Is Wireless N working for you?

What are you using and what is your experience with wireless n?
Is it working for you?

I have three Dell notebooks:

• Inspiron 1520
• Inspiron 1525
• XPS M1530

All three have the Dell Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card.

I have tried two different routers:

• Netgear Dual Band WNDR3300
• LinkSys WRT160N

I have spent uncounted hours talking to reps from Dell, Netgear, Linksys, Googleing and just trying anything I could think of.
The problem I have (short version) is:

• When the router is set to wireless G only I can browse at speeds of ~1500 Kbps.
• When the router is set to wireless N only I can browse at speeds of ~350 Kbps.

(Speeds measured using CNET Bandwidth meter and other sites).

My question for you is:
What are you using and what is your experience with wireless n?
Is it working for you?

I'd like to hear from as many people as possible, even if you repeat what someone else said.

The reps make it sound like I'm the only one with problems...

Thanks,
Dave

 

well, the restriction is your internet connection i suppose. Wireless-N (even the Draft- version) is ten times faster than the fastest internet connection.

 

I use a D-Link DGL-4500 with an Intel 4965 ABGN network card. I get a connection speed of 130Mb/s with this setup (max speed for the card on this band). It works fine for me.

-J.B.

 

Up until fios came out 802.11b was faster then anything an ISP could provide. Personally I have an abgn card on my HP and I never use N, so I cant comment on its performance. But I do know that A/G work just fine and do not limit my internet speed unless Im far from the AP. The one thing I could say is that the N signal could be more prone to interference and materials it passes through. But then again N runs on 2.4GHz/5GHz radio wave frequencies which are the same as b/g/a. Maybe the signaling aspect is more effected but then again working as a sys admin my signaling knowledge is going down the crapper.

 

Hi, thanks for the replies.

First, I'm no networking expert, but....
I don't see how my ISP could be an issue.

The wireless n is is one fourth of the speed of the wireless g - using the same ISP. If the ISP was the limiting factor, I would expect the wireless n to be approximately the same as the wireless g, not that much slower.

Personally, I am wondering about the Dell 1505 wireless n card.
Is there anyone out there with this card that is getting good results with wireless n?

Dave

 

Yes. Using Linksys WRT600N flashed w/DD-WRT firmware...

WRT600N also uses Broadcom chipset radios for 802.11b/g & 802.11a bands...



http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=14644

Latest Broadcom driver for Dell Wireless 1500,1505,1510, ect...

 

I have the Intel 4965 ABGN card and a D-Link 655 router. It's 2.4GHz, but I usually get the full 130Mbps speed available. Sometime it drops down to 54 Mbps if I'm far from the router, but as others have mentioned...that's way faster than my 15Mbps cable service.

I haven't heard of much good things about the Dell wireless-N card...seems to be flakey for whatever reason. What is your local network speed being reported as?

 

Thanks somms and snork,

I am using a Linksys WRT160N w/ latest firmware.

When wireless G only:

• Network speed ~36-48 Mbps
• Copying ~84 MB of data from desktop (hardwired) to laptop (wireless) ~40 sec
• CNET Bandwidth meter ~1600 kbps

When wireless N only:

• Network speed ~72-100 Mbps
• Copying ~84 MB of data from desktop (hardwired) to laptop (wireless) ~35 sec
• CNET Bandwidth meter ~350 kbps

It just doesn't seem right....

Thanks, Dave

 

Try using Speakeasy bandwidth tester and see what you get.

One thing there are still a lot of bugs in most of the firmware. Mfg push these out to help pay for there R&D so the end users are BETA tester for them. Since 11g had a problem with some mfg channel bonding and taking down adjacent networks, the 11n spec has a play nice clause. Not all mfg are using it since the spec has not been finalized. But when the mfg goes for 11n certification it must comply with this clause. Meaning if it SEE's another wireless network using a channel/freq (2.4, 11g) that it will use for bonding to increase it's speed IT CAN NOT go into channel bonding. This is why most users are looking for a dual radio and 5ghz (a,n) router. This allow the 11n to move up to a less crowed bandwidth. But MFG have yet to get the bugs worked out so the speed does not drop to 11b range, 3mbps for 11g and n is all over the map.

Another thing that impact downloads is HD speeds. Since a lot use 4200rp HD's this can limits on writes.

The test you ran from desktop to NB does not use the Internet so cnet speeds are not for your transfer. Use a FTP program like FileZilla and do the test again. It reports speed of your actual transfer.

And any services that you have running can suck bandwidth, and there are a lot of services. It seams all programs installed think they need to report to the mother ship. The only way to kill this is to use a personal firewall and restrict it's access. If you by chance have a IP phone they can suck your bandwidth too. Then there is torrents, these can consume most all as well as adware/spyware.

Mixed modes on 11n routers for ALL that I have seen have a huge problem. Since the spec prevents forcing 11n only in the 2.4ghz (11g) freq, some do it any way since this is beta firmware and has not been certified to 11n v2 specs. Chariots runs show a lot of flux during transfers.

If I recall the 160Nonly has 100baseT wired ports which will restrict transfer speeds to ~ 9-10MB/sec.

I did not mean to write a book but I felt you needed to know what is going on to fully understand the process.

 

Just a stab in the dark here, but G runs on 2.4ghz and N runs on 5ghz so maybe there is something in your area that is affecting the 5ghz frequency and causing corrupt/lost data reducing your speeds. Maybe try hooking the router up at a friends house a bit away and see how that works out. Again just a stab in the dark... I hope I killed someone though!

 

N can run on both freq 2.4 and 5 ghz.