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[IsThisOn?]

Hi All. I am a fulltime 3D artist working out of a home office. I have recently made the decision to pull both of my desktops offline. I work directly off of one machine and use the second one as a render slave. I have been struggling with getting this set up properly.

I need as fast transfer speeds as possible. I tried purchasing a gigaswitch from Best Buy (like $50) and was eventually able to make it work but the transfer speeds were really slow.

A little bit about my computers. They are identical. Stats are the same for both.

Windows 10
x99 Deluxe Mboard
OS Disc is 500GB Samsung Evo
64GB ram

What the best way to network these puppies together so that I can file share and access both computers from either desktop without having the internet.

 

[C0RR0SIVE]

What about the specs on the second machine? Are both connected at 1Gbit speeds? Did you statically assign an IP and Subnet mask to both machines, or do you have a DHCP server (a router can accomplish this task easily) on the network handing out addresses?

What transfer speeds are you seeing? At 1Gbit, the most you will see is ~100MB/s in transfer rates.

 

[IsThisOn?]

Thanks for your reply...

What about the specs on the second machine?
The machines are identical. Specs are the same. Bothe have the X99 Deluxe. 64GB ram etc.

Are both connected at 1Gbit speeds?
When I tried using the gigaswitch they were both connected to that via a cat6 cable. Im sorry I'm not sure what the speed was.

Did you statically assign an IP and Subnet mask to both machines, or do you have a DHCP server (a router can accomplish this task easily) on the network handing out addresses?
No idea. I literally just connected both computers to the gigaswitch. That was it.

What transfer speeds are you seeing? At 1Gbit, the most you will see is ~100MB/s in transfer rates.
I can't remember off the top of my head. It was slower than that though. Is there a way to get faster speeds than that?

 

[Fat.Clown]

have you tried connecting both computers together with an Ethernet cable? just skip the switch.

 

[S0ULphIRE]

With just 2 PCs connected to the switch it shouldn't have any impact on the speed really.

OP, on one of your PCs, right click the little computer monitor icon in the bottom right hand corner of your screen and choose "Open network and sharing centre"
Next, in the new window that opens up, click on "Local Area Connection" on the right. The connection speed will be listed there and should say "1Gbps"

Also c0rr0sive is right, at 1Gbps your max file transfer rate will be about 100-120MB/s. What transfer speeds are you currently seeing?

 

[Fat.Clown]

maybe a bad switch? just throwing ideas out there.

 

[S0ULphIRE]

True dat! Always a good idea to simplify a setup when troubleshooting, good idea

 

[C0RR0SIVE]

When I tried using the gigaswitch they were both connected to that via a cat6 cable. Im sorry I'm not sure what the speed was.

An easy way to tell is to open Task Manager, click performance, click on ethernet, then on the graph area right-click and open, "view network details". This will show the "Link speed" that the machine has connected at. Verify that both machines show a 1Gbps connection. If it shows 100Mbps or slower, then you certainly have issues, either with the switch, cables, or hardware.

No idea. I literally just connected both computers to the gigaswitch. That was it.

You may want to assign addresses to these machines or connect a generic router so that it can at least give the machines proper addresses. I have had issues with machines assigning their own addresses in the past. If you want to go the static route, here is a guide on setting the addresses, How to Assign a Static IP Address in Windows 7, 8, 10, XP, or Vista

Set one machine to:
IPv4: 192.168.1.10
Subnet: 255.255.255.0

Set the other machine to:
IPv4: 192.168.1.11
Subnet: 255.255.255.0

This at a minimum, will make it easier to connect to the other machine and make it easier on the computers when they start talking.

I can't remember off the top of my head. It was slower than that though. Is there a way to get faster speeds than that?

If you want any faster, it's going to cost a serious pretty penny. Gigabit switches have been around for awhile so costs are of course rather cheap, the next standards are 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps, but they haven't really made it out into the wild yet. After that we have more common 10Gbps hardware, but that is certainly in the several hundred dollar range for the network cards alone. Even if you have a 10Gbit network, you may never see full 10Gbit speeds if transferring from machine to machine as hard-drives and SSD's become limiting factors.