Wireless creeps, Wired fine any suggestions?

[darkside9923]

Hello,

I have been trying to figure out what is going on with my network. I have a 2 year old Netgear MR814V2 802.11B router. Lately seems as if my wireless connections crawl and my wired connections are fine. Speed tests confirm these findings showing wireless at 384 to 500 down and my wired connections anywere from 2.6 -3.3 MB down.

I do run 128bit Wep, but I do not think it should slow a connection that bad. Also do different channels make a difference in speed? Im running channel 10

My network consists of
1 desktop running a Dlink 802.11B Pci card
1 Laptop running a Cisco Aeronet 340 PCMCIA card
2 wired desktops with 3Com adaptors
Brand New Motorola Surfboard modem (Just switched to cable from dsl)

Does it sound like my router is on its way out? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[imported_waldo]

There are multiple reasons why you could be experiencing a slow down in speed. The first questions would be....do you have a wireless phone, fridge, dryer, or other heavy appliance in between you adn the router. Second, Wep does slow it down quite a bit...I take it you are running B, and if so, how far away are you? 2.6 - 3.3. isn't really that bad. Actual is always considerably slower than theoretical. Lastly, even with that speed you should max out your dsl speed.

 

[darkside9923]

The router is a B

The down speed are around 180-500K wireless. I hit 1.2MB Once, but my wired comps are perfect spot on.

As for Interference, I have a 5.8 GHz cordless phone. The distance Im useing my wireless connection is probally at best 60 feet (gustimate) My cisco survey utility shows excellent signal strength about 89-92 perscent. The router is in the back bedroom and does have to penetrate a kitchen. but were the router is located it shouldnt be shooting through the refridgerator.

Im going to bring the laptop back in the room and test it again signigigantly to see if there is any marked improvements.

Also I have Adaware Pro, Spybot, I run Firefox. I have been to DSL reports.com and have run the tweal test I have the MTU set to 1500 and have tried moving the RWIN to 37,900 as oposed to the default 17,900.

Hopefully that will give a lil more insite to the issue

 

[spidey07]

most common cause it inteferance (sp?)

change the channel on the AP to 1, 6 or 11 and see what provides the best results.

 

[JackMDS]

The only frame of reference that a regular user can use for Wireless Network is by placing the Source (Router) and Client (Wireless Computer) one next to the other.

Doing so allows making sure that the Hardware is Working well and the configuration is correct.

People tend to put the Hardware in its final position and when it does not work ?cling? to the ?Silly? Signal Strength Bars.

The signal strength is a combination of the actual 802.11x signal + Phone + Microwaves + other sources that might generate 2.4GHz ?Noise? + Brain emissions of the user?s anxiety state (j/k), in other words it is visual representation of all the 2.4GHz in the atmosphere around the your Wireless hardware.

I.e. you might see High Signal Strength that Shows: Excellent = 30% signal + 70% noise.

Such a signal would be the reason for low bandwidth, and or frequent disconnection of the Wireless Network.

The real measure of the Wireless signal capacity is Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR), a measure that takes into consideration the relevant Signal adjusted to the Noise Level. Unfortunately, none of the Entry Level Wireless drivers provides such a measure.

May be this can Help.

Link to: Wireless - Basic Configuration.

Link to: Wireless Security for the Home User.

Link to: Extending the Distance of Entry Level Wireless Network.

Link to: Wirelessly Bridging Home / SOHO Network.

Link to: Hi Gain Antenna for Entry Level Wireless.

:sun:

 

[darkside9923]

Thanks so far for all the suggestions...

My Cisco Aironet card is far from an end user card It doesn't show SNR per se but I did find somewhere in the utilities and it does give a "signal quality" measurement. In moving my access point around I have gotten it to a whopping 60% quality from 40%. I may look into maybe implementing an omni directional antenna for a lil more boost and maybe even replace this Cisco card as I have been told the newer cards are more powerful. This card is only running 30mw max

 

[nweaver]

that cisco card will perform RM measurments, as defined by Cisco's Compatible Extensions. Just have to get an AP that supports RM, and then you can get noise, traffic, etc.
Wep does not effect bandwidth much (on my Aironet 1220AP's). I run tests using 40 bit wep, 128 wep, TKIP Ciphers with CCKM/WPA, and open. the difference in an FTP session is negligle. I don't know if that will be determined by AP/cards or not, but I do it as a CCX engineer, and have used Intel/Broadcom/Atheros and many other cards with 1200 series AP's.