Internet performance poor on wifi

Sunburn74

Diamond Member
Oct 5, 2009
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Hi. I have a belkin N150 wireless router and am using Comcasts 25mb/s download service. I've noticed some latency with webpages (ie chrome takes a while to start the load, but when it does its fast). I recently changed from wireless to connected ethernet connection and I've noticed that those latency issues are gone (every page is extremely snappy).

Why is this and what can I do to get better latency performance on a wireless network?
 

Fardringle

Diamond Member
Oct 23, 2000
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Wireless in an ideal environment does not have any more latency than a wired connection. The throughput speed will (usually) be lower, but the PING/latency will not. If you are getting significant latency on your wireless connection, you are probably trying to use it at long distances, in an area with obstructions that block the signal, on the same channel as other nearby networks, have improperly configured (or malfunctioning) equipment, or there is wireless interference from other networks or other electrical/electronic devices. Or a combination of these things.
 

PliotronX

Diamond Member
Oct 17, 1999
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Use the freeware version of inSSIDer and scope out other networks in the area and change to a channel that is not occupied, disable turbo mode/40MHz, try a different wireless mode besides mixed, you might even try just 11g, disable QoS/WMM, make sure short preamble is enabled...

Wireless in an ideal environment does not have any more latency than a wired connection. The throughput speed will (usually) be lower, but the PING/latency will not. If you are getting significant latency on your wireless connection, you are probably trying to use it at long distances, in an area with obstructions that block the signal, on the same channel as other nearby networks, have improperly configured (or malfunctioning) equipment, or there is wireless interference from other networks or other electrical/electronic devices. Or a combination of these things.
I wouldn't go that far, wired normally shows either 1ms or less than 1ms, wireless is at least 1ms (usually averages 3-5ms which wouldn't be noticeable) and if more than one node is using the AP, that will increase in factors of 10. Just by the nature of a shared omni-directional medium with more signalling rules, it will never be as consistently fast as wired. Though excessive latency is usually an indicator of either the AP needing a restart or reconfiguration to escape interference as you recommended.
 

azazel1024

Senior member
Jan 6, 2014
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That is funny, pinging my server over WLAN still shows <1ms...just like it does on the wire in my network. When my WLAN is congested I sometimes see 2-4ms latency running pings to my server.

You can get it to spike much higher for wireless, but that generally requires active interference and/or a long signaling path/weak signal where you are getting lots of packet collisions and retransmits. Especially if that is happening that can add considerable amounts of time to things like page loading.
 

Fardringle

Diamond Member
Oct 23, 2000
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OK, I should have said a proper wireless network won't have any more noticeable latency than a wired connection. Sure, the PING utility will say that it took one extra flap of a hummingbird's wings for the packet to be delivered over wireless, but it's not enough to matter for anything a normal home user (or even most business users) will be doing.
 

JackMDS

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Oct 25, 1999
29,491
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Wireless was not really planned to the tasks the most of End user "pile on" it.

If Stability Speed, Lag, Pings, are really important to a user. One can try (emphasis on try because No matter what it is not as good as a wire connection)t he Top of the End Uses line devices (like the Asus N66U), or do not use Wireless.

In addition; Belkin N150 wireless router is nothing to write home about either.

P.S. It sad, but Networking Forums turned into a place where many users basically waste their time on Posts like: "I bought a Fiat 500 and am surprised that I can not use it for my construction business".


:cool:
 
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Fardringle

Diamond Member
Oct 23, 2000
9,199
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P.S. It sad, but Networking Forums turned into a place where many users basically waste their time on Posts like: "I bought a Fiat 500 and am surprised that I can not use it for my construction business".
:cool:
I really don't see any problem with that. A Fiat 500 can tow a pretty serious payload! ;)
fiat.jpg
 

azazel1024

Senior member
Jan 6, 2014
901
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What isn't revealed is the scale of that image...that is actualy a trailer for a bicycle attached ot the back of the Fiat :-D
 

Sunburn74

Diamond Member
Oct 5, 2009
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How far are you from the router?
Really close actually. <4 feet I would say. About devices use our home wifi signal, probably on average 2-3 at a time.

I do notice that the wifi adapter picks up something like 20 wifi signals at any given time. I will try switching to a different channel and seeing what happens.
 

azazel1024

Senior member
Jan 6, 2014
901
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Yeah if you can pickup 20 odd wifi networks, odds are excellent you have oodles of interferance at any given time. I'd play with channels, but you may not be able to improve your situation.

Well, you could get a router that does 5GHz and run with that (supposing your devices support 5GHz also).