Questions regarding Router Cables and Distance

Liber8or

Hi,

I recently got 7.5Mb Broadband from BT Ireland and the Wireless Router which accompanies it. I tested the connection speed on Speedtest.net using a Wireless adaptor installed on my PC and with a standard Ethernet Cable. Obviously the Ethernet was faster, but due to the distance between my PC and the router it maybe awkward sending a cable to it. So i have two questions i hope someone can answer and help me with.

1. What is the max distance you can have an Ethernet Cable going from a router to a PC, or is there a max distance? Does the longer the cable have adverse and noticeable affect on the quality of the signal coming to the PC?

2. What are the best quality Ethernet Cables out there?

Cheers for the advice!

Jonathan

cat6e ethernet cables should do if you want to futureproof.

kippy

Ethernet cables (Cat 5e) are limited to a distance of 100 metres.
You can put repeaters or bridges in to increase the distance but 100 metres would cover most situations.
I personally dont think there are any cables better than another.
To be honest, a wireless connection back to your router should be fine. The wireless will probably run at 24-52Mbps (dependent on environmental conditions and type of connection) while your internet connection will be far slower than that already.....
I dont really understand why the connection test showed the ethernet being faster to be honest.

Kippy

Liber8or

I dont really understand why the connection test showed the ethernet being faster to be honest.

Might it have something to do with the fact that Wireless connects at 54Mbs where as Ethernet is 100Mbs?

kaiser sauze

Liber8or wrote: »

Might it have something to do with the fact that Wireless connects at 54Mbs where as Ethernet is 100Mbs?

No.

Those figures are the theoretical maximum connection speed between your PC and the router over a particular type of connection.

Your internet connection speed is different to your WAN (wireless network 54 mbps) and your LAN (ethernet 100mbps).

Your internet connection's theoretical maximum is 7.5 mbps, nowhere near the 100 mbps of your ethernet and still nowhere near the 54 mbps of your wireless.

kippy

Liber8or wrote: »

Might it have something to do with the fact that Wireless connects at 54Mbs where as Ethernet is 100Mbs?

That should be completely irrelevant in this instance.
You internet connection runs at 7.5Mbps. Far slower than either your wireless or LAN speeds can run at. The bottleneck is with the internet connection not your internal connection.
If you had a few PC's connecting to each other on your own network the LAN speeds would make a difference, but not out to the internet where the slowest part of your connection is the actual internet connection.
Kippy

suntreader

Kippy you are absolutely correct from a theoretical point of view but I too have found that I get twice the speed over a 100mb cable than a 54mb wireless connection even though both connections way exceed the DSL connection speed.

Could it have anything to do with the type or size of packets used for a speed test? Fragmenting on the wireless connection?

Have reproduced this on several wireless routers!

watty

54Mbps WiFi is more like 20Mbps. If there are several users speed drops. If the signal is poor the speed drops.
On 3Mbps internet you won't see a difference between WiFi and ethernet, but at 7.6Mbps if your wiFi signal is poor and/or several computers it's feasible it could be about 5Mbps. If the signal is very poor, WiFi does drop back to 2Mbps or 1Mbps.

suntreader

Hi Watty

I thought of that so I set up as follows;

6 inches from wireless router
Connection speed 54mbps
No other wireless device on net.
No other wireless network in range
No other 2.4 Ghz devices in range (dect phone, baby monitor, wireless cctv etc.)

and the max speed I show wirelessly is 2.5mbps as opposed to 6.5mbps.

seems to do ftp at full speed, that was why I thought the type/size of packets being used by the speed tests could be causing the problem??

Yarnhall

kippy wrote: »

Ethernet cables (Cat 5e) are limited to a distance of 100 metres.
Kippy

Rule of thumb is to limit the length to 80 meters to allow 2 10 meter patch cables, one at either end (so I'm led to believe anyway).