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I need help limiting bandwidth to a computer on my network

G

Grimmett

Member
Hey guys,
I'm pretty unfamiliar with networking. I have a Network Everywhere 4 port router. I believe the serial is NR-041. Its a cheapo. Anyway, I need help throttling his computers download and upload speeds so that I can have a little bandwidth to play Counterstrike. My ping is always in the 300-500 ms. I downloaded NetPeeker thinking it was the appropriate tool, but I couldnt get it to recognize his traffic, only mine. I'd also really like to be able to accomplish this without getting onto his computer.

Thanks Guys
Griz
 
You will need a higher end box then a Netgear NR-041 to do this. If you have a junker computer lying around (and I mean junker, 150Mhz and up would be good) you could install Smoothwall on it. Smoothwall is a freely available Linux-based firewall distro which I believe has QoS functionality. Do a Google search for it. 🙂

Cheers! 🙂

-Por
 
You could also replace it with a Linksys WRT54G router, flash it with the sveasoft firmware and you would get the exact QoS functionality you need. Filter all unknown traffic to one of the small queues and filter anything important like http traffic, ACK packets, maybe email or IM traffic into the higher priority queues. It's not hard to set up in a distro which is already configured for QoS.

Gaidin
 
Thanks for the link.
It cleared a few things up for me. I'll probably mess around with that Dr. TCP on his computer while he's gone. I don't really want to spend 60 bucks or so on that Linksys router mentioned above if I have to flash the firmware. I could possibly not work and I'd be out 60 bucks. I have an older computer, so I might be able to do that as well. Thanks for all your help.
BTW, why wouldnt NetSeeker work? It seems like it advertises to do what I need, I just cant get it too. Thanks
 
Switches do not broadcast information transferred over the network to all computers like hubs do. They only send data to the devices that are communicating. This limits the ability of programs to watch traffic for the entire network as it will only pick up information for the computer it is installed on.
 
Originally posted by: Grimmett
Thanks for the link.
It cleared a few things up for me. I'll probably mess around with that Dr. TCP on his computer while he's gone. I don't really want to spend 60 bucks or so on that Linksys router mentioned above if I have to flash the firmware. I could possibly not work and I'd be out 60 bucks. I have an older computer, so I might be able to do that as well. Thanks for all your help.
BTW, why wouldnt NetSeeker work? It seems like it advertises to do what I need, I just cant get it too. Thanks
Click to expand...

The Linksys Firmware upgrade is now commonplace and practially guarenteed to work. It is truly a fantastic product/upgrade combo.

As for software, it can always be turned off, and will be limited. Basically, it will have to be installed on his PC.

Smoothwall, and equally, Astaro secuirty Linux are both great security products. THey do invlove a llittle reading, a spare computer, and time....

 
Thanks for the info.
I may be looking into that Linksys router then. I cannot have him dl'ing crap 24/7 and play online games as well at this rate. I'll check pricewatch for that router. Thanks again!
 
Just another quick question.
Net Peeker . The page says
NetPeeker can limit data transfer speed for every application, every remote IP address and every connection, both upload and download. Now you can control the usage of your bandwidth resource freely.
Click to expand...
So I can't use this program to do what I need?
I don't doubt what you guys are saying at all, just curious.
Thanks
 
Originally posted by: Grimmett
Just another quick question.
Net Peeker . The page says
NetPeeker can limit data transfer speed for every application, every remote IP address and every connection, both upload and download. Now you can control the usage of your bandwidth resource freely.
Click to expand...
So I can't use this program to do what I need?
I don't doubt what you guys are saying at all, just curious.
Thanks
Click to expand...

This assumes that

A) He will let you install this on his PC
b) He will not modify it


Just get the router...trust us....I've been both the greedy rommate and then the one who is locked out by others hogging the line.
 
Haha okay,
I was hoping I could access his IP since I can access the router and turn his ports off. I thought maybe this program would let me do that though my PC and not his...I didn't want him to know. I guess I'll get that rotuer. Thanks alot Goosemaster
 
Just one more question, if you dont mind.....
Since I can't limit the download/upload speed of another IP on the router, is there a way I can block the port he is using for Direct Connect? I know you can do this through the router settings, but he can access that and see if I've done this or not. So, is there some program I can block that IP with on my computer that he can't access???
Thanks again!
 
You could just password the router so he can't change the settings. As for blocking a specific port I THINK you can, but I'm not near my WRT54G to check. It may also depend on the firmware.
 
Ya,
I just don't want him to get suspicious about things. I dont want him to think Im being a jerk and passwording it all of a sudden may tip him off if his DC just quit working.
 
Maybe you can just talk to him about it. If you pay 100% of the broadband cost all by your self.

Just talk to him and tell him you are not happy when he does it. He should honor it or get his own broadband connection.
 
The best way to do the traffic shaping with something like DC and a "normal" broadband connection would be to classify all unknown traffic to a very low priority queue, ie maybe 5-10KB/s up max. Classify all known stuff to high priority queues so that when you want something (ie games usually use UDP, usually only on a few ports per game) to work no matter what, it does.

For traffic shaping to be useful you unfortunately need to give up a small percentage of both your upstream and downstream. You must do this or else traffic will get queued up in your cable/DSL modem or at your ISP. You need to be in control of the queues and the only way to do this is limit yourself just enough to not have a backlog of traffic except at your router.

The wondershaper example you're sure to run across (the sveasoft linksys firmware uses a variant of this script as do most Linux QoS solutions) prioritizes ACK packets which is what you send when you are downloading files along with any interactive TCP traffic. The upshot of this (sorry for the long winded answer!) is that by limiting your roomate's DC you, in effect, will only be limiting how fast he uploads files to others and not how fast his downloads go.

Gaidin
 
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