Why does my wireless client have a faster internet connection than my directly connected one?

[tjaisv]

I've just installed my wireless home network (Netgear MR814 wireless router, dsl modem, WinXP server and 1 wireless client) and conducted some speed tests on dslreports.com which show that my wired XP machine has gone from an average 648K/136K to 170K/70K but yet the wireless client has maintained 648K/136K.

Now I've restarted the network multiple times and disabled WEP and I installed a firewall to see if that could help but still no go. And I know nobody else is sabotaging my bandwidth because I'm constantly looking at the router's data activity light and it only blinks when it should be.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

TJ

 

[Lord Evermore]

What do you mean you installed a firewall? Where? And what is your WinXP "server" doing?

Don't use a speed test as your sole definition of performance. If you can upload to an FTP server at the same speeds, and download files at the same speeds, then don't worry about it.

Were you previously only using one computer connected to the DSL modem and getting the 648/136 speeds, and now have put the router in place and the wired machine is slower?

WEP wouldn't affect your wired computer's speed. It only applies to encrypting the data sent and received on the wireless segment, and in fact reduces the usable bandwidth from the router to the wireless client due to the overhead of encryption.

 

[JackMDS]

I would not count too much on the online speed tests. Log to a fast site (Microsoft .com IBM.com ) and download 10MB file look at the down load stable speed the rule of thumb is x10 if you get a stable download speed of 200KB/sec (B=Byte) your download connection is about. 2Mb/sec. (b=bit)

To optimize the Broadband connection.

Download DrTCP: <a target=new class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.dslre
ports.com/front/DRTCP021.exe">http://www.dslreports.com/front/DRTCP021.exe</a>

Run the program, it will show the current settings of TCP/IP parameters. Write them down.

You can change any variable that you want, click Apply, and reboot the computer, if no good; you can always change to your original values.

Start with:

MaxMTU - DSL=1492. Cable=1500).

Tcp Receive - 255552

Window Scaling - Yes

Time Stamping - No

Selective Acks - Yes

Path MTU Discovery - Yes.

Black Hole - NO

Max Duplicate - 2

TTL ? 64

 

[tjaisv]

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore
What do you mean you installed a firewall? Where? And what is your WinXP "server" doing?

It's a software firewall and I've disabled it. Forget about the server term, i just wanted to emphasize it was my main machine on the network.

Don't use a speed test as your sole definition of performance. If you can upload to an FTP server at the same speeds, and download files at the same speeds, then don't worry about it.

I'm downloading something right now and am only getting 3Kbps! YIKES!

Were you previously only using one computer connected to the DSL modem and getting the 648/136 speeds, and now have put the router in place and the wired machine is slower?

Exactly.


You know this problem first started to occur when I enabled print sharing on the wired machine. I've since disabled file and print sharing but the problem persists.

I called Netgear and they said to call my ISP (Verizon) and have them remotely configure my DSL modem (a Westell WireSpeed) in "bridging mode" because apparently it's in routing mode right now. Does this sound right to you guys?

TJ

 

[tjaisv]

Ok now I've isolated the problem to between the router and wired client, since I can't even open up the router's HTTP configuration utility in IE. Connecting to http://192.168.0.1 gives me the login prompt, but after successfully logging in the page never completely loads...it takes forever to load just a little .gif image!!!

I'm thinking that WinXP Pro must of done something to my protocol or system or networks settings when I enabled print sharing yesterday, because before this was enabled everything worked fine -- my wired client was able to access everything perfectly.

 

[rw120555]

Why don't you try a system restore to two days ago and see if the problem goes away.

 

[tjaisv]

Originally posted by: rw120555
Why don't you try a system restore to two days ago and see if the problem goes away.

Well unless there's some way I can have WinXP Pro do its own system restore to 2 days ago then I'm afraid I'm going to have to totally reinstall WinXP because I've already manually restored all the settings that I thought I'd changed.

 

[rw120555]

WinXP Pro does have its own system restore -- it is one of the nicer features in XP, in my opinion. There are various ways to get to it -- try clicking on Start/All Programs/Accessories/System Tools/System Restore. Or, you can get to it from the Control Panel. You might read up on it a little bit in help first, just so you know what it does. Before I do major changes, I like to set a "restore point" first -- but it will also periodically set up restore points on its own, so just pick one that is before you did the fiddling around.

 

[tjaisv]

Awesome, I didn't know that, thanks. I'll try it out and see what happens.

UPDATE: Didn't work. I'm tending to think now that the router itself is defective, because when I hit the reset button on the back of the router to restore factory settings, all it does is reboot the link; what I need to do is start out fresh again but I can't do that if the router keeps on using the same configuration settings. Weird...

 

[tjaisv]

I tried another wired client but again encountered the same problem. So I guess it's not my WinXP computer's settings after all, it's the router. I guess the router's switching device may be defective. RMA time

 

[Lord Evermore]

Usually you need to do something like holding the reset button down on the router to make it use default configuration (prevents it being accidentally defaulted by pushing the button once).

Have you made sure the router has the newest firmware?

Verizon doesn't need to change anything with your modem or connection. "Bridging" mode would be used if your connection allowed multiple IP addresses, and you'd be able to just plug a switch or hub into the DSL modem, and each machine would get its own IP as if it was connected directly to the modem. Your connection I assume uses PPPoe, and you're only allowed one IP. When your router logs in, it is assigned the IP by Verizon's servers, just like if one computer were connected, and then uses NAT to share the connection between multiple machines. Netgear's tech support, at least one of them, is clueless.

 

[tjaisv]

Yeah I was finally able to reset the router to factory settings after being instructed by Netgear tech support. But I was thereafter still unable to connect locally to the router on both my WinXP client and a Win2K Server client, and therefore was unable to upgrade the firmware (which i don't think was the problem anyway, it's just defective IMO).

 

[Saxoholic]

As a test, you could put the wireless card in your wired client, just to see if there's a speed change.

 

[tjaisv]

No it was defective so I just RMA'ed it. Now, I'm a little hesitant to replace it again, so I may try another brand. But, looking at the less than stellar reviews of various vendors' wireless routers I think I'll go ahead and give the Netgear MR814 another shot.