Hello, we are running a 100mb ethernet network with 4 Windows servers, 1 HP Procurve Switch and about 20 client workstations. Our procurve switch shows that almost a dozen clients on the network have errors on their ports. Some are significant. One user has nearly 3500 errors on her port. The switch has only been in use for about 8 months now. We have compared the workstations with errors to the workstations without errors and there isn't really any major configuration difference. Are there any good tools out there that can tells us where these errors are coming from? We mainly are looking for any additional information about these errors that will give us an idea of what is causing them. We have a hunch that the problem is our Altigen phones that have built in hubs but we have no way of proving that right now.
Here is our network configuration:
4 Windows servers
1 Procurve 4000 (10/100mb)
20-25 Workstations
15 Altigen Phones that are networked (they have built in hubs, not switches)
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You could setup a syslog server for the switch to dump its logs to so that you are able to go through them and see if any errors are occuring. If you can try taking one machine connected to a phone and connect it directly to the switch and see if the problem still exists. Also on the switchports that do not have this issue is a phone connected or only and phone and no PC?
There are several ports that have both a phone and a computer on it and then there are several ports that only have phones on them and then the remaining ports only have PCs on them. However there is no pattern. The errors are occuring across the board - not just on ports that have phones or just have computers. The errors do conitnue to increase on several ports - maybe a total of about 25-50 new errors switch wide.
I would verify that the duplex settings match and if using autonegotiation that it is doing the right thing and not negotiating one end to half duplex and one end to full duplex.
That being OK I'd be looking to a physical layer problem with the cable, failing nic, etc.
Can you be specific as to the errors? Can you post the output from one of the problem ports?
If most ports show errors then I don't think you're having a cabling problem, I would have to agree with Millscl that you have a speed/duplex mismatch. This is the most common problem with networking. If you have collisions, then port speeds are not full duplex. If you have transmit or receive errors, this means that there is a speed mismatch. Set the switchport to 100/full duplex and the client machine to 100/full duplex and it shouldn't increment any more errors. If it does, then the computer/switch is still having problems negotiating a connection on the port. This may require a firmware upgrade on the switch or a driver upgrade on the end device.
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by: millsclPosted on 2009-11-05 at 12:08:17ID: 25753385
3500 errors in 8 months might not be a big deal.
Could have been one burst of errors as you plugged the cable in or upon a reboot of the server.
Baselining is very important here. Watch the ports to see if the counters are incrementing.
If they are, you definitely have a problem. If a one time event, you may never know what caused it.