DualNet Technology

Everything is going dual: first it was dual channel DDR, then Dual Graphic and most recently Dual Core. The next area is dual networking, using the two available Gigabit Ethernet connections of the nForce 5 core-logic. Teaming allows the two integrated network connections to work together, appearing as a single network connection while providing up to twice the Ethernet bandwidth for transferring large amounts of data from home file servers to other PCs, for example.



By using both Gigabit connections the PC can become a viable game server to handle all the connections. This may be of use during a private LAN Party, as home users do not have a seperate game server and use their own PCs to serve and play along at the same time. Big, commercial LAN parties usually have dedicated game servers for their tournament matches to give everyone an equal playing field. We will certainly see professional players using this technology if it does provide great improvements in latency and bandwith. Imagine a 500 person LAN party becoming a 250 person one because everyone uses two network connections. Most games do not need more than a 10 MBit connection to function properly, so it remains to be seen what kind of gains this technology has in store.

DualNet can only improve the outgoing bandwidth. You will be able to send with up to 2000 MBit/s but incoming traffic will still go over one Ethernet interface, resulting in 1000 MBit/s. This means the best gains will be seen with file serving applications. To be able to pump out 200 Megabytes per second you will need fast harddisks, preferably in RAID.