60.38 Speed of Network Interface

The iperf package provides a convenient tool to measure the speed of local network connections. The package is installed on two local computers, yoga and theano.

$ wajig install iperf

Run iperf as a server on the first host using -s:

@yoga$ iperf -s
------------------------------------------------------------
Server listening on TCP port 5001
TCP window size: 85.3 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------

On the other host which will connect to that server run the iperf client using -c. The client here is connected through USB (direct or via a USB2 Hub) to an ethernet adaptor (connected at 100Mbit/s), obtaining 94Mbits/sec (repeated with similar results):

@theano$ iperf -c yogae
------------------------------------------------------------
Client connecting to yogae, TCP port 5001
TCP window size:  162 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
[  3] local 192.168.178.83 port 34532 connected with 192.168.178.91 port 5001
[ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
[  3]  0.0-10.0 sec   112 MBytes  94.3 Mbits/sec

On the client, turn the wired connection off and Wifi on to achieve 160Mbits/sec (again repeated multiple times with similar results):

@theano$ iperf -c yogae
------------------------------------------------------------
Client connecting to yogae, TCP port 5001
TCP window size:  136 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
[  3] local 192.168.178.82 port 42206 connected with 192.168.178.91 port 5001
[ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
[  3]  0.0-10.1 sec   193 MBytes   161 Mbits/sec

On the server the following is reported:

[  4] local 192.168.178.91 port 5001 connected with 192.168.178.83 port 34532
[ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
[  4]  0.0-10.0 sec   112 MBytes  93.9 Mbits/sec
[  4] local 192.168.178.91 port 5001 connected with 192.168.178.83 port 34638
[  4]  0.0-10.0 sec   112 MBytes  93.9 Mbits/sec
[  4] local 192.168.178.91 port 5001 connected with 192.168.178.82 port 42206
[  4]  0.0-10.2 sec   193 MBytes   159 Mbits/sec
[  4] local 192.168.178.91 port 5001 connected with 192.168.178.82 port 42214
[  4]  0.0-10.1 sec   194 MBytes   161 Mbits/sec

Some experimentation, from client to server speeds:

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