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    intel pro or windows? which to believe?

    Discussion in 'Networking and Wireless' started by soccerjoe5, Aug 19, 2004.

  1. soccerjoe5

    soccerjoe5 Notebook Consultant

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    sometimes the intel pro indicates that i have great signal and the wireless network connection icon indicates that i have a low signal.. which one should i really believe? weird..
     
    soccerjoe5, Aug 19, 2004
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  2. CSpwntsYOU

    CSpwntsYOU Notebook Geek

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    my guess would be that windows would be the accurate one, what does Intel have to do with your wireless card??

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    CSpwntsYOU, Aug 19, 2004
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  3. jchastain

    jchastain Notebook Consultant

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    It is an interesting observation and something I have never really considered. My guess would be that both are correct but that they are actually measuring either different things or at least against different scales. When you start to get into the technical details you have raw signal strength, noise-to-signal ratios, sustained throughput, and plenty of other things that might seem to designers like the "right" indicator to display to end users. And even if you choose the same stat, who defined what is a "good" signal or whether you need a 5 or an 8 or a 10 to fill the indicator bar completely? Assuming we agree on even that, is the scale then linear or logarythmic? There are no standards for defining such things. It doesn't surprise me that the hardware driver is more lenient in reporting that it has a good signal. They want you to think their device has better signals than competing products. So my first gut reaction would be to use the windows guage so that at least you are getting apples to apples comparisons between devices. But at the end of the day, all of that is just to help you determine if you are connecting well or if you need to make some sort of adjustments so over time your experiences will tell you which you can and should trust based on what kind of performance you see versus what the indicators are telling you.
     
    jchastain, Aug 19, 2004
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  4. soccerjoe5

    soccerjoe5 Notebook Consultant

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    <blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by CSpwntsYOU
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 8, 2015
    soccerjoe5, Aug 19, 2004
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  5. freeman

    freeman Notebook Deity

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    the one that show lower signal is the one that's more accurate.
    BTW, signal can be fluncuate from second-2-second. and none of the software is update every second, so none is accurate.

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    freeman, Aug 19, 2004
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