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[chrisgixer]

Virgin isp. Superhub 2, recently replaced as the first one gave inconsistent performance. Sited upstairs in the office.

Specifically, I want to see best performance from the wifi. Etheret cable to lappy always gives faultless performance of 54 meg, above the advertised max of 50 on that particular plan. However the wifi would give anything from 1.2meg to 54. Depending on mood, NOT the time of day. In fact, if anything the performance was better in busy times of day. Above 40 meg in the evening, then 1.2 at 7.30am was not unusual.

New replacement router us much better and a lot more consistent, but not always what I would call max performance at 54meg, which is often seen on speed test at the opposite end of the house. But not always, 38meg depending on signal strength and other devices connected implies an improvement could be had. I suspect wifi signal could be better.

What is reasonable to expect from it? ...and is it worth getting a decent aftermarket router if there's a performance gain to be had? On the one hand most of our use is just web pages, athough it's slow page loading the irritates most. Its also surprising how much slow service affects ipad performance, even in basic opperation it seems.

We have, on last count, 9 wifi devices in the house.
Sky box. Prety heavy use with on demand, iplayer etc
Amp. Minimal use just for remote control.
2 iPhones. Medium use in hers. Minimal on mine
2 iPads. One old one rarely used. New one, always on it.
2 laptops. Her own, light to medium use, and a work one used all day in office hours.
My netbook. Much as I like it, it's rarely used.

But there's only two of us in the house so what ever personal device we're using will be competing with the sky box for the router bandwidth I guess.
 
Rightly or wrongly I don't expect to get 54meg on speed test.net on the iPad, if the sky box is downloading a movie at the same time. So only likely to be 4 devices actually in use at once , although 6 might actually be connected.

Worth getting a decent router? Either a cable router to replace the s2 completely, or turn the wifi off and plug in a wifi router into the s2? We had an n900 wifi router briefly a while back that worked well, with greater range than the superhub 1. But we got a superhub 2 upgrade and sent the n900 back. I wish I'd kept in now. But could buy another one...?

Reliability is important as setting eveything up to a new router is a pita! I don't really trust the superhub2 not to fail again anyway.

[chrisgixer]

Ah. That was a much longer post than I intended.

[TheBoy]

In ideal conditions, you should be expecting approx. 20Mb from 54g wifi, and around 35Mb from the 150/300/450Mbps wifi technologies.

This is half duplex, and shared amongst all devices. In addition, its shared by all devices in local neighbourhood that are using same or adjacent frequencies.

1Mbps, if consistent, is absolutely more than adequate for web surfing, and gaytube style video streaming. For broadcast quality HD streaming, I'd revert to running a cable - wifi can do it, but you're always at the mercy of external influences.


ISP routers are all universally shite for Wifi (although 5GHz has helped, but even they are rubbish), getting a decent Wifi access point (or 2 if you use dual band), and optimising the location better than the router (which has to go where the line terminates) will yield better results.

As a short term measure, check what other wifis you can see and what frequency they are on, and see if there is somewhere free to put yours (or put it on top of the weakest signal you can see).

[chrisgixer]

In ideal conditions, you should be expecting approx. 20Mb from 54g wifi, and around 35Mb from the 150/300/450Mbps wifi technologies.

This is half duplex, and shared amongst all devices. In addition, its shared by all devices in local neighbourhood that are using same or adjacent frequencies.

1Mbps, if consistent, is absolutely more than adequate for web surfing, and gaytube style video streaming. For broadcast quality HD streaming, I'd revert to running a cable - wifi can do it, but you're always at the mercy of external influences.


ISP routers are all universally shite for Wifi (although 5GHz has helped, but even they are rubbish), getting a decent Wifi access point (or 2 if you use dual band), and optimising the location better than the router (which has to go where the line terminates) will yield better results.

As a short term measure, check what other wifis you can see and what frequency they are on, and see if there is somewhere free to put yours (or put it on top of the weakest signal you can see).

Ah didn't know that. so one Meg on a cable would be fine. One Meg on a wifi maaaybe not so good....? ESP if a week signal. Certainly no good on our old superhub 2 with wifi all over the place/dropping connection/dropping to zero in tests but an average result giving 1.2mbps. Then Virgin tell us it's fine.

Aaaanyway, our complication is the line enters the building in the upstairs office. There no easy, or even mildly simple way of running a cable downstirs, to the sky box and amp/PS3 and Xbox (*). So leaves a wall socket plug in, or, wifi. (Or literally removing plaster board and floor boards to run a cable almost 50ft up walls down walls along landing, down lounge wall to boxs)

* add xbox and PS3 to the list of wifi devices, I forgot those although the wifi is busted on the PS3

[chrisgixer]

And I will  google the the stuff on router frequencies etc.

[TheBoy]

For Windows machines, try inSSIDer. Not sure about gayDevices.

Any such tool will only pick up frequencies that it has the capability to, so a 2.4Ghz only laptop cannot display 5Ghz details.

[TheBoy]

Mains based devices can be hit or miss. *Should* be OK for streaming, suffer many of the issues that wifi does, although to a lesser extent. The cheaper ones tend to be particularly naff.  Online gaming and any other latency sensitive use isn't going to be ideal.

I have a BT one here, basically it has 2 ethernets and a Wifi access point. Its intention is to end up in the garage, but currently in my dining room as Mrs TB's laptop was struggling with wifi (my older laptop, with less capable Wifi has no such issues).  I could plug an Ethernet cable in and run some tests later.  Wifi, she gets about 38Mb.  The broadband line she is connected to is currently giving around 49Mb on the PC upstairs (hardwired to router) when I last checked.

[chrisgixer]

Does make sense to hard wire the stationary devices, like the sky box/amp/ps3/Xbox that reside under the tv. Might give the mobile devices more of a chance. Pita as it might be.
 Presume run a single cable from a single Ethernet port on the superhub, then have a four gang splitter to home cinema devices? Or would it help to run two cables on two router ports and devide those those at tother end....?


Thanks for wifi figures. They seem comparable. Also presumably shows what a waste of bandwidth wifi is. I was unaware of the basic loss levels. 

[TheBoy]

If you're running one cable, I'd always run 2 if possible.

For "splitter" you are actually after a network switch. These are usually 5, 8 or 16 port - so for 4 devices, you need a 5 port ("incoming" wire from router uses one), more than 4, you probably need a life, geek boy . These come as 100Mb and gigabit (at prices you're looking at). Personally I'd go gigabit, so at least the link between SH2 and switch is gigabit, and gigabit is almost as cheap at these small scale implementations.

If you want to test/play first, lets arrange a curry, and we'll pop over early, throw a cable down the stairs, bung on a gigabit switch, and run some tests . I can bring the Mains Adapters over as well for testing. At least you will know if/what works for you before spending.

Obviously, the virgin line is the limit, and due to shared nature of Virgin lines, I'd expect slowdown at peak times (as opposed to ADSL/FTTC type products that only slow down due to ISP capacity (except in now rare cases of exchange congestion)). Other circumstance dictate your need to use virgin, so that's out of our hands.

[Taxi_Driver]

Chris, Do you have a room thermostat/timer that is wifi?

I had a room stat (wifi) that the plumber changed last week for a new timer/room stat (wifi)

This morning I've been trying to send video over the wifi and its been struggling (kept freezing as the data played catchup).

I wondered if the new timer was causing a problem....so I changed the jumpers on the back of the timer (also at the base unit end) to the same settings of the old room stat and hey presto.....my wifi is back to normal 

[chrisgixer]

If you're running one cable, I'd always run 2 if possible.

For "splitter" you are actually after a network switch. These are usually 5, 8 or 16 port - so for 4 devices, you need a 5 port ("incoming" wire from router uses one), more than 4, you probably need a life, geek boy . These come as 100Mb and gigabit (at prices you're looking at). Personally I'd go gigabit, so at least the link between SH2 and switch is gigabit, and gigabit is almost as cheap at these small scale implementations.

If you want to test/play first, lets arrange a curry, and we'll pop over early, throw a cable down the stairs, bung on a gigabit switch, and run some tests . I can bring the Mains Adapters over as well for testing. At least you will know if/what works for you before spending.

Obviously, the virgin line is the limit, and due to shared nature of Virgin lines, I'd expect slowdown at peak times (as opposed to ADSL/FTTC type products that only slow down due to ISP capacity (except in now rare cases of exchange congestion)). Other circumstance dictate your need to use virgin, so that's out of our hands.

H was just saying we have'nt had a furry for a while. There's a new place opened up near the Chinese in the precinct. It's always busy....? But then so is everyone here

Or there's the usual places

[chrisgixer]

Chris, Do you have a room thermostat/timer that is wifi?

I had a room stat (wifi) that the plumber changed last week for a new timer/room stat (wifi)

This morning I've been trying to send video over the wifi and its been struggling (kept freezing as the data played catchup).

I wondered if the new timer was causing a problem....so I changed the jumpers on the back of the timer (also at the base unit end) to the same settings of the old room stat and hey presto.....my wifi is back to normal 

Do you know, we have. I never considered that.   Although it's been in place since before the Virgin box was installed, so presume that didn't effect SH2 when it was performing well. The new one is purring away nicely now too. so not sure that's affecting things or not?

[Kevin Wood]

Chris, Do you have a room thermostat/timer that is wifi?

I had a room stat (wifi) that the plumber changed last week for a new timer/room stat (wifi)

This morning I've been trying to send video over the wifi and its been struggling (kept freezing as the data played catchup).

I wondered if the new timer was causing a problem....so I changed the jumpers on the back of the timer (also at the base unit end) to the same settings of the old room stat and hey presto.....my wifi is back to normal 

Do you know, we have. I never considered that.   Although it's been in place since before the Virgin box was installed, so presume that didn't effect SH2 when it was performing well. The new one is purring away nicely now too. so not sure that's affecting things or not?

A wireless thermostat will presumably be battery operated, so can't transmit very frequently at all if it's going to provide sensible battery life. I'm guessing it will only transmit a burst of data when the heating actually switches on or off. I can't, therefore, see any way in which it'll interfere with WLAN, to be honest.

I'd say most are going to be based on a cheaper standard to implement than WLAN, too. As such I'd bet they are using one of the narrow band license exempt bits of spectrum at 433 / 868 MHz anyway.

I can't see how they are going to interfere with wireless LAN, to be honest... unless you're talking about one of these systems you can control with your gayphone? Even then... unless they are causing it to drop down to 11b or something?

[Taxi_Driver]

Chris, Do you have a room thermostat/timer that is wifi?

I had a room stat (wifi) that the plumber changed last week for a new timer/room stat (wifi)

This morning I've been trying to send video over the wifi and its been struggling (kept freezing as the data played catchup).

I wondered if the new timer was causing a problem....so I changed the jumpers on the back of the timer (also at the base unit end) to the same settings of the old room stat and hey presto.....my wifi is back to normal 

Do you know, we have. I never considered that.   Although it's been in place since before the Virgin box was installed, so presume that didn't effect SH2 when it was performing well. The new one is purring away nicely now too. so not sure that's affecting things or not?

A wireless thermostat will presumably be battery operated, so can't transmit very frequently at all if it's going to provide sensible battery life. I'm guessing it will only transmit a burst of data when the heating actually switches on or off. I can't, therefore, see any way in which it'll interfere with WLAN, to be honest.

I'd say most are going to be based on a cheaper standard to implement than WLAN, too. As such I'd bet they are using one of the narrow band license exempt bits of spectrum at 433 / 868 MHz anyway.

I can't see how they are going to interfere with wireless LAN, to be honest... unless you're talking about one of these systems you can control with your gayphone? Even then... unless they are causing it to drop down to 11b or something?

It chats to controller a bit more often than you think....about every 30secs or so...iirc .... for old the wifi stat i had ... two aa batteries lasted about 1 year   

Changing the frequency of it...certainly sorted my prob out  and its not one you can chat to it with my mobile ....

[TheBoy]

unless they are causing it to drop down to 11b or something?

A valid point, if the SH2 sees a 11b device, does it drop to 11b speeds only?

However, in a large estate, I suspect a neighbour has a new router on the same frequency set...