Fastest Wireless Possible

[stevedave]

I am moving and will have to use wireless. A few years back I tried 300n and it wasn't fast enough. So I'm looking for the fastest current wireless setup.

The ASUS RT-AC66U says up too 1.75Gbps which would be plenty fast enough if I could actually get 1.75...... hell 1.0 GBPS would be fast enough If I could get it.

However the fastest Wireless adapter I can find is this NETGEAR A6200-100NAS 802.11ac It says speeds up to 1.3.....but I'm quite skeptical as I thought USB 2.0 maxed out at like .5.

I can't seem to find an adapter that will use that " 1.75 " does anyone have any suggestions or wireless setups that are fast enough for Large file transfers and Playing 1080p through wireless without any snags?

.....reading the reviews seems to have just wasted my time only 1 person posted transfer speeds at they were only 450mbs.....he didn't post his wireless adapter though.

 

[Brak710]

I'm not trying to be a lame - I like bleeding edge, too, but I just have to ask honestly... What exactly are you doing that is maxing out 802.11n that you couldn't run an Ethernet line for?

I mean, you can steam uncompressed Bluray over a 300mbps connection with room to spare.

802.11ac is cool, but it's in it's infancy, and it needs time to mature. Like the NETGEAR adapter you linked, it sucks solely because it's USB 2.0 which is the biggest fail design decision ever.

 

[stevedave]

I can't run Ethernet because my office will be upstairs and my router will have to be down stairs......renting so I can't really go into the walls.

I have a home server that will be downstairs which has quite a few TB's of data that me and my wife transfer too and from often. Large Photoshop and Video files mostly. Some of my video files get into the 10+ gig range. I also backed up all my games on there and if I want to play a game I don't want to have to wait forever to copy the game over locally.

So the fastest wireless Setup I can get the better.

 

[Sage2k]

Do you have phone lines in both of the rooms? If so, use the phone lines to pull some cables to just those plates. When you leave, just reterminate the cat6 you ran back to the phone system

 

[stevedave]

Do you have phone lines in both of the rooms? If so, use the phone lines to pull some cables to just those plates. When you leave, just reterminate the cat6 you ran back to the phone system

I don't think so, but I haven't moved in yet so don't know for sure, Its an Idea worth exploring though.

reading up on it a bit it would seem 802.11ac and ad are quite new. Maybe they'll have a new card out by mid December when I move.

 

[Innocence]

Run a wire.

Wireless is for web browsing and portability. If you have a desk, it should have a real network drop.

Do you have central heat/Aircon? If so, use the cold air return vents to run cable.
Do you have existing low voltage wire (Telephone or TV Coax)? If so, use that to pull a bundle of Cat5.

 

[jjeff1]

Do you have central heat/Aircon? If so, use the cold air return vents to run cable.
Do you have existing low voltage wire (Telephone or TV Coax)? If so, use that to pull a bundle of Cat5.

I'm a landlord, I'm renting out the house I used to live in. Please don't do what was suggested. Almost nothing is going to make me more nervous than a tenant carrying out secret construction work in my property. If the house burns down 5 years later because you nicked an electrical cable, the landlord will be held responsible. When I converted my property from a primary residence to a rental, my insurance more than doubled, just for extra liability coverage.

Instead, look more at wireless or powerline networking. Personally I'd suggest talking to the landlord and seeing what they can do.

I installed CATV drops in my place before I rented it out just because a potential tenant asked about it and I realized it would be something I was expected to have.

 

[dandragonrage]

Uhh, use MoCA. Using wireless for this is stupid. Wireless is for actual wireless devices only. Even powerline networking would be significantly better.

802.11ac would be great if wireless worked anywhere even remotely close to the theoretical rate. Unfortunately, the people who give us the theoretical numbers seem to pull them out of their asses every time.

 

[klank]

Do you have phone lines in both of the rooms? If so, use the phone lines to pull some cables to just those plates. When you leave, just reterminate the cat6 you ran back to the phone system

This is about the most idiotic thing I have heard. Most cable ran in the walls is stapled down, not to mention the bends or other obstructions.

OP ignore this guys post as it is horribly incorrect.

 

[schnell]

wireless =/= speed

If you cant run a wire look into powerline networking. The latest gen gear is actually pretty fast.

I have ran cat5 through the walls in every apartment I have ever rented, granted that was through walls not ceiling but still it is possible. I took 2 wall keystones and connected a short cat5 between each one inside the wall and just screwed the plates into the wall. In some places I just left it in and it other places I put blank plates in first, either way they never said a thing to me when I moved out.

 

[Brak710]

This is about the most idiotic thing I have heard. Most cable ran in the walls is stapled down, not to mention the bends or other obstructions.

OP ignore this guys post as it is horribly incorrect.

This is about the most idiotic thing I have heard. A lot of people at least attempt to do this, and it works pretty often.

 

[Sage2k]

This is about the most idiotic thing I have heard. A lot of people at least attempt to do this, and it works pretty often.

This is about the most idiotic thing I have heard. Most cable ran in the walls is stapled down, not to mention the bends or other obstructions.

OP ignore this guys post as it is horribly incorrect.

I have done this before....I don't believe most phone line is stabled...if so it must just be the newer houses?

What I've done is take off the phone wall plate, tie the phone line to cat6, go to the attic and pull the phoneline up which pulls the cat6 up the wall into the attic, go to the other phone line in the attic and tie the newly pulled cat6 to it, then go to the other phone wall plate and pull the phoneline out with the cat6...

 

[wizdum]

I'm a landlord, I'm renting out the house I used to live in. Please don't do what was suggested. Almost nothing is going to make me more nervous than a tenant carrying out secret construction work in my property. If the house burns down 5 years later because you nicked an electrical cable, the landlord will be held responsible. When I converted my property from a primary residence to a rental, my insurance more than doubled, just for extra liability coverage.

Instead, look more at wireless or powerline networking. Personally I'd suggest talking to the landlord and seeing what they can do.

I installed CATV drops in my place before I rented it out just because a potential tenant asked about it and I realized it would be something I was expected to have.

As a landlord in the Northeastern US, I would also like to add to this. Do not open a window on each floor and run the cable through them (yes I have seen this happen, and no we weren't able to make the tenants pay for the lost heat).

Talk to your landlord. Rental properties often have chaseways (even if they are a bad idea) to make repairs quick. Usually its just a matter of removing a few screws, the landlord may let you use this.

 

[Liger88]

Do not open a window on each floor and run the cable through them (yes I have seen this happen, and no we weren't able to make the tenants pay for the lost heat).

LOL damn and here I was going to suggest ghetto rigging it that very same way. Bad things happen when you're desperate haha.

 

[wizdum]

LOL damn and here I was going to suggest ghetto rigging it that very same way. Bad things happen when you're desperate haha.

If you pay for the heat/AC on the place, and insulate it well (to keep any pipes directly below it from freezing), then it may be ok. Its still an eyesore though, and it looks unsafe.

 

[Innocence]

I'm a landlord, I'm renting out the house I used to live in. Please don't do what was suggested. Almost nothing is going to make me more nervous than a tenant carrying out secret construction work in my property. If the house burns down 5 years later because you nicked an electrical cable, the landlord will be held responsible. When I converted my property from a primary residence to a rental, my insurance more than doubled, just for extra liability coverage.

Instead, look more at wireless or powerline networking. Personally I'd suggest talking to the landlord and seeing what they can do.

I installed CATV drops in my place before I rented it out just because a potential tenant asked about it and I realized it would be something I was expected to have.

Depends what type of landlord you are, and what your properties are.

I own 3 modest houses (live 1, rent 2). All 3 are over 90 years old. Over the past 90+ years there have been so many half-assed renovations and patchwork garbage done by previous owners that I'm really not concerned at all if a tenant runs some low-volt wire through the air returns.

Now if you own a bunch of brand new McMansions or some such business, I'd understand why you would want everything done on the level, and would assume you'd make this extremely clear to your tenants with a verbal and written agreement. Anything less would be extremely foolish.


But to the OP - talk to your landlord if you can't come up with a 100% removable / repairable installation option.

 

[stevedave]

Shit if I was single I'd just run the line strait up the stairs....but the wife doesn't want cables running everywhere, not to blame her though ghetto is never good.

I'll have to see what I can do after I move it.



Never herd of Power-line until today......I'll have to read how this works....

What is the best speeds i could get with Power-line? and will it work on a house made in the 40's?

 

[Metraon]

Contact the landlord, he must be aware that the house/office needs to be wired up. Most of the time, they will not care unless you make holes everywhere. I am paying my studies doing freelancer jobs on SOHO and if the job is well done, they often want to wire more units because its adding value for the next tenant.

With cable management, and clean installation its not an real issue, even in new units. If they don't like it, its easily removable.

 

[klank]

This is about the most idiotic thing I have heard. A lot of people at least attempt to do this, and it works pretty often.

Good for you and get over yourself. Most of the time I have seen this tried in the field it fails.

This is a bad idea for the OP. They will be opening a can of worms that may leave them paying thousands of dollars in damages.

Best thing to do is ask the landlord if they can have some cable ran, or fall back to powerline networking.

 

[klank]

Depends what type of landlord you are, and what your properties are.

I own 3 modest houses (live 1, rent 2). All 3 are over 90 years old. Over the past 90+ years there have been so many half-assed renovations and patchwork garbage done by previous owners that I'm really not concerned at all if a tenant runs some low-volt wire through the air returns.

Now if you own a bunch of brand new McMansions or some such business, I'd understand why you would want everything done on the level, and would assume you'd make this extremely clear to your tenants with a verbal and written agreement. Anything less would be extremely foolish.


But to the OP - talk to your landlord if you can't come up with a 100% removable / repairable installation option.

The reason that it is not advised for a tenant to pull cable is due to liability. If it burns down your house your insurance will likely not cover it.

 

[dandragonrage]

Best thing to do is ask the landlord if they can have some cable ran, or fall back to powerline networking.

You all need to listen (read) better. The options are not just wireless and PLN.

MoCA

MoCA

MoCA

Understood? Or do I need to say it more times?

 

[Metraon]

You all need to listen (read) better.

MoCA

MoCA

MoCA

Understood? Or do I need to say it more times?

Mocacino ?

 

[klank]

Mocacino ?

I could go for a latte right now...

 

[schnell]

You all need to listen (read) better. The options are not just wireless and PLN.

MoCA

MoCA

MoCA

Understood? Or do I need to say it more times?

This only works if there is cable lines in the rooms. The OP did not state that. I am sure there are power plugs though

Another option would be running a cable down the cold air return vent if there is central air/heat. Just make sure you use plenum cable as it is rated to be run in air vents. I did this in my parents old house and it worked great.

 

[/usr/home]

Or you could just put the server in the same room as your other computer... Lol.

 

[Mccaula718]

Just run a cat 5e cable out the window and go buy so cable trays at lowes/homedepot. This is what I did for my xbox360 mce extender upstairs. I originally tryed the cold air return which did not work bc of the crappy design.

 

[Brak710]

Good for you and get over yourself. Most of the time I have seen this tried in the field it fails.

This is a bad idea for the OP. They will be opening a can of worms that may leave them paying thousands of dollars in damages.

Best thing to do is ask the landlord if they can have some cable ran, or fall back to powerline networking.

hahahaahahaha thousands of dollars in damages from trying to repull phone lines.

What is this apartment wired with? Undersea fiber?

 

[wizdum]

hahahaahahaha thousands of dollars in damages from trying to repull phone lines.

What is this apartment wired with? Undersea fiber?

Never underestimate the power of stupid tenants with tools. We've had tenants pull outlets out of the walls, and then wrap them in masking tape to hold plugs in. We also had one were they replaced the outlet, but wired the hot wire to ground. Another one screwed a bookshelf into the plaster, which ripped off a 4 foot by 4 foot section when it fell. Running extension cords through doorways, under carpets, and up stairs is also popular. And thats just the legal stuff that we caught them doing. I don't even want to get into the illegal crap.

If they do something stupid like nick an old electrical wire, or steel pipe, we aren't allowed to just patch that. We have to replace the whole wire until it terminates somewhere (either a breaker box, fixture, or junction). Even then, good luck finding an electrician that wants to touch old wiring. If the building is pre-1970's, then we can run into lead based paint issues, than can easily add up to thousands. I have also never run into a situation where phone lines weren't stapled down. My house was built in the 50's, and I had to cut the old phone lines and run new because they stapled them and ran them horizontally in the exterior walls.

 

[bman212121]

Shit if I was single I'd just run the line strait up the stairs....but the wife doesn't want cables running everywhere, not to blame her though ghetto is never good.

I'll have to see what I can do after I move it.



Never herd of Power-line until today......I'll have to read how this works....

What is the best speeds i could get with Power-line? and will it work on a house made in the 40's?

If the wiring is from the 40's (IE you only have 2 prong wall outlets) then I'd be worried about it working well. I think people can get a solid 100mbits or more out of some of the adapters, but it largely depends upon the wiring. If two outlets are on the same circuit you will get your best results between them.

As for 802.11ac, it is plenty new and I wouldn't worry about trying to go that route if you're only going to be there for a month. AC does have some features that would make it better than N for wireless bridging (It can do full duplex versus half duplex on N) but there is basically no chance you'll find a device with 1.75gbps theoretical speeds. AFAIK no devices right now can do 160mhz channels, so you would need 4 antennas on each side for that to happen. Wikipedia has some really good info about wireless and what to expect. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11ac

Basically the table with the MCS values shows data rates. In order to get the higher mcs values you need to have a stronger signal. If you have 3 bars you might only be halfway up the chart, if you have both aps in the same room 10 feet apart you can probably get the highest speeds. So in the real world MCS 6 with 80mhz channels and 800 GI would be a good guess where you might connect between two devices on different floors. That's about 263mbps per spatial stream. You might have 2 spatial streams via 2 antennas so you're looking at 500mbps theoretical. Then on wireless you can basically take 60% of that as your max real world speeds after you factor in overhead from encryption and other things. So a good real world number would be 300mbps as your max data rate for 802.11ac. The theoretical max you'd see on the box would be 866mbps.

 

[swoop56]

I have a Netgear WNDR3700 router. It's a dual band 300mbps router. Using a laptop with an Intel 6205 WiFi card which is also dual band, I've transferred files to my NAS at over 24MB per second using the 5Ghz band.

 

[Chrisroman]

OP clearly stated he wanted wireless options, and half this thread is obtuse banter about wiring... ffs..,

 

[dandragonrage]

OP clearly stated he wanted wireless options, and half this thread is obtuse banter about wiring... ffs..,

Because OP didn't know about several of the alternatives, to which he has since expressed interest. It is perfectly valid to explain to someone why there are better options than the idea presented. If he weren't looking for that kind of help, he wouldn't have posted.

So go take your unwanted thread policing elsewhere. And besides, if we're talking usefulness of posts, yours was the absolute worst (not that this is that much better - mods feel free to delete it when you delete the whiner's post as well).

 

[Mackintire]

Well....if cost and size is no object.... http://www.ubnt.com/store/airfiber/airfiber_24

Enjoy

 

[laguerre]

As a starting point: The d-link powerline option might be helpful. They advertise 500 Mbps. My brother did a review sample of a 200 Mbps streaming to his bedroom Roku and found no fault in the product.

It's definitely not your 1Gbps, but if you're looking for stability, you're half-way there. At least you could dedicate the line to your office.

It would be interesting if you could stack multiple powerline adapters on the same infrastructure that would enable one line for you and one line for the wife...

 

[KMac]

Here is the adapter you want if you have the RT-AC66U. $99 at Newegg and set for release on 12/10. It must run hot because they sure didn't skimp on the heatsink.

Your target speed of 1.75 is theoretical and the sum of the 2.4 and 5g bands. Even with this adapter, you won't hit that speed, but this is the best you can get today.

 

[scottatwittenberg]

I have had bad experience on a few occasions with "ethernet over powerline" or whatever it is called. I have also seen it work very well in a few instances..

Being that you are moving into an older place, I would advise against it..

 

[FlangeMonkey]

I've skipped many of the posts relating to the rental argument, so I might mention stuff in other posts.

Power Line only works on the same loop. Usually there are 2 separate circuits for upstairs and downstairs, so Power Line might not work. I don't like power line for what its worth.

802.11ac is a draft revision and hopefully it won't take long to get an official standard. 802.11n took an age to go official, however the good news is 802.11ac increases the numbers of 802.11n rather than it being a completely new standard. 802.11n was so much more different than 802.11g it took longer to get an official standard as it also included additional features such as MIMO.

Throughput is a completely different subject. I did read earlier someone stating the speeds are pulled out of there arses. This is something I've stated myself, however the confusion is its a bit level speed. When you apply protocols to communicate over a media that is in effect a Collision Domain, anyone to use and gets interference, speeds are usually much less. The theoretical maximum throughput of 802.11g's 54Mb is something like 20Mb when you include the 802.11 protocols (not including encryption).

If your curious about speed, its a pre-AC or Draft so you need to look at someone already using the Netgear to find out throughput. AC is however the quickest consumer grade wireless you'll get.

Edit: I've just been informed that Power Line will go over a ring main, however it cannot go over a mains meter. This is different from the last time I used one, which was some time ago, so it is worth double checking, as there will be signal loss going over a fuse and I'm completely unsure if it will work over an RCD?

 

[laguerre]

If you're looking for a solution now and can spend the money, ignore everyone bitching about 802.11ac draft and just get two 802.11ac routers and set one as a bridge. There won't be compatibility issues and all the devices you plug into it will see it as a wired connection.

Hell, you can even stick a regular wireless router on top of that for the upstairs if you need mobility.

 

[stevedave]

Here is the adapter you want if you have the RT-AC66U. $99 at Newegg and set for release on 12/10. It must run hot because they sure didn't skimp on the heatsink.

Your target speed of 1.75 is theoretical and the sum of the 2.4 and 5g bands. Even with this adapter, you won't hit that speed, but this is the best you can get today.

Thank you.

If you're looking for a solution now and can spend the money, ignore everyone bitching about 802.11ac draft and just get two 802.11ac routers and set one as a bridge. There won't be compatibility issues and all the devices you plug into it will see it as a wired connection.

Hell, you can even stick a regular wireless router on top of that for the upstairs if you need mobility.

Another good idea....Though I have never done it before I'm assuming its pretty simple. Would the Speed from Router to Router be faster than the speeds from router to the adapter above?

Well....if cost and size is no object.... http://www.ubnt.com/store/airfiber/airfiber_24

Enjoy

I thought price wasn't a factor until I click the link....but even with that how would I connect to it? The adapter used to connect would limit the speed.

 

[-Dragon-]

Buy one for upstairs and attach it to the ceiling facing down, get another for downstairs and attach it to the floor facing up, you may need to provide line of sight to achieve max speed so just knock a hole in the floor, and BAM >1Gbps wireless connection between upstairs and down stairs for the low low price of just over $3000.