Draft N wifi

[Pghpooh]

Dumb question.
If you buy a router that is draft N wifi and the laptop you use is G band,, when using the wifi is the draft N frequency broadcast?
Or to ask it this way,, does the router broadcast both frequencies for both G band and N band at the same time??

 

[JackMDS]

There is No g or N broadcast frequency.

g and draft_n both use 2.4GHz and the same basic radio.

Some draft_N have dual Radio and can do 802.11a too which is 5GHz. In such case the client has to be 5GHZ capable too.

When there is any 802.11g conversation the Draft_N works as 802.11g

No body is willing to admit it but the whole 802.11n idea was a weak upgrade from 802.11g and could be useful it came out as an interim standard few years ago.

Since it never turned into a standard who knows what its fate would be.

 

[masteryoda34]

All routers I have seen have options that allow all of the above. (i.e. G only, N only, or G + N)

 

[JackMDS]

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
All routers I have seen have options that allow all of the above. (i.e. G only, N only, or G + N)

Allow is a nice thing, but that does not mean that it works with all of the above ate the same time.

Your Car can be empty or full of passengers, but it can not be Empty full.

 

[masteryoda34]

Originally posted by: JackMDS

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
All routers I have seen have options that allow all of the above. (i.e. G only, N only, or G + N)

Allow is a nice thing, but that does not mean that it works with all of the above ate the same time.

Your Car can be empty or full of passengers, but it can not be Empty full.

Waht?

 

[Jamsan]

He's saying your car can be empty or it can be full, but not empty and full at the same time...

which translates to...

Your access point can do G and it can do N, but not both at the same time. The AP will only run at the speed of the slowest client connected. So if you have 5 laptops, 4 of them with N capable cards, and 1 is G-only, all 5 laptops will run at G speeds instead if the 4 at N and the 1 at G.

 

[spidey07]

That's not entirely true. It won't slow everything down to G speeds but it will slow overall performance and throughput. The N clients will still see much better than G thruput but it will also depend on how much the G client is using the carrier (frequency). Same thing as when G has B clients on it, overall thruput for G goes down but doesn't drop to b speeds.

That's why G should be setup as G only and N should be setup as N only for best performance.

 

[masteryoda34]

I have a Belkin wireless N router. Currently two laptops on the wireless. One is G, the other is N. I am getting 5-6MB/s of throughput on the N laptop. Also running WPA2.

 

[spidey07]

Force it to N only to see how much of performance improvement you would get.

 

[JackMDS]

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
I have a Belkin wireless N router. Currently two laptops on the wireless. One is G, the other is N. I am getting 5-6MB/s of throughput on the N laptop. Also running WPA2.

Wow, you getting 5-6 MB/sec from Wireless (B=Byte). :thumbsup:

Unless you meant 5-6 mb/sec. b=bit, then No Wow.

 

[masteryoda34]

Originally posted by: JackMDS

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
I have a Belkin wireless N router. Currently two laptops on the wireless. One is G, the other is N. I am getting 5-6MB/s of throughput on the N laptop. Also running WPA2.

Wow, you getting 5-6 MB/sec from Wireless (B=Byte). :thumbsup:

Unless you meant 5-6 mb/sec. b=bit, then No Wow.

Yes, my capitalization was intentional. 5-6 Megabytes per sec. (yes MB != mb)

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: JackMDS

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
I have a Belkin wireless N router. Currently two laptops on the wireless. One is G, the other is N. I am getting 5-6MB/s of throughput on the N laptop. Also running WPA2.

Wow, you getting 5-6 MB/sec from Wireless (B=Byte). :thumbsup:

Unless you meant 5-6 mb/sec. b=bit, then No Wow.

Jack, you know that it all depends on the environment. I wouldn't be surprised at better performance to force N only.

 

[JackMDS]

Originally posted by: spidey07

Originally posted by: JackMDS

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
I have a Belkin wireless N router. Currently two laptops on the wireless. One is G, the other is N. I am getting 5-6MB/s of throughput on the N laptop. Also running WPA2.

Wow, you getting 5-6 MB/sec from Wireless (B=Byte). :thumbsup:

Unless you meant 5-6 mb/sec. b=bit, then No Wow.

Jack, you know that it all depends on the environment. I wouldn't be surprised at better performance to force N only.

Yap, you are right it is depending on the environment, and the amount of the the G traffic in a mixed environment.

 

[Pghpooh]

This is what confused me.
This is from this info in Wikipedia.
Here is the link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi
"General guidance to those who suffer these forms of interference or network crowding is to migrate to a Wi-Fi 5 GHz product, (802.11a, or the newer 802.11n if it has 5 GHz support) because the 5 GHz band is relatively unused, and there are many more channels available"
I saw the 5 ghz and jumped to the wrong idea!!!

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: Pghpooh
This is what confused me.
This is from this info in Wikipedia.
Here is the link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi
"General guidance to those who suffer these forms of interference or network crowding is to migrate to a Wi-Fi 5 GHz product, (802.11a, or the newer 802.11n if it has 5 GHz support) because the 5 GHz band is relatively unused, and there are many more channels available"
I saw the 5 ghz and jumped to the wrong idea!!!

Rule of thumb, wikipedia is full of misinformation.

 

[Matt84]

Originally posted by: JackMDS

Originally posted by: spidey07

Originally posted by: JackMDS

Originally posted by: masteryoda34
I have a Belkin wireless N router. Currently two laptops on the wireless. One is G, the other is N. I am getting 5-6MB/s of throughput on the N laptop. Also running WPA2.

Wow, you getting 5-6 MB/sec from Wireless (B=Byte). :thumbsup:

Unless you meant 5-6 mb/sec. b=bit, then No Wow.

Jack, you know that it all depends on the environment. I wouldn't be surprised at better performance to force N only.

Yap, you are right it is depending on the environment, and the amount of the the G traffic in a mixed environment.

One or two G clients which aren't constantly using the network connection don't have much of an impact on my N network. With only my usual single N wirless HTPC connected to my AP I can get sustained transfer rates of 8 to 10 megabytes per second. When my friends come over with their two older G laptops this does drop and my transfer range becomes 6 to 10 megabytes per second. This is a reduction in speed yes, but it is still alot better than normal G speeds.

Even though Draft N isn't an official standard, in my opinion it is a necessary evil. Over my old G wireless network it was almost impossible to stream video to my HTPC. These video files were the old 700MB DivX encoded files and playback would stutter and glitch constantly. This meant I had no chance to stream 720 or 1080 HD content like I can now.

Since getting a Draft N router (DIR 655) and a USB Draft N NIC (DWA 140) I've had no trouble streaming any type of content. Also connecting older G clients didn't adversly affect performance too much giving me a great balance of speed and compatibility.

Draft N is a standard? No! But for high bandwidth useage is it worth it? Yes!

 

[JackMDS]

Yap, if Wireless streaming Video is what between One Misery or Happiness then the Draft (of any kind) offers relief to some people.