Fastest - "Best" LAN Sharing - FTP vs Network Location (SMB) vs LAN software?

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Fastest - "Best" LAN Sharing - FTP vs Network Location (SMB) vs LAN software?

I've set up (NON-Workgroup) successful resource sharing between 2 @ w7 and 2 @ w10 machines running behind a Trendnet GB Ethernet switch - all wired (no wireless).

I had to make use of numerous tutorials to understand & attend to all the settings -
from Properties > Sharing/Security, Services settings, several Group Policy settings,
Enable Additional Windows Settings like SMB, etc etc.

According to dOpus, I average 10 MB/sec for a mix of both compressed and non-compressed data,
plus large AV files and folders.

[* Am I reading this right? That's 10 megaBYTES / sec, or approx 80 megaBITS / sec. ]

Comparing this LAN speed to my AT&T speed via Ookla SpeedTest,
I seem to be getting the promised AT&T WAN performance on my LAN.

I've only had semi-reliable file/folder resource-sharing (no printer sharing)
for a couple days, but it's got me wondering what the "better way" might be?

b/c sometimes the Network Locations take awhile to populate -
though I believe I've attended to the pertinent settings in dOpus > Preferences,
and today I wondered why I was able to share resources
but unable to successfully ping the same machine serving resources?

So, I remember that many dOpus users report how happy they are
to be able to FTP from dOpus, and I want to ask how FTP would compare
as a LAN resource-sharing method, vs Window Network Location/Map a drive (SMB)?

Am I comparing apples to apples, or apples to oranges?

I'd like to understand this in regards to several criteria --
speed, reliability of a consistent, dependable connection, and ease of use.

The 1st discussion points in my mind are the connection protocols -
basically TCP-IP - NetBIOS - SMB - FTP.

Several (freeware) LAN apps such as D-LAN, Dukto, Nitroshare, etc.
claim to make this step much easier/more reliable than MSoft's notorious procedures,
and this is also where I wonder how FTP compares?

Then next would come the actual data copying method APIs -
including RoboCopy.

Is it possible to use (optimally configured) RoboCopy as a data copying method,
in conjunction with the different network sharing protocols?

Thanks for any helps to understand these phenomena.

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edit - plz move this to another section if more appropriate --
the relevance of my thread as a dOpus-related question-issue,
is to ask how dOpus' native FTP functionality compares to other methods of LAN resource sharing?

Also, in my search before posting, I found various threads asking how dOpus'
file copying functionality compares to other apps - FastCopy, Teracopy, etc.
And several years ago I used Teracopy, until testing for myself that dOpus' native code
was at least as good if not better than Teracopy -

I just want to utilize dOpus to the best of my + dOpus' abilities! thx

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FTP is usually slower than SMB, in my experience. But a lot can depend on network latency and other factors, which can have a large and different impact on different protocols.

FTP is also a lot more limited, so it wouldn't usually make sense to use it on a LAN where SMB is an option.

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OK, so instead of pursuing FTP as a LAN resource-sharing mgmt. strategy,
maybe explore the dedicated LAN mgrs such as Nitroshare or (dated/deprecated)
Dukto / D-LAN ?

(And this is b/c the native Windows route is gonna probably prove unreliable sooner than later.)

I'm still at the 1st-grade level where I thought a major upgrade to my 'sneaker-net' resource sharing
between computers was deploying 1 TB internal SSDs w/ a SATA/USB-3 adapter to replace my USB-3 thumb drives! :crazy_face:

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I'm not familiar with those products. Most LANs just use normal Windows file sharing. What problem are you trying to solve here? If it doesn't really involve Opus then it might make more sense to ask on a more general forum.

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yes thanks - I just want to make sure I'm using dOpus' full capabilities for LAN --
especially if it has anything to replace/out-perform normal Windows file sharing.

I did pay for the dOpus FTP upgrade, so I'm gonna experiment with that a little bit.

I do understand that even though 3rd-party apps are constrained by Windows' APIs,
apps like dOpus manage to take those and transform them into something terrific,
vs the default klunky-kludgy Windows implementations.

Still, I'm grateful for Windows as a base from which to customize --
much more freely than a dozen friends/family Macs which I also maintain.

Thanks again --

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Unless there's a specific issue you need to solve, I would just use normal Windows file sharing. Anything else will complicate things, and leave most of your software unable to load and save files over the LAN.

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:+1: