Performance management of computer networks is intended to improve a given network performance in order for more efficient information exchange between subsystems of an integrated large-scale system. Importance of perfomance management is growing as many functions of the large- scale system depend on the quality of communication services provided by the network. The role of performance management is to manipulate the adjustable protocol parameters on line so that the network can adapt itself to a dynamic environment. This can be divided into two subtasks : performance evaluation to find how changes in protocol parameters affect the network performance and decision making to determine the magnitude and direction of parameter adjustment. This paper is the first part of the two papers focusing on conceptual design, development, and evaluation of performance management for token bus networks. This paper specifically deals with the task of performance evaluation which utilizes the principle of perturbation analysis of discrete event dynamic systems. The developed algorithm can estimate the network performance under a perturbed protocol parameter setting from observations of the network operations under a nominal parameter setting