strangley slow wi-fi

Kev M

Kev M

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I have a 10MB connection with Virgin Media and had a new wireless router installed yesterday. Using Wi-Fi on a laptop 8ft from the router I get a download spead of around 1MB. If I plug the laptop into the router using a cable I get just onder 10MB.

So, my line speed is actually fine but something is throttling the Wi-Fi. Any suggestions?
 
Need a bit more than that, router model (is it the virgin one?) and what have you changed in the router settings or have you left the default settings.

Is it the virgin modem hooked up to your router or is it a separate modem/router ?
 
? I don't understand this ^

anyway, my wi-fi has never ever compared favourably to hard wire, I have always got roughly half, currently running 20mb Virgin and getting 9.5mb at my netbook over wi-fi.
I thought that was just the nature of transferring large amounts of data by witchcraft..

:)
 
A lot depends on the adapter in your laptop. Older laptops use 11mbps adapters, that 11 mega bits.

Most probably use 54mbps so will be considerably faster, and some I believe run at 100 mbps

wifi seems for some unknown reason to be measured in mega bits not bytes.

When your hard wired your probably running 100 mbs all the time, and the speed will always be faster.
 
Gazamonk said:
Need a bit more than that, router model (is it the virgin one?) and what have you changed in the router settings or have you left the default settings.

Is it the virgin modem hooked up to your router or is it a separate modem/router ?
Click to expand...

It's the new Virgin Superhub that combines the functions of the old seperate router and modem. Following some advice from an old friend who works for Virgin the only settings I changed were to change from auto to channel 13, knock the speed down from 300mbps to 150mbps and uncheck Ip flood detection under services

That killed the wi-fi connection to upstairs, but gave me 9MB on the netbook in the same room as the router. Some further fiddling and I've discovered that the wireless card in the PC upstairs really doesn't like certain channels even when there is no other traffic on them.

For example it won't detect any channel above 10 or channel 3. Channel 1 seems the best about now and I've given up changing the channels because something is screwy with the software in the router I think because sometimes when I change the channel neither computer will then connect to the network. I have to turn the router off and leave it for half an hour and try again.


marc2004 said:
Change the channel setting on the router :thumbs:
Click to expand...

Sorted (eventually), thanks.

hollis_f said:
There are a couple of iPhone apps that will show you the traffic on all the wi-fi channels, so you can pick the least busy.
Click to expand...

Used an Android app to do the same. Eventually found a channel that was free and both computers could see. The app I've got also shows signal strength over time and it looks like the router drops out quite frequently.

joxby said:
? I don't understand this ^

anyway, my wi-fi has never ever compared favourably to hard wire, I have always got roughly half, currently running 20mb Virgin and getting 9.5mb at my netbook over wi-fi.
I thought that was just the nature of transferring large amounts of data by witchcraft..

:)
Click to expand...

Agreed, like all things digital there's a degree of witchcraft involved.

ChrisH said:
A lot depends on the adapter in your laptop. Older laptops use 11mbps adapters, that 11 mega bits.

Most probably use 54mbps so will be considerably faster, and some I believe run at 100 mbps

wifi seems for some unknown reason to be measured in mega bits not bytes.

When your hard wired your probably running 100 mbs all the time, and the speed will always be faster.
Click to expand...

It's a reasonably new netbook and the PC is using this card here so both should be capable of decent speeds.

Eventually I got both computers, with the PC upstairs getting just under 7MB download which is good enough for now. If I continue to have problems though I'm going to have to look at some of those adaptors that use the plug sockets.
 
When I was on Virgin way back when I had some router issues and they kept dying so brought one of their routers from ebay for less than a tenner delivered and followed a guide like this

http://digiex.net/guides-reviews/gu...reless-n-router-dd-wrt-d-link-dir-615-d4.html

to stick open wrt on it and its been great, now on BT so using the home hub which has been good in its standard form, but have that router now as an wireless bridge so use it as a ethernet to WIFI dongle for a sony tv I refuse to spend £50 or some other daft amount on a usb wifi dongle so the wife can watch iplayer on
 
Thanks for the tips Rich although you started losing me towards the end there!:lol:
 
Make sure the router is nowhere near a cordless phone or large metal suface.
I was getting 0.9mb on my 30MB wifi when I first had the superhub set up. Moved the router away from the phone and PC an it instantly shot up to 31MB using speedtest.
 
Should probably move it away from the home cinema subwoofer then.
 
Cordless phone/PC emit lots of high frequency noise that will make it more difficult for the signal to be seen by a laptop. Unless the wireless is obscured by the magnet in the subwoofer, it won't make a difference being next to anything large like a sub. FWIW, my router is next to a large angle iron stand and 6 heavy aluminium boxes and it works fine :)
 
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