ESXi: Whitebox Build - Multiple NICs

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StarsFan4Life

Golden Member
May 28, 2008
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Over the weekend, I built myself the following whitebox for me ESXi 4.1 server:

Motherboard: Gigabyte ga-ma78gm-s2h
CPU: AMD Phenom II 940 Quad Core
Ram: GSkill DDR2-6400 8GB
NIC: Intel Pro/1000 GT Gigabit

Now, currently I only have 3 vm's going on it:

WHS
Windows 7 64bit
Google Chrome

I also have Verizon FIOS 35/35. Now, all three VM's are sharing the same NIC. My WHS currently is just on, nothing being ran/used that would affect bandwidth. Google Chrome is actually off. My Windows 7 64bit vm is what I have a question about. Again, with the 35/35 connection I have, I normally would get around 42/38 on Speedtest.net (on my main machine). Within my VM, I get 7/4 at best. What am I doing wrong here? I haven't tested in WHS just yet, but this doesn't seem right.

Now, with this said, should I add a secondary NIC to the machine and dedicate it to my Win7 VM? Will this actually work? Will I see an improvement? Should I get another PCI Intel PRO/1000 GT or go with a PCI-e Intel NIC?
 
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imagoon

Diamond Member
Feb 19, 2003
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When you start wandering off the ESXi supported hardware list it gets difficult to know for sure what is going on but I would check the connection from the NIC to the switch and make sure everything is on auto, jumbo frames off etc. I am pretty sure the 1000GT is on the compatibility list but I don't think your system board is.

Also the typical rules apply, the connection is with a known good machine made cable? If you built the cable yourself it is the first thing I would suspect. I would not be confident that another nic would help you. You are only running 3 VM's which is "basically nothing" in the ESXi world. I have a couple of servers @ 15 VMs on those Intel 1000(xx) nics pushing 1700Mbps with out to much of an issue.
 
Fullmetal Chocobo

Fullmetal Chocobo

Moderator<br>Distributed Computing
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May 13, 2003
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What version of ESXi are you running? And have you verified the speed of the VM NICs?
 
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imagoon

Diamond Member
Feb 19, 2003
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Have you tried just downloading a file and seeing what the xfer rate is? I have no idea how speedtest.net determines the speed but it is possible it doesn't like the virtual clock counter. Also you do have VMware Tools installed in the VM's right?
 
mvbighead

mvbighead

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Apr 20, 2009
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I have a similar problem as well with connection speeds, and this is on simple disk to disk transfers over the LAN. It's my home white box, so I don't care too much... but if this does get figured out, I'd be interested to hear what you come up with.
 
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drebo

Diamond Member
Feb 24, 2006
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Remember that speed test sites use Flash, which is extremely processor intensive on the client side, and typically doesn't work very well over RDP or other screen-sharing utilities (vSphere Client included).

Download a file directly from Microsoft for a more accurate indication of speed.
 
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StarsFan4Life

Golden Member
May 28, 2008
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imagoon said:
Have you tried just downloading a file and seeing what the xfer rate is? I have no idea how speedtest.net determines the speed but it is possible it doesn't like the virtual clock counter. Also you do have VMware Tools installed in the VM's right?
Click to expand...

In vsphere, I initiated the VMWare tools to install. How do I verify?
 
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imagoon

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Feb 19, 2003
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You should also see a "VMware tools: OK" in vSphere client when you hover over the machine. (I think, that might be a vSphere [full product] specific thing.)
 
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StarsFan4Life

Golden Member
May 28, 2008
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imagoon said:
You should also see a "VMware tools: OK" in vSphere client when you hover over the machine. (I think, that might be a vSphere [full product] specific thing.)
Click to expand...

Are there any benefits to installing another NIC and dedicated it to a particular VM, or is this just redundant?
 
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imagoon

Diamond Member
Feb 19, 2003
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StarsFan4Life said:
Are there any benefits to installing another NIC and dedicated it to a particular VM, or is this just redundant?
Click to expand...

The only time there is benefit is if the nic is overloaded or you are bonding nics to support a higher ratio of machines (like etherchannel for 30 machines on one host etc.) If that one VM will 'always' be pushing 80% of the nic or above then ut would help to give it its own. Considering the odds that your hardware can't even push that (typically) I wouldn't expect to see any gain.
 
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StarsFan4Life

Golden Member
May 28, 2008
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Started downloading WinXP SP3 and barely reached 1mb speeds. I usually get 3.5-4.2mbps. Now, I tried on my WHS VM and it all ran fine (SPEEDTEST showed correct speeds and WinXP SP3 downloaded at 4.25mbps.

The VM I am having the slow speed on is my Win7 64bit vm. Any ideas?
 
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