802.11ac wireless adapter number 3

[JimmiG]

So I'm now on my third Wi-Fi NIC/adapter since I got my 802.11ac AP/router last October.

Asus PCE-AC68: Computer would BSOD, pointing to the NIC driver .dll during heavy traffic such as torrents or using multiple download streams (download accelerators etc.)

D-Link DWA-192: This worked fine for 4 months - Good download speeds, reliable connection, no BSODs. However since a few weeks ago, if I try to upload data, it overheats (probably - it gets very hot) and drops the connection. When this happens, I have to unplug and reconnect the adapter before the computer will see it again.
Recently, it has gotten so bad that just running the upload test on speedtest.net causes the upload speed to instantly drop to <1Mbps for a few seconds, before the entire device is dropped.

So today I installed my third Wi-Fi adapter, the Netgear A6210. Hopefully this one will last longer than 3-4 months. It's only AC1200, but honestly, as long as it's reliable, I don't care any more. The "AC1900" DWA-192 can now only sustain about 1 Mbps uploads for about 5 seconds before it bombs out, so specs mean nothing.

If the A6210 craps out, I'll probably just buy a second wireless access point, and run it in bridge mode via the Ethernet port of my PC. It seems 802.11ac adapters have terrible quality.

 

[VirtualLarry]

It seems 802.11ac adapters have terrible quality.

Not all of them. I've been quite happy with my PremierTek PT-8812 (Realtek 8812AU USB3.0 chipset) adapters, using Edimax Realtek drivers.

I chose to run wired gigabit though, but when I have to use the wireless in a pinch, the AC1200 USB3.0 adapters work fairly well.

Edit: Get them from ebay from PremierTek's online store for around $20 or less.

 

[Yakk]

I'll just chime in my AC experience.

I've used a TP-Link setup consisting of a C7 AC1750 for the last couple years and a pcie T8E for the last year or so and it's been extremely smooth. The router rarely has less than 10 connections 24/7 running 2 networks (primary and guest, mix of wired and lots of wireless including AC speeds) and doesn't miss a beat, been rock solid.

I never thought it would worth this well TBH.

 

[sdifox]

Why would you torrent over wifi?

 

[XavierMace]

I'll second the TP-Link suggestion. I've got a T9E AC1900, works great.

 

[repoman0]

Asus PCE-AC68: Computer would BSOD, pointing to the NIC driver .dll during heavy traffic such as torrents or using multiple download streams (download accelerators etc.

FYI this is a driver problem. I had the same issue under Windows 10 and fixed it by installing an earlier version. A reddit thread about this issue pointed me to the solution ... huge pain in the ass while it was happening because everything worked fine under Windows 7 and under 10 for a while before they pushed out the new driver, so I went through a lot of hardware changes to figure it out.

It's been great since though (four months?) and it was fine for a year and a half before the driver push.

 

[repoman0]

Why would you torrent over wifi?

Why not? I max out my 100 mbit internet connection easily over 802.11ac

 

[sdifox]

Why not? I max out my 100 mbit internet connection easily over 802.11ac

Torrent is a high strain protocol, couple that to high drain wifi chip and you will get earlier hardware failure. Extra cooling will help somewhat but bottom line you are pushing the thermal envelope.

 

[XavierMace]

Do you have any sort of documentation showing thermal issues on these WiFi cards he's using?

 

[JimmiG]

FYI this is a driver problem. I had the same issue under Windows 10 and fixed it by installing an earlier version. A reddit thread about this issue pointed me to the solution ... huge pain in the ass while it was happening because everything worked fine under Windows 7 and under 10 for a while before they pushed out the new driver, so I went through a lot of hardware changes to figure it out.

It's been great since though (four months?) and it was fine for a year and a half before the driver push.

I tried a bunch of drivers, both old and new. It's possible I would eventually have found the "magic" driver that would have worked on my system, but as you said, it was a huge PITA. So in the end I bought the DWA-192 because I was sick of dealing with BSODs.

Torrent is a high strain protocol, couple that to high drain wifi chip and you will get earlier hardware failure. Extra cooling will help somewhat but bottom line you are pushing the thermal envelope.

It's an application level protocol, though. The Wi-Fi protocol itself is the same whether you're running FTP, HTTP or Bittorrent on top. Copying files over the local network would strain the chip more anyway. I get about 50 - 60 MB/s copying files locally, torrents rarely download at more than 10 MB/s, with upload speeds being even slower. It's not like I download them 24/7, either. Just the occassional..err, Linux ISO. If that's enough to kill a Wi-Fi chip in 3 -4 months they're faulty and should be recalled...

As for why? Rented apartment, with a couple of thin walls between the internet jack in the living room and the bedroom where I have my desktop computer. Don't want to drill for ethernet cables and pay for the damage later. 802.11n Wi-Fi has worked great for years, including torrents. But when I upgraded my Internet connection, it saturated the Wi-Fi. So I "upgraded" to 802.11ac, and that's when the problems started. The 802.11ac AP has been very reliable, but the client devices, both internal PCI-E and USB 3.0 have been rubbish, as you can see.

 

[sdifox]

Do you have any sort of documentation showing thermal issues on these WiFi cards he's using?

No actual paper no and not on the particular cards, just general observation. But I went through a few wifi NICs downloading err Linux distros. Gave up switched to wired and zero problem. I am guessing dendrites created by heat stress are killing the them. Notice how electronics fail faster since ROHS removal of lead from solder? Lead was in the solder to slow down whisker growth in the first place.

 

[sdifox]

I tried a bunch of drivers, both old and new. It's possible I would eventually have found the "magic" driver that would have worked on my system, but as you said, it was a huge PITA. So in the end I bought the DWA-192 because I was sick of dealing with BSODs.



It's an application level protocol, though. The Wi-Fi protocol itself is the same whether you're running FTP, HTTP or Bittorrent on top. Copying files over the local network would strain the chip more anyway. I get about 50 - 60 MB/s copying files locally, torrents rarely download at more than 10 MB/s, with upload speeds being even slower. It's not like I download them 24/7, either. Just the occassional..err, Linux ISO. If that's enough to kill a Wi-Fi chip in 3 -4 months they're faulty and should be recalled...

As for why? Rented apartment, with a couple of thin walls between the internet jack in the living room and the bedroom where I have my desktop computer. Don't want to drill for ethernet cables and pay for the damage later. 802.11n Wi-Fi has worked great for years, including torrents. But when I upgraded my Internet connection, it saturated the Wi-Fi. So I "upgraded" to 802.11ac, and that's when the problems started. The 802.11ac AP has been very reliable, but the client devices, both internal PCI-E and USB 3.0 have been rubbish, as you can see.

Not a network guy but I have been torrenting a long time :whiste:

I think it is the BT protocol itself. You are opening hundreds of connections and closing them continuously, stressing the TCB Hash table. I dont thin BT checks the state of the connection, rather depends on the wait time to reuse the connection again, which makes the problem worse. I have killed a few router that way as well. One of the main reasons for me to move to pfSense was the ability to handle a huge state table.


still, lifespan of a few months per nic is ridiculous.

 

[mxnerd]

Heavy BT kills many things - Wi-Fi adapters, Wi-Fi routers & disks.

 

[killster1]

seriously one person mentions PremierTek PT-8812 everyone else says they kill wifi adapters!.. well yes any usb wifi device is going to be to hot no matter what you do with it. I didnt get the memo that torrents kill wifi devices. i guess i dont download enough torrents. prob should get you a pcie / usenet account. been searching for pcie half height or usb3 wifi 1200 adapters.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Though I haven't done BT on my PremierTek USB3.0 wifi, I've streamed internet radio for hours, as well as done multi-hour transfers to and from my NAS.

Still works fine.

 

[sdifox]

seriously one person mentions PremierTek PT-8812 everyone else says they kill wifi adapters!.. well yes any usb wifi device is going to be to hot no matter what you do with it. I didnt get the memo that torrents kill wifi devices. i guess i dont download enough torrents. prob should get you a pcie / usenet account. been searching for pcie half height or usb3 wifi 1200 adapters.

Huh? Who said premier tech kill wifi adapters?

 

[sdifox]

Though I haven't done BT on my PremierTek USB3.0 wifi, I've streamed internet radio for hours, as well as done multi-hour transfers to and from my NAS.

Still works fine.

You are not hammering the nic through hundreds of connection opening and closing when you stream or file transfer though.

 

[VirtualLarry]

You are not hammering the nic through hundreds of connection opening and closing when you stream or file transfer though.

Opening and closing TCP connections has nothing to do with the L1/L2 wireless ethernet frames though. A constant stream of wireless ethernet frames being received and broadcast, make the adapter heat up pretty much the same way.

 

[sdifox]

Opening and closing TCP connections has nothing to do with the L1/L2 wireless ethernet frames though. A constant stream of wireless ethernet frames being received and broadcast, make the adapter heat up pretty much the same way.

Well, that was my best guess. I have transferred TBs of data over wifi without ill effect. BT however killed a few nics.

 

[bigboxes]

Not trying to threadcrap. I reserve my wireless to tablets, phones and visiting guests on my ac network. If there are issues I just switch them to my 2.4Ghz network. Everything else in my home, main rig, wife's PC, file server, HTPC are all hard wired with CAT6.

Homey don't play that game.

 

[JeffMD]

Torrent is a high strain protocol... earlier hardware failure... pushing the thermal envelope.

LOL. Ive actually never had any of my networking eq fail, let alone fail because of bit torrents.

 

[Makaveli]

LOL. Ive actually never had any of my networking eq fail, let alone fail because of bit torrents.

Try running bit torrent on a router that is 8+ years old then you will see it.

Anything fairly recent won't have an issue.

 

[JeffMD]

Maka, On a couple of cheaper routers many years ago I found that they slapped a daughterboard with the same chip used in laptops and PCI wireless cards, and they were inadequately heatsinked. My first linksys (blue beast, 802.11b) didnt have the issue though. If anything, it was the cable modem I had at the time that would fail in some way. (I beta tested road runners broadband. I found that the first modem would fail spectacularly when hundreds of servers were queried as was the case in most multi player games, as well as the program Qspy. I did also have a cable modem that would reset when torrents got to a certain speed. Both incidents simply required me to call up RR and ask for one of their newest modems.)

Today that stuff is old hat. Although I won't rule out crap wifi chipsets. I had to replace the wireless card (a/c capable) in my mini pc cause its chipset just sucked. went with an intel chip.

 

[Makaveli]

Maka, On a couple of cheaper routers many years ago I found that they slapped a daughterboard with the same chip used in laptops and PCI wireless cards, and they were inadequately heatsinked. My first linksys (blue beast, 802.11b) didnt have the issue though. If anything, it was the cable modem I had at the time that would fail in some way. (I beta tested road runners broadband. I found that the first modem would fail spectacularly when hundreds of servers were queried as was the case in most multi player games, as well as the program Qspy. I did also have a cable modem that would reset when torrents got to a certain speed. Both incidents simply required me to call up RR and ask for one of their newest modems.)

Today that stuff is old hat. Although I won't rule out crap wifi chipsets. I had to replace the wireless card (a/c capable) in my mini pc cause its chipset just sucked. went with an intel chip.

lol I remember that blue beast.

I mostly stuck with dlink gear back in the day and it would choke hard if you didn't cap the amount of connections in the torrent clients.

 

[nerp]

LOL. Ive actually never had any of my networking eq fail, let alone fail because of bit torrents.

Yes, this is odd to me. Suddenly wondering if I should watercool my NIC.