Bandwidth sharing and router throughput

azazel1024

Senior member
Jan 6, 2014
901
2
76
I had a general question on wireless networking. A scenario I have never personally run in to is, what happens when you have multiple clients connecting to an AP at high throughput where the AP has more radios/streams than any individual client has?

For example I connect a 300Mbps 2:2 client and a 150Mbps 1:1 client to a 450Mbps 3:3 AP. Am I likely to see closer to the AP's maximum throughput? Or am I likely to see closer to the 2:2 clients maximum throughput split between the two clients?

I know there will be some amount of interference between the two devices as they are operating in the same channels as each other, but is it possible for the router to use all 3 streams split between the clients resonable well? Or is there still going to be plenty of halt and wait packets going out from the AP to the clients sharing time?

So, to sum it up, with a 3:3 router with 2:2 and 1:1 (or multiple 1:1) clients behave more like a 3:3 router for total bandwidth/throughput, or will it behave more like the fastest client in terms of total throughput?
 

Pandasaurus

Member
Aug 19, 2012
196
2
76
If I am understanding your question correctly and I understand wireless correctly, you will see 150Mbps on both clients. Wireless only goes as fast as the slowest client.