Poor performance with 3c905b network

[Ferry Korving]

Hello,

I'm having trouble understanding the poor performance of my 
home-based network and was wondering if anybody on this list could
help me. 

I have a server (P166, kernel 2.2.4) with a 3c905b (rev. 40) and 
a client (PII450, kernel 2.2.11) with the same card (rev. 48). 
They are connected through a cheap fast ethernet hub. Both use 
the latest vortex driver, version 0.99L.

Server mii-diag output:

Basic registers of MII PHY #24:  2000 784d 0000 0000 01e1 0000 0004 2001.
 Basic mode control register 0x2000: Auto-negotiation disabled, with
 Speed fixed at 100 mbps, half-duplex.
 You have link beat, and everything is working OK.
 Your link partner is strange, status 0000.

Client mii-diag output:

Basic registers of MII PHY #24:  2000 784d 0000 0000 0081 0000 0004 2001.
 Basic mode control register 0x2000: Auto-negotiation disabled, with
 Speed fixed at 100 mbps, half-duplex.
 You have link beat, and everything is working OK.
 Your link partner is strange, status 0000.

Thus both cards are fixed at 100 mbps half-duplex, which should be fine
in this situation. Then why do I get a performance of max. 800 kbps when 
I ftp some large files? I already removed the hub using a patch-cord and 
changed some cables, with no result. Any ideas?


best regards,

Ferry