Wireless file transfering speeds help

Movieesa

Gawd
Joined
Jun 23, 2003
Messages
673
I just recently bought a linksys router ac1600 with a usb adapter that is ac580 dual band. I also have have a my book external drive usb 3. The drive has been hooked up to the router and I have tried transfering files from my laptop to the drive and the speeds I am getting are around 1.5 megs a sec. Does this sound right? I was hoping to hit a lot higher. Is there something I am missing?
 
I just recently bought a linksys router ac1600 with a usb adapter that is ac580 dual band. I also have have a my book external drive usb 3. The drive has been hooked up to the router and I have tried transfering files from my laptop to the drive and the speeds I am getting are around 1.5 megs a sec. Does this sound right? I was hoping to hit a lot higher. Is there something I am missing?

That's low... on "N" here at work, with good signal we get 7-8mb/sec.
 
Is your computer Windows? And is it configured to be in "Homegroup" workgroup? For some reason, that causes slow network transfer speeds (pretty well documented if you look it up, sometimes leaving homegroup--or whatever workgroup--fixes the problem--didn't for me).
 
My 2.4 is on auto width and my 5 ghz is on 80 mhz width. Turned off homegroups but no changes speed wise.
 
just for reference, what speeds do you get writing to the drive on wired?
 
the speed jumps around a lot with no consistency. 300k- 1 meg when transfering to the drive.
 
The speed jumping around is an indicator of interference, assuming you have avg or better signal strength.


You'll need to use to a tool such as the old 3.x version of inSSIDer to see what interference issues you could possibly have. Wider channels only work properly when you do not have interference issues..

Best Practice is starting with a 20Mhz channel wide, typically 2.4Ghz with a excellent signal on a clear channel and going forward from there.

If you post a couple of screen shots of inSSIDer output we can guide you forward from there.
 
I will try and gather that info for you later this afternoon. thank you all for the assistance
 
What wireless NIC does your laptop have? What is the RSSI on your laptop from the SSID? Inssider should show you this.
 
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Old version of InSIDDer doesn't support 802.11AC, so the information their doesn't really help us. Give us a print screen of your "Wireless Network Connection Status."
 
Even in that screenshot, with a -73 your throughput is going to suffer tremendously. It even shows a max data rate of 54mbps, meaning in the best case scenario you'll see ~27Mbps which roughly equates to 3MBps. And that's assuming theres no interference or other wireless clients gobbling up airtime.

Step 1: move closer to the WAP.
 
Have you tried transferring from a non-windows machine to your drive plugged into your router? I still think this is a windows-side issue, it's exactly what I experienced when doing the same thing. Regardless of whether I left Homegroup or not. Then I came across this, and it's improved things (I still get far slower than expected speeds, but went from 300k-1MB/s to about 3.5-4.5MB/s on wireless): http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...indows-7/25166fe1-6d40-48f8-8ade-860e242f261f

There are lots of other things that you can try which are closely related to this problem if you google it.
 
Also go to your adapter settings in windows to see if it might be placed in the wrong mode
 
My first guess is that the signal strength is too low for a 80Mhz channel bond to work properly.

Before continuing make sure you are using WPA2-AES encryption

But you need to debug first and try every iteration from the slowest incrementing until you find the problem.

Drop down to 20Mhz mode wireless N 5Ghz.... then test it. 144Mbps connection pulling 10MBps is what you should see when downloading from your local network.

If you can not get that to work try channel 1 on 2.4Ghz with a 20Mhz channel width and see what they gets you on throughput.

One of these two above choices should work at the correct rated speed. If they do not you either have a signal strength issue, driver issue, or defective hardware.

You can test the theory on signal strength by moving closer to the AP. But you must do that while performing the test above...and starting making certain that your equipment is operating properly.


Then retest wireless N 5Ghz at 40Mhz channel width. 300Mbps connection pulling atleast 16MBps

THEN retest using wireless AC at 5Ghz with 40Mhz channel width. See if you get faster than 16MBps.

The last test should be moving everything back to wireless AC 80Mhz channel width 5Ghz.
 
I will give those ideas a try tonight. I set up the router right beside my laptop and that did improve speeds and perhaps I have to high of hopes for a router in a condo. I see no reason why i should need an range extender or anything. Thank you again for the tips.
 
Yes... I have used multiple range extenders and have YET to find one that worked well. I would suggest against using one.
 
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