Wireless Network Fast, Net Slow?

[Dario D.]

Hi all. I just got a new router, and a wireless networking card for my laptop (the old one died magically, right about the time I really needed it), and have a question:

Is it normal for wireless net speeds to be WAY slower than hard-wired ones? On my laptop, I can download at about 60-90k per second, whereas on my PC, I can download at 1 mb per second.

Is it supposed to be like that? My laptop can send files to other computers on the network at blazing fast speeds, so shouldn't it be able to communicate with the router just as quickly? (or at least better than 60-90k per second)

(btw, talking about Linksys Wireless G router/cards here)

 

[Dario D.]

No takers?

 

[Toytown]

Is it normal for wireless net speeds to be WAY slower than hard-wired ones?

Yes this is true, wired is always much faster and reliable (at least in 99.9% of cases). However you should be getting a lot more than 60kB-90k of traffic. My wireless im using right now i can get varying speeds, but 2-3MB is almost always achievable depending on where the laptop is.

Goto the routers configuration page and see what settings there is available. The most important one for me that alters the speed the most is the "Channel" so change that first.....also moving the router can help.

 

[msabo]

Hi all. I just got a new router, and a wireless networking card for my laptop (the old one died magically, right about the time I really needed it), and have a question:

Is it normal for wireless net speeds to be WAY slower than hard-wired ones? On my laptop, I can download at about 60-90k per second, whereas on my PC, I can download at 1 mb per second.

Is it supposed to be like that? My laptop can send files to other computers on the network at blazing fast speeds, so shouldn't it be able to communicate with the router just as quickly? (or at least better than 60-90k per second)

(btw, talking about Linksys Wireless G router/cards here)

So basically it appears you have a 1Mbps broadband connection (at least on the down link portion) and your wireless can't even keep up with that. Do you have any 802.11b devices on your wireless net? If so, that will cut all of your G cards performance. Are there a lot of other WiFi networks in your area? If so, it could be interference and you can try changing your channel to 1 or 11 (these are non-overlapping) from the default 6. How far is your laptop from your wireless router? If its too far the system will drop performance to gain reach. Try moving into the same room and testing its performance.

 

[Dario D.]

So basically it appears you have a 1Mbps broadband connection (at least on the down link portion) and your wireless can't even keep up with that. Do you have any 802.11b devices on your wireless net? If so, that will cut all of your G cards performance.

Yes, there is a laptop that uses a built-in 802.11b card, I believe, but it's usually turned off... I messed with the router settings, and tried eeeeeeeverything I could think of (all channels, including changing the router mode to Wireless G only), but things remained the same.

 

[msabo]

Okay, using a laptop on the WiFi go under start menu click run. Enter cmd and return. That will pop up a DOS window. Do a trace route and to see what the latencies look like. tracert www.yahoo.com When I do that, most hops are less than 30ms. Also do a tracert to your router admin port. I have a Linksys, my default admin address is 192.168.1.1 When I tracert 192.168.1.1 my latency is 2ms. What's yours?

 

[msabo]

By the way, what mechanism are you using to measure your bandwidth?