Ethernet Card vs MoBo Ethernet

KingmanRossKingmanRoss Kingman,AZ
edited November 2011 in Hardware
Crazy question; which is better? Separate Ethernet card,or,Ethernet integrated into MoBo??

Comments

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Separate, but you'd be hard-pressed to prove that under normal circumstances.
  • Mt_GoatMt_Goat Head Cheezy Knob Pflugerville (north of Austin) Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Thrax wrote:
    Separate, but you'd be hard-pressed to prove that under normal circumstances.

    Add another vote for the same. And add that "normal circumstances" will take you extremely far. Todays onboard NIC's are very dependable and perform quite well.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited November 2011
    No difference in measurable performance. Onboard free's up space in the case and power consumption technically. It used to be putting it on a card had speed and stability advantages but that's not really the case anymore for well most circumstances.

    There's no real good reason to not just use an onboard nic if your mobo comes with it.
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    kryyst wrote:
    No difference in measurable performance. Onboard free's up space in the case and power consumption technically. It used to be putting it on a card had speed and stability advantages but that's not really the case anymore for well most circumstances.

    There's no real good reason to not just use an onboard nic if your mobo comes with it.

    Well, the onboard network chip does want a bit of system RAM for work space-- so real slow RAM (no longer an issue for most of the Icrontian used boards talked about here) would slow it down versus a discrete card with work RAM on board.

    I use onboard NICs except in older systems with 10/100 Mbit onboard chips where I want to upgrade network flow to the Gigabit range, no issues with modern systems with Gigabit onboard nics there.
  • TushonTushon I'm scared, Coach Alexandria, VA Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    kryyst wrote:
    There's no real good reason to not just use an onboard nic if your mobo comes with it.

    This is what it boils down to, with the exception of wanting gigabit transfer.
  • ShortyShorty Manchester, UK Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Tushon wrote:
    This is what it boils down to, with the exception of wanting gigabit transfer.

    and there are now onboard gig PHY on mobos.

    Separate adapters are usually because you want a access a collection of advanced features that an add-on adapter can support (802.1q or LACP trunking as examples).
  • TushonTushon I'm scared, Coach Alexandria, VA Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Certainly, but that would be something OP would have to check.
  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Unless you're talking about a very busy webserver.... onboard should be more than adequate.

    If you're talking about a busy webserver, however, you will definitely want a dedicated card.
  • ErrorNullTurnipErrorNullTurnip Illinois Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Would a modern computer be smart enough to use both an onboard card and a dedicated card at the same time? My school network seems to limit bandwidth by machine so I'd imagine a second port would double my bandwidth?
  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    edited November 2011
    Computers can be configured to use both network cards for their traffic, however, doing so generally requires special configuration on the network side which your school will most likely not be willing to do.
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