Good NICs for transferring video files over LAN

Hardware Hub Networking
1

Okay, I don't know a damn thing about Network Interface Cards, and can't find any reviews on them anywhere.

Now that that's out of the way, I actually have a few questions, and I don't even know the relevant information to provide. I guess I'll start with what I'm looking to achieve and the purpose. I edit a lot of videos, compress a lot of data, do a lot of encoding for streams, the standard stuff you do when you get an i7. I've encountered a serious problem, one that's costing me plenty of time and money throughout the day. My current mouth breather set up is I have a PC that records videos (my wife's) and a PC that edits/renders/does everything else (mine).

The problem I've lead myself to is that the way I transfer the recorded videos to my editing machine is via a USB 2.0 External Hard Drive. Instead of buying a 3.0 drive, I'd rather eliminate the need for me having to plug and unplug stuff when its done, and I don't want to buy another internal hard drive and a hot swap drive isn't going to work because the recording drives are set up in Raid 0. So, I'm thinking about setting up a LAN between the two PCs and transferring files that way.

What research I've done has shown me that getting a couple NICs and linking the two computers together that way would give me about the same transfer speeds that I could expect out of an external disk drive, minus the additional steps required. However, there's also these now relatively cheap 4 Gbps Fiber cards, some as low as 50 American Denars used. And my Raid 0 SSDs can handle that... So, can 4 Gbps Fiber cards work in consumer/gaming grade motherboards?

Those motherboards being:

  • Asus Maximus VI Hero (Mine)
  • ASRock Z87 Extreme6 (Her's)

If they do, is there anything I should look for in a fiber NIC?

Also, my internet connection on my editing PC is rather choppy, and I feel like its the fault of a bad Intel I217-V LAN chipset as her computer doesn't have this issue. So would there be any benefit to getting a second 1000mbps NIC and using that to connect to the internet? Is that even possible?

Just in case the rest of the systems are relevant, I've rebuilt them in wish lists on newegg:

  • Her's: http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=29656427
  • Mine: http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=29656447

Mine also has a custom water cooling system, I didn't leave out the cooler. Thanks for reading this stupidly long post.

2

However, there's also these now relatively cheap 4 Gbps Fiber cards, some as low as 50 American Denars used. And my Raid 0 SSDs can handle that... So, can 4 Gbps Fiber cards work in consumer/gaming grade motherboards?

No. I assume you are refering to Fibre Channel cards. They are designed to connect SANs not computers. (CNA was superseded by FCoIP with 10Gb Ethernet)

Look at just getting dual Gigabit NICs (HP 360T, they use dual Intel Gigabit) and using those to directly connect the PCs (with LACP). You'll be able to push around 180MB/s which is faster than the HDD on your wife's computer.

If you really want something silly (in terms of performance), look at Infiniband. 4x DDR cards are pretty cheap and will allow you to push 10Gb/s

3

Why thank you! I figured it couldn't be that simple to set up a 4gbps LAN. lol

By dual Gigabit NIC, do you mean just a NIC with 2 Ethernet cables?

If so, are there any you recommend? Or are they pretty much all the same these days?

We stream for about 6-8 hours a day, pushing 3mbps up the whole time, I don't know how much that would factor into it. I'm kind of thinking I'd like to eliminate my on board LAN Chipset at this point, because I really think its the thing giving me the unstable internet issue.

4

Her motherboard already has two NIC's integrated, at Gb speeds. Just get a second one for you, and link them together.

5

Scratch my asking for a recommendation, HP 360T just jumped out at me. Much appreciated!

6

That's why I bought that one hoping that would work, but of course, I also have no idea what I'm doing with networking. Will that cause any major issues relying on the LAN Chipset? I'm assuming they're pretty much like onboard audio now days.

7

I wish it were that simple :P.

Yes, I'd look at HP 360T's they're usually pretty cheap on ebay.

I'd usually look at something that is using an Intel Controller, as they just seem to be more reliable. Sometimes I might use a Broadcom controller, sometimes.

8

That motherboard uses an Intel NIC, so its pretty good, I actually have the same one.

9

Ohh, the HP 360T is a PCIE x4? That's rough. I've got two Water cooled GTX 780 Classifieds in my Asus Maximus VI Hero. Would plugging in this NIC into my 3rd and final slot drop the video cards to 8x/4x? The IRQ assignments have the PCIE_x16/x8_1 (first PCI-E 3.0 x16 slot) and the x4_3 (3rd PCI-E 2.0 x16 slot) shared. 

10

Do you think you could go into what makes Intel controllers so good in comparison to the competition? I'd like to stop being in a haze when looking at this stuff. lol

11

Mostly because they "Just work". They're the most stable, and the most used NICs out there. Very high quality, and very reliable.

12

You wouldn't happen to know where I could find reviews on Dual Gigabit NICs would you?