Wireless Slower than 3G?

[jbernard703]

Well, I guess I don't really understand what wifi analyzer is telling me. It gives the same amount of stars for all 14 channels and says I'm on channel 6. I have no idea how to change it to a different channel. Can someone explain?

You need to access your router by typing its address into you browser. It is probably 192.168.1.1 then look through the settings to change the channel. You can look online to find your routers default IP address or use IP config to find out what it is, it will be called default gateway. Unless your have lots of other wireless things in your house or close neighbors you should be fine with whatever channel your on

 

[therock]

I have used "wirelessmon" by Passmark for years from my laptop and its great. You can use it for a 30 day trial. It tells me of all the networks broadcasting that my lapper adapter can see.

Everyone it seems is on channel 6 by factory default. You can see this and make changes to get off the busy channel for a cleaner signal. I had one neighbors router that would follow mine. I go to 4, he goes to 4. Weird because I am secured and he is not and it made me wonder if he was somehow feeding off me. I fixed that.

 

[huskur]

Well, I guess I don't really understand what wifi analyzer is telling me. It gives the same amount of stars for all 14 channels and says I'm on channel 6. I have no idea how to change it to a different channel. Can someone explain?

In your routers webpage is a utility to change frequency and channel. It's under "wireless settings" in most routers. To access your router webpage --- is a number entered into your webrowser like 192.168.2.1 or 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1

those are the 3 most common

 

[gwlaw99]

How are people getting 1.5MB+ downloads over 3g?

 

[hookbill]

Well, I guess I don't really understand what wifi analyzer is telling me. It gives the same amount of stars for all 14 channels and says I'm on channel 6. I have no idea how to change it to a different channel. Can someone explain?

You need to access your router by typing its address into you browser. It is probably 192.168.1.1 then look through the settings to change the channel. You can look online to find your routers default IP address or use IP config to find out what it is, it will be called default gateway. Unless your have lots of other wireless things in your house or close neighbors you should be fine with whatever channel your on

Well, I guess I don't really understand what wifi analyzer is telling me. It gives the same amount of stars for all 14 channels and says I'm on channel 6. I have no idea how to change it to a different channel. Can someone explain?

In your routers webpage is a utility to change frequency and channel. It's under "wireless settings" in most routers. To access your router webpage --- is a number entered into your webrowser like 192.168.2.1 or 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1

those are the 3 most common

My wife insists that the router is set on automatic and the channel selection is greyed out. I'll double check though tomorrow. Thanks guys.

 

[therock]

My wife insists that the router is set on automatic and the channel selection is greyed out. I'll double check though tomorrow. Thanks guys.

What router do you have?

 

[hookbill]

My wife insists that the router is set on automatic and the channel selection is greyed out. I'll double check though tomorrow. Thanks guys.

What router do you have?

Linksys Wireless N.

 

[therock]

My wife insists that the router is set on automatic and the channel selection is greyed out. I'll double check though tomorrow. Thanks guys.

What router do you have?

Linksys Wireless N.

WRT150N?

Anyway, in basic wireless settings, if radio band is in auto, the rest are in auto. Change it to standard 20MHz or wide 40MHz and pick a known less traveled clean channel in your neighborhood.

 

[hookbill]

Well, did as instructed. Didn't do a darn thing for the speed on my WiFi. It did however manage to disconnect my two TiVo's. They can't see each other.

I'll fix that problem. Thanks for trying to help guys.

 

[MuzzleBuster]

I use Speedtest and I get 1.7 - 2.0 Mbps on 3G when I am close to "full bars", and standing next to my 802.11 BG router connected to RoadRunner, I get 1.9 - 2.1 Mbps on wi-fi...

Really? This doesn't seem right.

Same conditions as you using Road Runner High Speed Turbo:

3G Download 452 kbps, upload 476 kbps

wifi Download 2015 kbps upload 780 kbps

Big difference.

(4 bars) 3G Download 1532kbps, upload 627
(2-3 bars) 3G Dnload 1013kbps, upload 609


I have Road Runner (no turbo):
Wifi on Moto Droid
Channel 6 - Average of 3 tests was DL 3800, UL 559
Channel 11 - Average of 3 tests was DL 3500, UL 559
Channel 1 - Average of 3 tests was DL 4700, UL 559 (most consistent)

Computer is wired and averages download of 8000kbps from testmy.net

I live "out in the country" and it's not bad for speed on Verizon, much more stable. Little better speed in the city.
Can't imagine what my Blackberry data speeds would have been on AT&T. Probably 80kbps on EDGE (seriously :icon_eek.... and that's when it did work.
Got real tired of seeing "sos" for service.

 

[MuzzleBuster]

Well, did as instructed. Didn't do a darn thing for the speed on my WiFi. It did however manage to disconnect my two TiVo's. They can't see each other.

I'll fix that problem. Thanks for trying to help guys.

This might be a dumb question but have you updated the router's firmware recently?

I hadn't checked for quite a while and just found an update from last year.
There must have been a bug, wireless network hasn't hiccuped since.

 

[therock]

Channel 1 at my house is the best.
Also the type of security encryption can effect speed in some systems.
I run WPA2 PSK. I was running PSK & AES and dropped the AES and it cleaned up.
PSK is the same shared key (pass phrase) per configured machines using the same access point. AES uses different pass phrases per machine. I only have my Droid and a laptop pulling from my router so I didn't need AES. Not sure how it cleaned it up if at all but it seems better.

The below being said it depends on your phone's and Router's hardware. And may be as simple as your antenna positioning or router placement. Keep in mind the signal radiates like plate spinning on a stick. This is why 3 antennas work so well. Angle two of them to spin downward @ say a 45* angle and one straight up to spin flat. It's really important if you have your router placed up high.

I use Wirelessmon from the laptop and the free app "Wifi Analyzer" (WFA) from the droid. When I'm out and about WFA indicates my Droid is fine.
At home with the laptop and Wirelessmon I experimented with channels, router placement, and antenna positioning, and found the physical hardware positioning to gain or suffer most from experimentation.

There are a total of 14 available channels to 802.11b/g/n networks, some of which may be restricted depending on the regulatory body for each country.
The channels are on the 2.4 GHz band, starting with channel 1 at 2.412 GHz and finishing with channel 14 at 2.484 GHz.
Due to the nature of wireless signals this leads to some overlap between each channel but there are 3 "non overlapping" channels, 1, 6 and 11. While this doesn't mean there is zero interference between these two channels it does make them the best choices and this is the reason most wireless access points will default to one of these channels.
Country Available channels Europe 1-13 Spain 10-11 France 10-13 Australia 1-11 United States 1-11 Canada 1-11 Japan 14

GooD Hunting

 

[therock]

I guess I posted the original message too soon. Now my wireless smokes my 3G by a bunch. I must have had a bad day or something.
I did check my router settings and perhaps it's reboot cured my woes.

 

[therock]

My Droid numbers,