difference between iperf tool and Ixchariot

Question

I want to know what is the difference between iperf tool and Ixchariot tool.

Both are used for performance testing. I want to know difference and features of both tools.

Thanks, Devanathan.D

Answer 1

Both iperf and IxChariot do network performance monitoring, much in the same way that GIMP and Photoshop both manipulate images. IxChariot is a commercial, enterprise-level, customizable tool. On the other hand, iperf is open source freeware and as such, you get what you pay for. The main advantage of iperf is that it's free. The application is a simple command line executable which can act as either a server or client, and is available on a variety of platforms. There is also a Java-based GUI called jperf which is convenient in that it presents all of iperf's features without requiring the user to recall command line arguments. It seems that jperf may no longer be maintained and some have reported difficulty making it work with more recent versions of iPerf, particularly iPerf3.

IxChariot is more advanced tool that can instantly assess network performance, including wireless performance. Performance endpoints run on mobile, PC, Mac or in any hypervisor or cloud service and allows central management of any platform. It also delivers full application emulation and key performance metrics, including throughput, packet loss, jitter, delay, MOS, and OTT video like Netflix, YouTube.

Some can get by with iperf and similar freeware, just like some can get by with GIMP instead of Photoshop. However, just like most serious graphic artists will eventually migrate to Photoshop, most organizations that really need robust network performance monitoring will eventually turn to commercial, enterprise grade solutions like IxChariot particularly if they need endpoint hardware appliances, advanced UDP, multi-codec voice, video, configurable mixed traffic, configurable TOS/DSCP or mixed traffic with different COS (TOS/DSCP).

Full disclosure - I am an Network Engineer at Ixia.

Answer 2

iperf is free. Thats the main difference to be truthful