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I'm trying to track down the cause of some network performance issues. One of the many diagnostic steps I've performed was running the server NIC's diagnostics. Every test passes except the CPU test, which fails consistently. Could this be involved in the performance issues? ProLiant ML310 G3, Windows Server 2003 SP2, NC320i Integrated Gigabit Server Adapter.

UPDATE 2011Apr15: We installed a new server to replace the one with the NIC in question. I left the old server running for testing and monitoring purposes. I finally had a chance to re-run the NIC diagnostics, and now all the tests pass, including the CPU test. I have no idea why this happened.

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  • If it's not are you just going to leave a broken NIC in there?
    – Brad Mace
    Commented Oct 21, 2010 at 23:03
  • @bemace: It's a company system. I'd love to just swap out the card but don't have purchasing authority. I need to make a case that it needs replacing. And of course it does function, so I'm not sure I would categorize it as 'broken'. Perhaps 'functioning non-optimally'.
    – boot13
    Commented Oct 22, 2010 at 11:06

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It does seem likely. Network issues and the network adaptor failing its diagnostics would be quite a coincidence otherwise.

If you have a spare compatible network card available try putting that into the machine and removing the other one (or disabling it in the BIOS if it is built onto the motherboard), to see if your network issues stop.

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  • No spare available, unfortunately. The weird thing is that the card is obviously working, just somewhat slower than I would expect. I was hoping someone might know whether a NIC with a non-functioning CPU could still work but slower than normal.
    – boot13
    Commented Oct 22, 2010 at 11:09
  • Does the NIC support protocol offloading (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TCP_Offload_Engine) perhaps that function is failing in some interesting way. See if the NIC has any such fancy features and turn off all that you can so it is working in as basic a mode as possible. If that helps, turn things back on one-by-one and see when the problems start.
    – David Spillett
    Commented Oct 22, 2010 at 16:55
  • I tried disabling all the offloading features as you suggested, but it didn't seem to make any difference. Eventually the problem just sort of went away (see update above). Anyway, I'm going to accept your answer since it was helpful.
    – boot13
    Commented Apr 15, 2011 at 18:10

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