Slow LAN why?

I have a PC, P3 600 XP SP2, on my home LAN that when it does a backup to a
network harddrive on the LAN, it only outputs data at about 10megbits/s or
about 10% of the LAN utilization and 100% CPU utilization. This is with no
other activity on the LAN. And this is doing drive image backups using
Norton Ghost 9.0. Alo

2 other PCs P4 3Ghz XP SP2, when doing the same backup operate at about
30megbits/s or about 30% of LAN capacity and less then 50% CPU utilization.

I have even swapped out the LAN card and set it for 100 duplex and still not
change.

Is there something I can do to improve the LAN transfer rate from the 1 PC?

Is it just that it take so much processing power to send ethernet data that
its slower CPU cant put out data like the other 2 faster P4s?.

If so, It surprizes me that it utilizes so much CPU cycles.

thanks for any insight

well, I'm going to say it's a slow harddrive on the P3. I'm assuming
that it is a 100mbit lan connection to that P3, right? Not using a
USB->ethernet connector? How about ram, how much ram does the P3 have?
Do you have the proper drivers for the P3? Like the chipset drivers,
are they the latest?

If you want to speed it up, get a new harddrive for it, get a PCI LAN
card that does a bus mastering, put 256mb to 512mb RAM into the
computer. And make sure you have the latest drivers for everything,
mainly the chipset and the lan card.

hope that can help you.

Nyder