for the NAS, it's been talked about here several times.

[fordem]

Well I tested all connections using my Fluke cable tester after I ran the wiring and didn't find any problems. I suppose I can check it again. But then again, if I did in fact have a miswire or faulty jack, I wouldn't be receiving network connectivity to those machines, correct?

Just to clarify - you could have miswired and faulty jacks and still have connectivity - the tcp/ip protocol suites are surprisingly tolerant and will more often that not handle network errors transparently (as they are designed to do), and frequently these errors can only be observed as you have done, as a drop in throughput rather than an outright failure.

A few more questions come to mind ...

What Fluke tester were you using and what does it check for?
Are we talking cable certification or cable testing?
What type of cable did you run for your gigabit links?

Last, but by no means least - are you sure that TrendNet router supports jumbo frame?  I had a quick look at the data sheet and there is no mention of jumbo frame.

[gunrunnerjohn]

It doesn't mention jumbo frames in the user manual specifications either.

[hilaireg]

I actually have found out that the 2 integrated LAN ports on my motherboard are different.  Although they are both gigabit one is PCI while the other is PCIE.  Technically the PCI port is limited in speed because of the bus although I have never confirmed this, this is what ASUS says.  Just wondering if there is a characteristic of one of your PCs and NIC that is different?

I've run into that issue with my old Asus P2BDS-850MHz, the D-Link Gigabit PCI adapters I had were flooding the bus and had to throttle them down to 100 Mbps.

Last, but by no means least - are you sure that TrendNet router supports jumbo frame?  I had a quick look at the data sheet and there is no mention of jumbo frame.

It doesn't mention jumbo frames in the user manual specifications either.

AFAIK, Jumbo Frames must be supported end-to-end in order to benefit from it ... the documentation does seem to imply that the TrendNet doesn't support it.  It's additionally possible that the implementation (if it does support JF) is not 100% compatible - i.e. poorly implemented.

[gsmyer]

Well, after some troubleshooting, I believe the router is at fault. Question is why. What I did was to disconnected the NAS from the router and hooked it into the wall jack that my primary computer is connected to. The search utility showed the DNS as having an IP address of 192.168.1.37. The old IP address when it was connected to my router was 192.168.10.101. So I changed my computer to a static IP of 192.168.1.2. I then was able to connect to the NAS and transfer the same 5gb in 6 minutes at 14.2mb per second. So that basically proves that the cabling between the equipment is not faulty. When I connected all cables back through the router, the transfer speed dropped back down to 300kb per second.

What I don't understand is that I am 100% positive that worked previously a few months ago. The only thing that has changed on my router is that a few months back, I lost all internet connectivity and the only was to get it to work again was to enable the MAC Address Cloning, which it didn't need previously.

[AKFubar]

Good job in isolating the fault.  Perhaps reflash the router with the same router firmware release.  Maybe somehow it got corrupted.

[gunrunnerjohn]

I'd not only update to the latest firmware, but also reset the router to factory defaults and reconfigure.  I've found this fixes a lot of oddball behavior with routers.

[gsmyer]

Well the issue has been resolved. The first thing I had to do was to remove my wife's computer from the router. I then restarted both the cable modem and the router. Once all that was back up, I logged into the router and cloned the MAC address of my primary computer. Once that was done, I was then successfully able to access the internet. I then plugged the NAS into the router and attempted the transfer the 5gb file. I was then able to transfer the file at a little over 20mb per second!

AKFubar, was also somewhat on the right track about something on the network taking up bandwidth. I noticed that once my wife's computer was plugged into the router, the file transfer speed would drop back down to around 300kb. Once removed from the router, transfer speed was back up to normal levels. I looked at the NIC on my wifes computer and it was flashing constantly. My guess is that the NIC in that computer is at the end of its life and is constantly broadcasting over the network. Good thing is that this gives me an excuse to purchase a 10/100/1000 NIC for that computer.

Thanks guys for all your help.

[AKFubar]

Please also remember that in a gigabit network, ALL interfacing components/cables must be gigabit certified to utilize speed and jumbo frames.

Ref:  http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gigabit-ethernet-bandwidth,2321.html

Cheers

[gunrunnerjohn]

Well, in truth, unless you have really long cable runs, even CAT5 cable will handle gigabit with no issues.  Obviously, it's better to have at least CAT5e for gigabit...  Of course, all the other parts obviously have to support both gigabit (and jumbo frames if you're going to use them) to actually sustain gigabit speeds.