X-Win32: REALLY high network load?

[Lisa]

Here's my setup...

Gentoo box (named: fw, which is acting as a gateway between my private network and the internet) running ShowEQ and a Windows 2000 SP3 box (named: lisa) running Everquest and an X-Win32 5.3 X server.

On fw, I export DISPLAY=ip.of.lisa.box:0 and then launch ShowEQ as normal.

While I am logged into Everquest and ShowEQ is running (and being displayed on lisa), I have an extremely high network load. That is, between 400 and 800 kilobytes/sec. Additionally, it would appear that the entire system (lisa) lags during this high load.

I've noticed that this issue is certainly periodic. I have a hunch that it is happening when a lot of people are moving at the same time.

Its happened in Karnor, Dreadlands, Bazaar... And I'm sure other zones and areas will be the same.

Has anyone else noticed this phenomenon before? Is there some way to cut down the network usage? My network is a switched 100BaseT, but I'd still prefer to keep the load down to ease system lag.

Is there a way to force ShowEQ to be very verbose? ie, "Telling X to do THIS because THIS happened" ?

[casey]

X is a very high bandwidth app, running just a few apps on my boxes, i regularly see 6-10 mbit/s usage.

If you want to see less, you can try out the x low bandwidth proxy, but i dont know how well that works.

you say you have switched 100mbit though, so whats the big deal? if you are really getting lag from the network throughput, ditch your crappy NIC's and get some real ones. little realtek's and dlink's and netgear's (ie any nic that costs less than $20) offloads all its work to the system CPU. That makes your throughput and latency cpu bound. Now if you get a card like an intel ee pro, or a 3com, they have onboard processors. With good NIC's, i can sustain 100mbit/s NFS transfers, and not notice any performance degredation (total throughput is actually higher than that from ACK's and stuff, my net is full duplex).

so, its not X-win32's fault, not showeq's fault, its just the X Protocol, which was made to be used on a LAN, using the bandwidth it expects to be there.

[Lisa]

Originally posted by casey
so, its not X-win32's fault, not showeq's fault, its just the X Protocol, which was made to be used on a LAN, using the bandwidth it expects to be there.

Okay, I was just wondering if the usage was normal. I think I'll have to look into those a new NIC. Can you reccomend some models?

[high_jeeves]

The only thing I would add to what casey said is: reduce the framerate on your ShowEQ map. Drop it down to 1. ShowEQ is still usable, but fewer X updates sent may help reduce the bandwidth used... This may help in the short term until you are able to upgrade your network cards to something more functional.

--Jeeves

[Dedpoet]

Like casey said, the 3Coms and the Intel PRO lines are very nice. I buy most of my stuff here personally. They carry both Intel and 3Com NICs.