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Posts Tagged ‘windows’

Iperf on Windows

February 15th, 2010

Iperf is a neat little tool with the simple goal of helping administrator measure network performance and can measure both TCP and UDP performance on a network. Iperf is cross platform software and open source.

You can Download Iperf from noc.ucf.edu/Tools/Iperf/

We will be making use of the command line, do not fear the command line Iperf is a simple tool to use.

Let’s say I want to test the available bandwidth between a server(Windows Server 2008) and a client workstation(Windows 7). Iperf will try to move as much data as possible using the available link in order to conduct the test.

iperf-server-client-windows

Instructions

Download the Iperf executable and place the file on any directory you wish, my web browser(Firefox) places all downloaded files on the Download directory which where I will be executing Iperf.

Note:You will need to open port 5001 on the Iperf server.

Server Set Up

Go to Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt

command-prompt

With the command line prompt open type

cd Dowloads

or the location where the Iperf executable resides.

cd-download

Now that you are in the same directory as Iperf type

iperf -s

to start the Iperf server. If you look at the screen Iperf listens on port 5001 you may have to open port 5001 on your firewall.

iperf-server

Client Set Up

Imitating the steps above execute Iperf in the same manner, but this time we are going to give the Iperf client different instructions. On the Iperf client command line type

iperf -c 192.168.1.51

. This will be our client and we are telling Iperf the server is located at 192.168.1.51.

iperf-c

Give Iperf some time to test the connection after the test is done Iperf will present the results.

iperf-test-done

The results are easy to understand Iperf managed to transfer 113 Mbytes at 94.5 Mbits/s, now the results will changed when used on a busy network which is where Iperf will reveal the real available bandwidth on the network.

Also

My previous Iperf on Linux post

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Free: HashCheck Windows checksum utility

February 4th, 2010

HackCheck 1

If you have backups or move data frequently from one place to another you should consider a checksum utility to ensure the integrity of your files. HashCheck is a free, open source, lightweight, and windows integrated utility making it the logical choice.

Features

32bit and 64bit support
light disk and memory footprint
Checksum/hash verification
Open source
Windows integration

HackCheck 2

Think of a checksum as the fingerprint of a file that can be used to ensure the genuineness of the same. If the checksum changes or mismatches then the file may be suspected of tampering, corruption, or unannounced changes.

HashCheck Home page

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Wireless adapter for Windows Server 2003 and 2008

November 30th, 2009

There are plenty of wireless adapter(USB/PCI) that work on Windows XP and Vista without a problem(most of the time). But I have yet to find one that officially supports Windows Server 2003 or 2008. It’s not uncommon to use one only to end up with repeated BSOD’s. I don’t think the administrator is going to be happy with ‘just reboot the server’.

Yes, this assumes you have no way of using wires.

An unstable driver is not something that should be impacting server performance. Since I’ve given up all hope of ever finding supported drivers I had to come up with an alternative solution.

The solution

Meet the Linksys WRT54GL and the open source firmware Tomato. The same combination that delivers a stable router can also be used to act as a wireless client.

Wireless Client

You are not limited to the WRT54GL, you can use any device that supports the wireless client feature

The wireless device will no longer act as a router but as an adapter for any devices that need wireless connectivity by receiving the signal and allowing wired devices to connect to the AP, think of it as a bridge.

Tomato Wireless Client

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Tags: windows windows server wireless wlan

Virtualize a Windows system with VMware vCenter Converter

August 17th, 2009

The title should have been transition from bare metal to virtual with VMware vCenter Converter. VMware foresaw the existence of server configurations that were either too complex or labor intensive to be recreated from scratch, that’s why they came up with VMware vCenter Converter. What it does is convert a bare-metal system in to a VMware virtual machine ready to be used.

VMware vCenter Converter is available for free from the VMware website.
Keep in mind you will need another drive or remote storage to store the new virtual machine.

How-To

Start VMware vCenter Converter and click on Convert Machine.

Select source type: – This is where you get to choose the system you wish to convert. I choose Powered-on machine, to convert the local system.
Specify the powered-on machine – Obviously, select This local machine.

In this window you will need to provide the following:

Select destination type – this option will create a virtual machine for use on VMware virtual infrastructure virtual machine or VMware Workstion or other VMware virtual machine.
Select VMware Product – Because I selected VMware Workstion or other VMware virtual machine in the option above, I have to specify the version of Vmware Workstation the virtual machine will be compatible with.
Name: – Give a name to the virtual machine or use the suggested one.
Choose a location for the virtual machine – Select the location where VMware Converter can output the new virtual machine to be created.
And then hit Next to continue.

Remember, you need a second disk where VMware Converter can output the virtual machine while it’s being created. You can not use the same disk you wish to virtualize to stored the vm.

In this windows you can change some aspect of the future virtual machine. Among the possible changes you can change: the allocated RAM, number of processors, and number of NICs. If you do not wish to make any changes hit Next to continue.