Networking [slow file transfer] problem

Hi everyone,

This is my first post and I don't know that much about computers so please be gentle. I have 2 computers on my home network. The main comp is 2.56 ghz, 80g harddrive, windows xp, and linksys router. My other comp is windows 98, 450mhz and 4g harddrive. My question is about file transfering. When I move files from the win98 machine to the xp machine its really fast but when I try to move files from the xp machine to the 98 machine its really slow. For instance a 3meg file takes about 10 minutes to move to the xp machine but only takes an instant when going from the 98 machine to the xp machine. Anyone have any suggestions on where I should start looking for my problem? They are connected with a cable and I just bought the network card for the old computer when I bought the router. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you for your patience.

 

Download DUN 1.4 and install it on the 98 machine. I know the title is Dial Up Networking but it contains updates to lots of your networking pieces.

Set both network cards to 100Mbps Full Duplex (they are probably set to Auto now).

If that hasn't helped, we can try some troubleshooting and figure out where the problem is but I'm hoping that a combo of the above will take care of things. Post back with good or bad results though.

 

Ok I downloaded and installed DUN 1.4 and set both the adapter cards media types to 100mbpstx full duplex and its still the same speed. I also tried autosense on the 98 machine and its the same speed. As a side note, my internet connection on the xp machine is really fast (like 40-80 kbps download) and my 98 SE machine is slow (6-14 kbps download). I hope that helps a little. The 98 SE machine was slower than that before but I changed a setting on my linksys router following the instructions on the linksys website and it about doubled the speed. Its still really slow though compared to my xp machine. Thanks for your help.

 

Try TweakDUN (free utility) and play with settings until you get the best speed. Now that we are sure you have the latest networking pieces for 98, you are probably looking at MTU or other similar settings that aren't optimal and are slowing you down some.

That being said, 98 was not written from the ground up as a network aware OS and is not ever going to be as agile as XP but it should certainly be faster than you are seeing.

Do leave both NICs set at 100mbps full duplex though.

I'd also suggest the following to be done now and about once a month after that.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

General clean-up instructions for Win95/98/ME

• Open a browser window and dump all TIF (temporary internet files) and cookies. Close.
• Open windows explorer and
  .. delete the contents of all temp folders
  .. delete any files in c:\ with a name filennnn.chk (where nnnn is any number so file0001.chk, file1034.chk, etc)
• verify that you have fewer than 500 files & folders directly under c:\. If you are close to that number, remove or move some files.
• empty the recycle bin
• boot to DOS
• from the command prompt do the following
  .. scanreg /fix <ENTER> (press the ENTER key)
  .. scanreg /opt <ENTER>
  ****note that 95 does not have scanreg.exe but a copy from 98 or ME will run fine if you can get one
  .. scandisk c:\ /nosave /autofix /surface <ENTER>
  .. Win /D:M (forces a safe mode windows start)
• Run another scandisk (start~programs~accessories~system tools) and check for a standard scan and to fix all errors found. The DOS scan couldn't check for long file name issues.
• Run a defrag
• Reboot to normal Windows.