Need Help Improving Network Speed

I'm currently getting ~20 meg/sec over my network between my computer and my wife's computer. I do a lot of transfering, and I have plans to set up a NAS box soon so I'd like to get some input on improving my network. Below are the components.

My Computer (WinXP Pro), Onboard GIGABYTE GA-G33M-DS2R, Realtek RTL8111B
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128053

Wife's Computer(Vista Ult), Onboard ASUS M3N78-VM, Realtek 8211CL
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131318

Router, DGL-4300
http://games.dlink.com/products/?pid=370

Cat5 Cables

I know for sure that my Cat5 cables need to be upgraded, but am I getting Cat5e or Cat6? Hard drives are less than a year old, and I defrag when needed so I'm fairly certain that is not the problem either. I copy over "My Network Places" so folder to folder. Should I be using FTP or some other way to transfer files? Is there any other limiting factor or test that I should run to improve my network?

are you NICs connecting at 1Gb? If so turn on jumbo frames

Subscribing since we have a similar situation (two PCs with Realtek Gigabit NICs, DIR-655 Router, Win 7 and XP) and similar transfer speeds (20MB/s between the two PCs)

Yes, all NIC's and router are connecting at 1Gb. Not sure if the 4300 supports jumbo frames though, and digging around Google seems to show that it does not. Beyond that, do I turn on jumbo frame on my OS or on the router?

Goto each PC and do this...

Click Start -> Right click "My Computer" -> Properties -> Hardware tab -> Device Manager -> Click the + sign next to Network adapters -> Right click your network adapter and goto properties -> click "Advanced" tab -> look for "Jumbo Frames" and enable.

ElvisG said:

Goto each PC and do this...

Click Start -> Right click "My Computer" -> Properties -> Hardware tab -> Device Manager -> Click the + sign next to Network adapters -> Right click your network adapter and goto properties -> click "Advanced" tab -> look for "Jumbo Frames" and enable.

Click to expand...

I see that on WinXP, and Jumbo Frames goes up to "4K MTU" which seems odd since it looks like I want to set it to 9k for better performance? Also, I don't see a "Jumbo Frames" option on Vista?

It doesn't matter. You are going to need a switch that supports jumbo frames. Your router does not. Google "DGL-4300 support jumbo frames".

Even if you did buy a new router or switch that supported jumbo frames, your network throughput would only be 40 - 60 MB/sec because of your hard drives.

*edit
"Why can´t I use jumbo frames of 9600k or above?

The Switch processor of the DIR-655 does not support jumbo frames above 4000k."

My guess is you can only see 4k is that your router is using the same switch and your nic's see that.

http://support.dlink.com/faq/view.asp?prod_id=3013&question=jumbo+frames

Thank ElvisG for the clarification!

If I can get 2-3x the transfer speed by just getting a switch that supports jumbo frames, I'll gladly buy it.