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70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

hazzardboy7
Grafter
Posts: 64
Registered: ‎26-09-2012

70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

I just had fiber 80/20 installed and I am using a Technicolour TG582N router. On wired (via ethernet cable) I get about 70 mbps when I run a speedtest. When I connect via wireless with my PC (which is 2 rooms away from the router), I get a poor 20-25 mbps. In the same room on my Samsung Galaxy S3 smartphone, I also get about 20-25mbps. When I test my phone above the router, I get no faster than 40 mbps. Going into the router settings (192.168.1.254) on my phone above the router, under "actual speed" it shows 65 mbps. On my PC via wireless, it shows 39 mbps. As I said, doing speed tests via wireless, and I can get no faster than 40 mbps. Why is this? Any ideas?
25 REPLIES 25
jelv
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Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

Does the PC's wireless card support N?
jelv (a.k.a Spoon Whittler)
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hazzardboy7
Grafter
Posts: 64
Registered: ‎26-09-2012

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

Quote from: jelv
Does the PC's wireless card support N?

Yes, it's a  TP-Link TL-WN821N Wireless N USB Adapter. My smartphone also supports wireless N. I can confirm that I have tried different channels and looked for conflicts with inSSIDer. Plusnet phoned me and are sending me a different dongle free of charge but to be honest, I don't see how that will help.
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
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Registered: ‎27-04-2007

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

Cheer for your time on the phone just now, as mentioned those kind of speeds can be typical of a fairly busy wifi environment but I'm glad to see that you've tried inSSIDer and have manually tried some different wireless channels. Have you tried connecting one device at a time wirelessly to see if that changes anything?

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 Plusnet Help Team
hazzardboy7
Grafter
Posts: 64
Registered: ‎26-09-2012

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

Quote from: _Adam_Walker_
Cheer for your time on the phone just now, as mentioned those kind of speeds can be typical of a fairly busy wifi environment but I'm glad to see that you've tried inSSIDer and have manually tried some different wireless channels. Have you tried connecting one device at a time wirelessly to see if that changes anything?

There is only one device trying to connect via wireless which is my PC (2 if you include my phone, but that's only connecting manually, not automatically). If I am performing a speedtest right next to the router with my phone and only getting half speed, I don't think it's the wireless signal strength. I decided to bring the modem and router to my PC and have included a photo below:

Getting no faster than 40mb even at this distance.
jelv
Seasoned Hero
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Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

Have you tried altering the orientation of the USB adapter.
(Incidently, when making a post if you open up the Additional Options and Attachments you can directly attach images without having to upload anywhere first)
jelv (a.k.a Spoon Whittler)
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hazzardboy7
Grafter
Posts: 64
Registered: ‎26-09-2012

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

The USB adapter was plugged into my PC so it's orientation was portrait. In the photo, it's different so that's covered lol. No antenna's on this device so can't move them about. Thanks for the tip about images!
jim:quote
lexusuk
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Posts: 567
Registered: ‎20-10-2009

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

Hi hazzardboy7,
In my experience 40Mbps over wireless is fairly typical.  Most customers will only see a consistent maximum speed over an ethernet connection.  That being said, have you checked that the wireless router is running in N mode?  Also, are there any new drivers available for your adapter?  You may be able to optimise the speed of your wireless link.
hazzardboy7
Grafter
Posts: 64
Registered: ‎26-09-2012

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

I am running the latest drivers for my USB adapter. Where does it show if the router is running in N mode? In the router settings, I do see: Interface Type: 802.11b/g/n I see no option to change this.
Is there new firmware available for my router? According to the router settings, it's on version 8.C.M.0.
adie:quote
dvorak
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Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

I get the same performance (though on the netgear router), does the router have a setting so that you can switch it to N only?
Having mixed modes of b/g/n will curtail the performance of n
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kmilburn
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Registered: ‎30-07-2007

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

From my own experience,  device compatibility plays an issue with things like this. 
For example,  speed tests on my Galaxy S II get around 40mbps on my Netgear N150,  but only 26mbps on the Zyxel  (which is N300) that Plusnet were trialing.
However,  my mums laptop was capable of matching my wired desktop at 75mbps on the Zyxel.
One key issue is the number of antennas in the device,  as to get more than the 65mbps requires multiple antennas (MIMO),  and most (if not all) smartphones only have one.
It might be a bit late to mention this,  but while your wireless adapter appears to support MIMO, it doesn't look the the router does (from a cursory check on the technicolor website),  so you'll not be able to get more than the 65mbps.  And IIRC that's total bandwidth,  so getting 40mbps down is a about the most you can expect.
hazzardboy7
Grafter
Posts: 64
Registered: ‎26-09-2012

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

The options in the router interface are very poor, it certainly isn't rich of settings. I can see no way of changing it to N only mode (of any other mode!). I can also see no QoS and WMM settings. I heard that wireless is half duplex and wired is full duplex, could this explain why my wireless speed is halved compared to wired?
@kmilburn, So trying a new router would be worth a try then? I am going to test a D-Link DIR-615 tomorrow. You say I may not be able to get more than 65 mbps on a router but when I use it wired via the router, I get 74 mbps.
kmilburn
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Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

The DIR-615 is an N300 device, so does support MIMO,  and hopefully will be a good match for your adapter,  but won't make any difference to the phone.
If it connects at its full potential this should allow you to get the same speed as the wired connection,  which is limited to 100mbps.
One thing to watch out for with speed ratings,  wireless is the total shared between all devices where wired is per device, subject to the router being  a bottleneck!
ejs
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Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

The TG582n is supposed to be "2x2" 11n according to the pdf datasheet, Technicolor don't seem to use the term "MIMO" nor any "N300" style numbers.
kmilburn
Grafter
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Registered: ‎30-07-2007

Re: 70 mbps Wired, 30-40 mbps (Beside Router) Wireless

It looks like the 2x2 is one of those pieces of information which is either informative or useless, with no way of determining which it is.
In theory, it means that the router has two transmit and two receive antennas, if they've followed the specs properly they allow for two 'spatial streams' which should double the bandwidth  .
To me, its telling that Technicolor don't mention what speed the device is capable of given that 802.11n operates at a maximum net data rate from 54 Mbit/s to 600 Mbit/s.