Help! WRT150N registers as 802.11g

Hello,
I recently received a new Dell Inspiron 1420 from the company. I upgraded the wireless connection to their "N" receiver (Dell 1505 draft N to be specific).
To use this feature to the maximum benefit I decided to purchase a Linksys WRT150N wireless router.

Now here's the problem: My connection is pretty stable while I am within a close range of the router, but it does fluctuate wildly from four bars to one or two. This seems odd enough to me since my old wireless G system would be pretty consistent.
If I go beyond the standard wireless G range I lose connection completely, and my understanding is that two wireless N devices working together should increase this significantly.
I'm going to bold the next section because it is maybe the best indicator that something is up:
For some reason my wireless N router appears as a 802.11g protocol.

If anyone could help me figure out what is going on, and hopefully help me fix it I would really appreciate it. Could this just be because of the fact that my receiver is a draft N device?

Thanks again for any help

 

Can you check to make sure that the card is a draft N card? If you have administration access to the router, make sure that it isn't locked into G mode.

 

Thanks for the reply.
Yes, I can confirm that the card is draft N. I double checked in the device manager and the status window of my wireless connection.
As far as the router goes, it was originally in "Mixed" mode for wireless, and after I changed that to "N" I still had the same problems. Interestingly I still have about 130mb a second when the connection is "very good", which is well above the 54mb a second "G" should support. I'm still concerned about range though because that is the main reason I invested in the technology.

 

Range is a myth between 11g and 11n. Some of the later 11g products use the same mimo technology as 11n is using. The 5ghz penetrates less, shorter distance than the 2.4 ghz. 11n is more sensitive to snr, the further you get the faster it drops off. 11n is also sensitive to the type of security you use, prefers WPA2 AES, and there has been some reports it works better with the SSID NOT Hidden. Most of these problems will clear up after the spec is finalized. But like 11g don't hold your breath. The only sure way is by using the client card from the mfg. MFG want you to by hardware, so they have no insentive to make it work with what come pre-installed.

Another thing that might be holding things up is the Law Suite against Buffalo. All mfg who write firmware are subject to this law suite. HW mfg are not. Buffalo was just the first to drop of many to come if they do not reach an agreement out of court.

I'm sure glad someone else is doing the beta testing for me this time......

 

don't worry about it saying G

if your're showing 130mbps, it's def N

as blue said, to hit 270 or 300mbps you have to use an adapter from the same manufacturer of the router until N is finalized....