Question about PCI NIC's.

[iTsOn]

Hi,

This is my first post here, but I've been reading the reviews for a while. I find them to be very informative but I couldn't find anything like a review on NIC's.

Well, I ordered a motherboard that doesn't have onboard LAN, so i need a PCI NIC. I'm just a normal end user on cable modem. My max speeds are 1.2mB/s down & 150kB/s up. I have been told a 10/100 will be fine for me, as compared to a gigabyte speed solution. The extent of my usage will be some high speed downloads, and FPS gaming.

I am deciding between these 2 NIC's. These are newegg links but I will be buying the card from Bestbuy.
D-LINK Model DFE-530TX+ ($15 at Bestbuy)
dlink
or

Linksys Model LNE100TX ($25 at Bestbuy)
linksys

Do some NIC's use more of my CPU than others? Which one of the above two do you recommend?

Thank you greatly in advance,
-Will

 

[JackMDS]

If you have a MicroCenter Store around.

You can make 1c + Tax after $8.00 rebate.

Link to: Gigafast NIC (-)1c aftre rebate

 

[cmetz]

iTsOn, I would urge you to get a gigabit Ethernet NIC because they're not much more than 10/100 and typically perform a good bit better especially compared to the cheap 10/100 boards, plus there's some future-proofing in there. Two to consider are the Netgear GA302T (Broadcom Tigon3) - $34 shipped from Newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=33-122-113&depa=5

and the new D-Link DGE-530T (Marvell Yukon) - $29 shipped from Newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=33-127-135&depa=5

I believe that both the D-Link and Linksys boards you are looking at are based on the Realtek 8139 chip which sucks for performance. If you really truly want to go there, get a no-name board, which is almost always based on that same chip anyway and at least would be priced cheaper. The Gigafast for example.

Best Buy, not at all surprisingly, has two choices that are overpriced for what they are.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: cmetz
I believe that both the D-Link and Linksys boards you are looking at are based on the Realtek 8139 chip which sucks for performance.

Unless they've changed considerably since the last time I bought a Linksys NIC, they use a tulip clone. According to benchmarks posted in some previous threads of this nature, they perform quite well speed wise, but eat up cpu more than high end cards. The tulip chipset is pretty good. If I remember my history correctly, DEC made it, Intel bought it, Intel got in trouble and licensed it.

If I had to choose between just the two in the OP, I would choose the linksys. For 10/100 cards, if Intel isn't an option, I go with Linksys. Unless they have changed the chipset, then I'll drop them like I did for their wireless cards (changing chipsets without changing model numbers is evil).

 

[Caveman]

So... If I were to buy any NIC under $40 and I was the most concerned about CPU speed being eaten into and wanted a "good" card, what would be the suggestions?

A friend at work told me he prefers SMC for networking needs and grimaced when I told him that I own a D-Link wifi router. What's the general consensus about who makes the best networking hardware?

 

[Cheetah8799]

Originally posted by: Caveman
So... If I were to buy any NIC under $40 and I was the most concerned about CPU speed being eaten into and wanted a "good" card, what would be the suggestions?

A friend at work told me he prefers SMC for networking needs and grimaced when I told him that I own a D-Link wifi router. What's the general consensus about who makes the best networking hardware?

D-link, linksys, netgear = home users . That's why your friend at work grimaced. For most of us, they are plenty fast. If you are setting up a fileserver that will be accessed by hundreds of users, then maybe you need something good and expensive.

Lots of the servers I've worked with come with Intel network cards built in.

I wouldn't spend more than $5 - $10 for a home use 10/100 PCI network card.

 

[narzy]

best nics I use are intel but you do pay for it.

 

[JackMDS]

If you are looking forward to the Future. I.e. Giga, then CMETZ above is the way to go.

As pertaining to Home and SOHO Networks.

Here you can see a comparison between a $5 NIC, and the two popular Anti-Anxiety* NICs.

Link: Comparing NICs Notice How the SMC did well as compare to the Giants It is $5 card).

It actually performed better than thee Intel.

*People who get anxious about Computer Hardware feel comfortable with expensive brand names, hence Anti-Anxiety.
:light:

 

[cmetz]

n0cmonkey, the DC21140AF late-gen Tulip was a great chip, but when Intel bought Digital Semiconductor, clearly Intel wasn't too interested in that line continuing. There have been some minor revs since then to the 21143 chip, but generally speaking, the real Tulip family is dead. The Tulip clones are a mixed bag, they're always broken in some way or other, the question is just how broken they are. Some are so broken they're as bad as the RTL8139 family, and some just have minor bugs that have no performance impact.

Caveman, it's more about the chips inside than the logo on the box. When you see me post about NICs, I'm pretty much always talking about chips, because that's what matters. Vendors change chips and don't change part numbers, and the result is very different performance (n0cmonkey is right to complain about this practice). So in general, at the low end, vendors are all the same, it's just a matter of what chips they're using to build around. None of the low end vendors I know of stand out with build quality problems versus their competition, that's not to say they're great, only that they're all about the same. For a NIC, it's pretty much a chip on a board with some capacitors and an isolation block and some LEDs, so there's hardly anything for the vendor to screw up anyway.

For particular recommendations, see my earlier post... both are well <$40.

Intel is good too (second narzy's comment) but you can typically get as good a quality for less money elsewhere. The later Pro/100 (82559) chips are known to have very good performance among 10/100 chips, for example, and the boards Intel sells have good features and reliability. Intel's gigabit drivers for Windows have caused many folks trouble, though, looks like they have some work to do.

JackMDS, linking to Tom's around here, that's brave

Seriously, from what I've seen and from the measurements of folks I know who are super hard core into performance, the 82559 is considered the top 10/100 controller in straight bulk unicast performance. If Tom's test says it's the slowest, that makes me seriously question their test methodology.

But a lot of why I harp on gigabit is that an 82559 Intel Pro/100MT board will cost you the same or even more than a BCM5701 Netgear GA302T, and the latter will perform just as well at 100Mb/s and can do gig. And I have high hopes for the Marvell Yukon boards like the new D-Link, they may even outperform the Netgear (I have not lab tested it yet) The Intel board is a good board, but you can get a better value in many of the cheap gigabit boards.

 

[JackMDS]

LOL. A screen with information is a screen with information, I am not relating here to any Site X vs., Site Y wars. Notice that my post includes Anonymous Link. (I personally dislike the Dr. but that is another story).

To the issue at hand.

I think that at times we are mixing variety of variables that are not necessary existing in each situation.

Especially it happens when we are relating to Small Network Issues taking the Big WAN-LAN approach.

Like Hub vs. Switch story. Technology wise Switch is superior to Hub, but when use in a network with few computers there is no real difference. SocttMac was not convinced and he actually performed a real Classy Test.

Log here, and click on Switch vs. Hub. scottmac.net

When I need a Card for a system that might be expensive to repair, I stick in a more expensive Card. The fee to send a Technician to replace a card is many times more expensive then the difference in cost between cheap card to Intel or 3com.

However I have many systems in which the owners do not mind to replace a card by themselves (if necessary).

I buy the cheapest that I can find. By now I probably bought any brand or OEM NIC, at times individual card might be ?Bad? but as far as I can judging from simple testing (usually run Qcheck to insure the solidity of the Network), and from the actual feel of the Networks, it really does not matter which card you use.

Is a 2.6GHz CPU faster than 2.5GHz? Sure! Is there really functional difference. Nah!

 

[cmetz]

A lot of folks around here are what the vendors's marketing folks call "enthusiasts" which is a nice way of saying we spend more money on this stuff than we could/should. Clearly, if you're looking for the cheapest solution, or the best price/performance, the free-after-rebate boards win. Hard to beat division by zero. But for folks who might easily have spent more than $30 on the fans in their boxes, to spend that much for a NIC that delivers noticeably better performance is worth it. Spend a little more, get a little more - certainly there are lots of places you can do that in a computer, but the sum of a lot of little mores is a lot more cost, but a lot better system too.

Now, the 3Com NICs and such, that are targeted squarely at corporate IT people and cost more like $100, those are hard to justify. The same performance as the $30 NIC, just a more prestiguous logo.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: JackMDS
If you are looking forward to the Future. I.e. Giga, then CMETZ above is the way to go.

As pertaining to Home and SOHO Networks.

Here you can see a comparison between a $5 NIC, and the two popular Anti-Anxiety* NICs.

Link: Comparing NICs Notice How the SMC did well as compare to the Giants It is $5 card).

It actually performed better than thee Intel.

*People who get anxious about Computer Hardware feel comfortable with expensive brand names, hence Anti-Anxiety.
:light:

Or we know what is supported well in our environment

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: cmetz
n0cmonkey, the DC21140AF late-gen Tulip was a great chip, but when Intel bought Digital Semiconductor, clearly Intel wasn't too interested in that line continuing. There have been some minor revs since then to the 21143 chip, but generally speaking, the real Tulip family is dead. The Tulip clones are a mixed bag, they're always broken in some way or other, the question is just how broken they are. Some are so broken they're as bad as the RTL8139 family, and some just have minor bugs that have no performance impact.

Thanks for the information. I did say tulip clone (or I usually do), and I do use Linksys cards in some machines at home. I've been very impressed with their performance. Not anywhere on the level of the 8139 (plus they are supported better).

 

[narzy]

I don't look at speed unless I absolutly have too, I generally judge by failure rate. to each his own.

 

[skyking]

Personal failure rate works for me. I've had 2 netgears pack it in, and none of the other ones..................

 

[JackMDS]

Originally posted by: cmetz
A lot of folks around here are what the vendors's marketing folks call "enthusiasts" which is a nice way of saying we spend more money on this stuff than we could/should.

LOL.

That is exactly the point. I saved $20 on the NIC and used the money to buy on sale an additional Belkin Wireless Router ($19 after rebate). Now I have Wireless in the Back Yard Tool Shed.

My neighbors are much more impressed with a Wireless in the Tool shed than with an Unseen Expensive NIC. :music::beer:

P.S. By now I probably have more Wireless Routers than the local CompUSA. And of course all of them are ""enthusiastically"" needed.