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How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

matt8787
Grafter
Posts: 31
Registered: ‎20-01-2013

How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Would just like to start off by saying that after some initial teething troubles, I'm now very satisfied with the service I'm receiving from Plusnet.  It took a few weeks, but I've now levelled out at a speed of 72mpps - which although not within +/- 1 mbps of the promised 80 mbps, I'm very satisfied with it all the same.
My only issue now is the much slower and inconsistent speed on wireless devices.
Standing right next to the wireless router, the speeds I get on my iphone, galaxy tab, ipad, etc all vary considerably and range between 20-35mbps.  
I've looked into changing channels, but the channel I'm on isn't being used by many others.
Anyone know how to get speeds closer to those of the wired connection?  I don't really want to fork out for a router with a stronger wireless signal
thanks
Plusnet wired connection speed:
8 REPLIES 8
AndyH
Grafter
Posts: 6,824
Thanks: 1
Registered: ‎27-10-2012

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Depends on the devices.
For some reason, Apple devices like the iPhone/iPad fail to get up to the max speed potential of 802.11n. Where as my iMac has no issues at all.
Bright
Grafter
Posts: 363
Registered: ‎02-02-2013

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Quote from: matt8787
I've looked into changing channels, but the channel I'm on isn't being used by many others.

That doesn't mean it doesn't suffer interference from other (non-wifi) sources. So it's worth trying other channels.
Quote from: matt8787
Anyone know how to get speeds closer to those of the wired connection?  I don't really want to fork out for a router with a stronger wireless signal

As AndyH says, the limitation is more likely to be the portable device. My iPhone achieves a throughput of about 17Mbps right next to my expensive, shiny, fast Asus RT-N66U router! Do you need 70Mbps on an iPhone?Huh
TBag
Grafter
Posts: 74
Registered: ‎06-03-2013

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Wouldn't know about iPhone/ipad. The new jellybean upgrade on android devices comes with power save ON as default, and there's no menu selection to turn it off. That inhibits the wifi speed. To turn powersave mode off, on your phone keypad, enter *#0011#, press menu, select wifi. The icon under power save state is lit. Touch the icon to turn powersave mode off. It made my galaxy phone yield the max speed on wifi. HTH
matt8787
Grafter
Posts: 31
Registered: ‎20-01-2013

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Quote from: Bright
Quote from: matt8787
I've looked into changing channels, but the channel I'm on isn't being used by many others.

That doesn't mean it doesn't suffer interference from other (non-wifi) sources. So it's worth trying other channels.
Quote from: matt8787
Anyone know how to get speeds closer to those of the wired connection?  I don't really want to fork out for a router with a stronger wireless signal

As AndyH says, the limitation is more likely to be the portable device. My iPhone achieves a throughput of about 17Mbps right next to my expensive, shiny, fast Asus RT-N66U router! Do you need 70Mbps on an iPhone?Huh

Hmm, thanks - that saves me a fair bit of cash as I was thinking of buying that Asus (with a view to upping my wireless speeds).
Re the speeds needed on the iphone - would be nice if they ran closer to my wired connection speeds,
Bright
Grafter
Posts: 363
Registered: ‎02-02-2013

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Quote from: matt8787
Re the speeds needed on the iphone - would be nice if they ran closer to my wired connection speeds,

Sure, but of course portable devices have to make compromises between performance, power consumption, size, heat dissipation, etc. They're getting faster, though. Put the cash saved on a router towards the next generation handset/tablet Wink
kmilburn
Grafter
Posts: 911
Thanks: 6
Registered: ‎30-07-2007

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Also,  phones and tablets tend to only have a single antenna,  which means they can only work with a single stream.
This will limit the devices to single channel (72.2mbps max), which has  a realistic maximum throughput of about 40mbps.
The only way to get close to the theoretical 300mbps is to have devices which are MIMO capable and do channel bonding,  which effectively means the device uses 4 channels simultaneously.
30FTTC06
Pro
Posts: 2,286
Thanks: 108
Fixes: 4
Registered: ‎18-02-2013

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

Quote from: kmilburn
Also,  phones and tablets tend to only have a single antenna,  which means they can only work with a single stream.
This will limit the devices to single channel (72.2mbps max), which has  a realistic maximum throughput of about 40mbps.
The only way to get close to the theoretical 300mbps is to have devices which are MIMO capable and do channel bonding,  which effectively means the device uses 4 channels simultaneously.

Spot on fella Smiley
iperf is a great network tool for looking at the speeds across your networks as well.
My 72mb AP came back with a result of....
 iperf -s -f M
------------------------------------------------------------
Server listening on TCP port 5001
TCP window size: 0.08 MByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
[  4] local 192.168.0.14 port 5001 connected with 192.168.0.20 port 35501
[ ID] Interval      Transfer    Bandwidth
[  4]  0.0-10.1 sec  42.0 MBytes  4.15 MBytes/sec

Tested with a Galaxy tab 10.1
running across my network to a wired Raspberry pi Smiley
thomasjc1
Grafter
Posts: 211
Thanks: 1
Registered: ‎04-02-2013

Re: How can I achieve more consistent and faster wireless speeds?

On my iphone i get throughput of 42
i also upgraded my laptop with a intel ultimate 6300n wifi card so i can use the 5.0ghz band and i put a extra antenna in it
i also have the asus its a brilliant router