MP 7,1 Network Speed

[bob_stan]

This may not be unique to the new Mac Pro but I have just noticed this. With a wired connection, my ping speeds are well under 1 second on my local network. However, if I enable wireless as a secondary connection (mainly so I can use handoff), the network ping speeds drop to almost 10 seconds although I am still connected through ethernet cable. Is this what I should expect?

 

[Juicy Box]

ping speeds drop to almost 10 seconds

I am assuming this is milliseconds and not seconds.

mainly so I can use handoff

Handoff doesn't work over Ethernet?

 

[Ludacrisvp]

This may not be unique to the new Mac Pro but I have just noticed this. With a wired connection, my ping speeds are well under 1 second on my local network. However, if I enable wireless as a secondary connection (mainly so I can use handoff), the network ping speeds drop to almost 10 seconds although I am still connected through ethernet cable. Is this what I should expect?

I'd check service order settings in your network preferences, my guess is that when you turn on WiFi that becomes your default route (which you probably don't want). Click the little gear/sprocket to see set service order in the network prefpane, move Wi-Fi down in the list.

 

[bob_stan]

Nope - the order makes absolutely no difference. If WIFI is enabled, the ping times are drastically increased.

 

[Juicy Box]

If WIFI is enabled, the ping times are drastically increased.

What are you using to test your ping?

I will test this when I get home and see if I can replicate the issue. Also, I thought Hand off worked over Ethernet, is this not the case? On my Mac, I don't have my Wifi antenna turned on, but at least some of the Hand off features still work.

I don't have a solution for you, but I am curious if this issue you are having is really a problem or you are just curious to why it is behaving this way. Assuming you meant milliseconds, the difference between 10 and 1 milliseconds would probably not be really noticeable during real world use.

 

[jasonmvp]

What are you using to test your ping?

I can confirm this weirdness on my Mac Pro. Even if I re-order the NICs to be above the WiFi adapter, the latter takes precedence over the former for some oddball reason. I tested this by logging into one of my local servers and could clearly see the IP address from my incoming connection: the Mac's WiFi adapter. Not its NIC.

Odd.

 

[Ludacrisvp]

check your default route in the command line?
setup static routes?

 

[jasonmvp]

check your default route in the command line?
setup static routes?

Same L3 broadcast domain. It just preferred the WiFi.

 

[Ludacrisvp]

Can't reproduce with the details I have...

First ping set from mac to router with 2x 1Gb switches between mac and router.
Using wired LAN as my default. I'm pinging my router which is my default gateway.
Also, not on an idle NIC at the time of this doing some cloud backups from my NAS which is mounted to this mac, so about 30MB/s up/down at the time of this. (yes Bytes, gigabit fiber internet)

macpro-osx:~ ludacrisvp$ ping 10.10.10.1 -c 10
PING 10.10.10.1 (10.10.10.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.671 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.891 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.526 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.493 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=64 time=0.481 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=5 ttl=64 time=1.052 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=6 ttl=64 time=0.464 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=7 ttl=64 time=0.965 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=8 ttl=64 time=0.524 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=9 ttl=64 time=0.503 ms

--- 10.10.10.1 ping statistics ---
10 packets transmitted, 10 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.464/0.657/1.052/0.214 ms

macpro-osx:~ ludacrisvp$ now wifi off

macpro-osx:~ ludacrisvp$ ping 10.10.10.1 -c 10
PING 10.10.10.1 (10.10.10.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.377 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.511 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.911 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.342 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=64 time=0.557 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=5 ttl=64 time=0.757 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=6 ttl=64 time=0.884 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=7 ttl=64 time=0.987 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=8 ttl=64 time=0.466 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.10.1: icmp_seq=9 ttl=64 time=0.449 ms

--- 10.10.10.1 ping statistics ---
10 packets transmitted, 10 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.342/0.624/0.987/0.226 ms

Looking at my routes....
WiFi off:

Destination        Gateway            Flags        Refs      Use   Netif Expire
default            10.10.10.1         UGSc           48        8     en0
10.10.10/24        link#9             UCS             5        0     en0      !

WiFi on:

Destination        Gateway            Flags        Refs      Use   Netif Expire
default            10.10.10.1         UGSc           54       10     en0
default            10.10.10.1         UGScI           2        0     en2
10.10.10/24        link#9             UCS             7        0     en0      !
10.10.10/24        link#11            UCSI            1        0     en2      !

WiFi is en2, first wired NIC is en0.

 

[bxs]

Nope - the order makes absolutely no difference. If WIFI is enabled, the ping times are drastically increased.

After you changed the service order, did you select/press "Apply" ?

 

[jasonmvp]

I see what I was doing wrong: I was letting the wireless connection grab a DHCPOFFER, which includes a default route. But my internal LAN interface is NOT accepting a DHCPOFFER, it's set manually. And it doesn't have a default route (my external NIC does). What that means is that the wireless connection was preferred over the internal LAN interface, even though I told it not to be.

The fix was to manually set the wireless interface's IP, and remove the default route from it. That set it way down in the priority list, and the Mac started using the private LAN interface for all of my internal traffic like it should.

And the Mac shows up as an Air Drop target now. To quote one my favorite movie characters, "Groovy!"

 

[bob_stan]

That is probably my issue as well. I know my wired connection has a fixed IP and I suspect my wireless does not. I will check it out in the morning. I sure am glad you knowledgeable guys are here!