Thanks for the reply. > You could check by dumping the forwarding table with 'br showmacs br0' Before I start the packet generator, I make sure that the mac addresses get put into the forwarding table. It may be simple minded, but I do this by pinging from the packet generator to the destination, and the destination to the packet generator (this is probably redundant, but server the purpose of also making sure that everything is "up" on both machines). I can confirm that they are in the table: [root@localhost ~]# brctl showmacs br0 port no mac addr is local? ageing timer 1 00:07:e9:0c:fd:07 no 2.02 <-- destination 2 00:07:e9:0c:fd:35 no 2.02 <-- packet generator 2 00:0c:41:8a:50:b6 no 50.86 1 00:0c:bd:00:69:cc yes 0.00 2 00:0c:bd:00:69:cd yes 0.00 2 00:90:96:f4:ce:2b no 0.00 2 00:e0:81:2d:08:01 no 198.57 > How are you testing? After I seed the table, I run the packet generator. It is one-way traffic, but the destination mac address is fixed (00:07:e9:0c:fd:07). I am trying to understand the code -- I misspoke earlier -- I meant "something I do *in*frequently" in my last email -- so this isn't a strong skill with me, though I'm learning. The data I sent last time was the bridge functioning at max-capacity without dropping packets or producing errors. I've since run it with the packet generator producing more packets that it can handle to see where the differences are. The results: # opreport -p /lib/modules/2.6.9-1.667smp/kernel/ --symbols |grep bridge 2496 15.0679 bridge.ko bridge fdb_insert 1424 8.5964 bridge.ko bridge br_nf_pre_routing 866 5.2279 bridge.ko bridge br_handle_frame 856 5.1675 bridge.ko bridge br_nf_post_routing 566 3.4168 bridge.ko bridge br_nf_forward_ip 560 3.3806 bridge.ko bridge br_nf_pre_routing_finish 521 3.1452 bridge.ko bridge ip_sabotage_out 462 2.7890 bridge.ko bridge br_nf_forward_finish 437 2.6381 bridge.ko bridge br_flood 430 2.5958 bridge.ko bridge br_fdb_insert 404 2.4389 bridge.ko bridge __br_fdb_get 383 2.3121 bridge.ko bridge br_handle_frame_finish 288 1.7386 bridge.ko bridge setup_pre_routing 285 1.7205 bridge.ko bridge __br_forward 284 1.7145 bridge.ko bridge br_dev_queue_push_xmit 235 1.4187 bridge.ko bridge br_forward_finish 210 1.2677 bridge.ko bridge ip_sabotage_in 163 0.9840 bridge.ko bridge br_flood_forward I'm looking at the differences. For what it's worth, when I test using the router setup I have to set the destination mac address to the router's mac address on the segment of the packet generator. Otherwise the router doesn't see the packets. This got me to thinking about performance differences between promiscuous mode and not promiscuous mode. Would you expect that this could make a difference? Thanks, Dan
