Erratic Wireless Card Performance

[zaxour]

I currently have two wireless cards based off the Ralink RT61. Normally they are great cards, but when I am running any kind of torrents, these cards tank. They go from 1.5 MB/s download rates to around 70-80 KB/s, and when I do a test at speedtest.net, they don't even break 1 Mbps to the server closest to me.
My macbook pro wireless will get 12 mbps (Time Warner 10 mbps connection) at the same time. I've tried installing many different driver versions to no avail and it does this on both Vista and XP. I'm pretty sure its not my router either (WRT54GL with Tomato firmware).

Does anyone have an idea of what to do here? These cards work great when they do, but this issue is very crippling. If not, what is a good wireless PCI card? I'm well aware of the interference issues with the antenna, but I'm not really concerned with that.

 

[dandragonrage]

Well, I'm sure others here will have more specific info for you, but I will say that Ralink is generally frowned upon and Atheros is considered the best for wireless. However, the Broadcom chipset in the WRT54G(L) will prevent an Atheros card from hitting its full potential.

 

[MrWizard6600]

misunderstood, sorry.

 

[Keiichi]

BT is a very resource intensive application. Basically those cards can't handle it.