SQL and Bandwidth use

kyfunguy5_at_hotmail.com
Date: 09/29/04 

Date: 28 Sep 2004 17:29:25 -0700

To all:

I have a situation at work I cannot explain.

Dell PowerEdge server, Dual Xeon 2.4GHz processors, 4 GB RAM. Windows NT 4.0
SP 6a.
250GB RAID 5 drives, connected to server via fiberlink in a SAN.
Approximately 230GB of space is free.
12GB SQL Database, created by Great Plains Dynamics software based package.
100Mb/sec Ethernet backbone LAN, full duplex. Server has 2 100Mb 3COM NICs -
set as teaming pair, connected to a 3COM 3300 switch.

Run Query against database, in Great Plains Client software. Via monitoring
software (Net Limiter) on client PC generating query (Windows XP), bandwidth
usage by client is peaks a 450kb/sec on query and goes no higher (no where
near 100Mb/sec bandwidth). While monitoring total bandwidth on segment via
Network Associates Sniffer product, network bandwidth utilization stays
below 2%. Client PC is on same segment as SQL server (not passing through
router). The SQL server barely measures a blip in Processor work (2%), or
RAM increase (RAM usage is at 450MB, 3,550MB free). It appears as though the
actual Queries take very little time to run (less then 5 seconds), it just
takes a very long time to transmit the data from the SQL server, to the
client (matter of 1-2 minutes). Net Limiter software reports about 100MB of
data downloaded to client from SQL Server.

Exact same query was run again on another PC (Win 2000 Pro), and both PC's
measured about the same bandwidth usage (~500kb/sec).
Same Query was run on both client PC's simultaneously, with both still
taking only about 500kb/sec bandwidth each.

My questions:

Is it possible that the client software is purposely limiting the bandwidth
usage, to prevent hogging all/most of LAN bandwidth? If so, is there
anything I can do to change this?
Are there any changes to either the SQL server, or the client PC's
themselves, that can be done to throttle up the bandwidth usage?

I'm a hardware person, no a software or SQL person. My SQL Database manager
is blaming the network for causing the slow queries ... but I can't find any
reason for the network to be limiting the bandwidth from the clients to the
SQL server. It appears to me that the actual limit, is by the software
itself. I just need to know if anyone can confirm this, and if so, why.

Thanks.

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