Speed Difference Between Wired and Wifi

Shane732

So I recently moved into an apartment and got 200mb broadband. I got the standard horizon box from UPC.

When I do a wired speed test I'm getting 200mb. However, when I do a wireless speed test I'm getting 50mb.

Is the loss of 150mb just the wifi on the horizon box? Would buying a decent router solve the problem?

I appreciate that I'm always going to have a different between wired and wireless but I would have thought it would be a lot less. What would be an acceptable difference?

degsie

Shane732 wrote: »

So I recently moved into an apartment and got 200mb broadband. I got the standard horizon box from UPC.

When I do a wired speed test I'm getting 200mb. However, when I do a wireless speed test I'm getting 50mb.

Is the loss of 150mb just the wifi on the horizon box? Would buying a decent router solve the problem?

I appreciate that I'm always going to have a different between wired and wireless but I would have thought it would be a lot less. What would be an acceptable difference?

This has been answered many, many times on this forum . Yes attaching a 'new' router will gratefully improve speeds. 'AC' routers seem to have the best results. Search for Archer C7, for example.

srsly78

Buying an ac router is no good unless the client device supports it.

Merrion

It will also depend on what wireless standards are supported by your computer and router. 802.11g - which is fairly common - tops out at 54Mbs.

degsie

srsly78 wrote: »

Buying an ac router is no good unless the client device supports it.

True, but these routers generally have massively improved aerial design to enhance b/g/n/ac performance.

bk

srsly78 wrote: »

Buying an ac router is no good unless the client device supports it.

As degsie said, ac routers have more ram, faster cpus and vastly superior antennas that tend to also vastly improve 802.11n performance.

I bought the Archer C7, not because it is an 802.11ac router, but because it has the best 802.11n 5GHz performance and range of any router.

The fact that it is also an ac router is an added bonus and there isn't any premium for this bonus, it costs about the same as the top 802.11n only routers from the big name brands.

Shane732

Merrion wrote: »

It will also depend on what wireless standards are supported by your computer and router. 802.11g - which is fairly common - tops out at 54Mbs.

My adapter is a Dual Band Wireless a/c 7260

ED E

OP its worth noting that wifi doesn't inherently slow your connection like its sometimes erroneously perceived to do, it may just limit it. If wwere on gigabit ftth you'd be slowed by 950mbps.

As above, a new ap is what's required. Its also very client dependent, there are N devices that will only manage 30mbps and others that will do 200.

Shane732

ED E wrote: »

OP its worth noting that wifi doesn't inherently slow your connection like its sometimes erroneously perceived to do, it may just limit it. If wwere on gigabit ftth you'd be slowed by 950mbps.

As above, a new ap is what's required. Its also very client dependent, there are N devices that will only manage 30mbps and others that will do 200.

So how about a TP Link Archer C9?

bk

Shane732 wrote: »

So how about a TP Link Archer C9?

Well the Archer C7 is rated and reviewed as one of the best routers out there (and I have one). The C9 is new and has been reviewed yet, but looking at the specs, I'm sure it is very good.

If you already have the C9, then cool, if not and you are looking at it, the C7 is €50 cheaper and the C9 doesn't look like a big upgrade over it.

carbsy

bk wrote: »

Well the Archer C7 is rated and reviewed as one of the best routers out there (and I have one). The C9 is new and has been reviewed yet, but looking at the specs, I'm sure it is very good.

If you already have the C9, then cool, if not and you are looking at it, the C7 is €50 cheaper and the C9 doesn't look like a big upgrade over it.

I too was stuck with a max of ~ 70Mbit/sec on my TP-Link 841ND ( 2.4Ghz only ) wirh DD-WRT ( 25 yoyos router but has done me proud for years! ) so on bk's recommendation and hours reading up on it, I took the plunge to unleash my new 240Mbit UPC connection. I'm expecting delivery on Fri / Sun so I'll let you know how I got on.

ThisRegard

Out of interest, where did you buy your Archer, presumably online ? How much ?

Harvey Norman are having a sale on networking products at the moment with 15% off which brings it to around €115 I think I worked it out when I saw it in store.

Currys also have it for sale at €109.99, not sure how hard it is to find though, the only place in Dublin I think has it is Jervis Street.

bk

ThisRegard wrote: »

Out of interest, where did you buy your Archer, presumably online ? How much ?

Amazon

ThisRegard

I'm collecting mine this afternoon bk, the pressure is on you now for it to live up to its hype !

You might want to send links to all your posts in which you recommend it to TP-Link, they might make you a product ambassador or something sending you all new equipment in order to spread the word.

Shane732

I'd order a C8 in the end. So we'll see how it goes.

bk

ThisRegard wrote: »

I'm collecting mine this afternoon bk, the pressure is on you now for it to live up to its hype !

Haha Ok, let me know if you have any issues, you might need to do some tweaking to get the most out of it. Don't forget to use the 5GHz frequency for the devices you own that support it.

Shane732 wrote: »

I'd order a C8 in the end. So we'll see how it goes.

Cool, that is a very interesting looking new model. Beamforming seems to be the big new feature over the C7, if it works well, could be a nice addition, let us know how it goes.

ED E

You're gonna have to start "The Boards.ie Badass Router Club" there BK with this trend youve started.

bk

ED E wrote: »

You're gonna have to start "The Boards.ie Badass Router Club" there BK with this trend youve started.

Glorious High End Router Master Race

Shane732

Slightly different question -

I currently have a powerline adapter 500 mbps and am using it in my room. The adapter also has wifi connectivity.

Unfortunately when I do a speed test on it I'm only getting a speed of 4 mbps wired or wireless.

Wiring is circa 2001.

What's the likely cause of the slow speed?

I should say that I'm not hugely worried about my speed through the powerline - I'm hoping the Archer should suit my problems with poorer coverage in the bedrooms - we're only talking about an apartment so coverage shouldn't be an issue. I use the powerline as a way of having my printer wired to my router as opposed to using the wifi on the printer. The wifi on the printer isn't very stable and the printer tends throw up a connectivity fault a lot. The powerline has solved that problem at least. Printer and router are in different locations.

silverharp

might be a silly question, but I want to test the horizon box using an ethernet cable , do I just plug it into the laptop and box? do I have to turn off the wireless connection on my laptop. any other steps involved? do I have to change any settings on the laptop?

bk

silverharp wrote: »

might be a silly question, but I want to test the horizon box using an ethernet cable , do I just plug it into the laptop and box? do I have to turn off the wireless connection on my laptop. any other steps involved? do I have to change any settings on the laptop?

That is all, good idea to switch off wifi on your laptop, to make sure it is really using ethernet.

ThisRegard

Alright, here goes.

Eventually got things up and running, I managed to temporarily brick my UPC modem, couldn't connect to it via ethernet or wirelessly so a hard reset was required, and started all over again.

Via ethernet on the Archer I'm getting pretty much max speeds.

On 5Ghz the best I've got is around 160Mbps. Edit, almost 200 on retests.

And with 2,4Ghz, I'm seeing no real improvement.

On the modem I have DHCP switched off and the IP address 192.168.0.2 set at the DMZ address.

On the Archer, within the WAN settings I have the IP address set as Static and it set to 192.168.0.2. Default gateway is the address of the UPC modem.

Within LAN I'm not so sure about, it has the default IP address, 192.168.1.1 and it doesn't allow me to change it, it gives the message WAN IP address and LAN IP address cannot be in a same subnet. Maybe that LAN address is fine.

And finally I have DHCP set up to hand out addresses from 192.168.1.100 - 199, with the default gateway as 192.168.1.1, the LAN default IP address above.

Does this sound ok, anything obvious or missing ?

Just to add, on another laptop with a Centrino Wireless-N 1030 card, not capable of 5Ghz, I'm only getting between the 60-70Mbps range, max.

The one which is hitting around 200 is a Centrino Advanced-N 6205. Maybe they're just not capable of anything faster ?

srsly78

Sounds about right. 160mbps is pretty amazing speed for wifi! Bridging would shave a few milliseconds off your ping, but wouldn't improve bandwidth.

ThisRegard

Yeah, I think I'm expecting a bit much. I'm getting closer to 200 at the moment on 5Ghz, Just expecting more on 2.4Ghz as the majority of devices here can't manage 5Ghz. I'm setting no real improvement over the Technicolor router.

bk

ThisRegard wrote: »

Does this sound ok, anything obvious or missing ?

Yup, perfect

ThisRegard wrote: »

Just to add, on another laptop with a Centrino Wireless-N 1030 card, not capable of 5Ghz, I'm only getting between the 60-70Mbps range, max.

The one which is hitting around 170 is a Centrino Advanced-N 6205. Maybe they're just not capable of anything faster ?

Yeah the specs of that first one are pretty old, it is 2.4GHz only and max speed 150mb/s (you never get close to those lab speeds, expect half of that).

The second one is better, supports 5Ghz, but max speed is 300Mb/s, 170 from that is pretty decent.

ThisRegard

Must resist updating my hardware to match my internet speeds now, I should have just been happy with my fast ethernet speeds.

It turned out to be a bit of a chore, but mainly down to myself, you would never have thought I once studied networking and did research into VOIP, albeit almost 20 years ago at this rate.

I initially ran the setup program for the Archer C7 and everything worked straight away, it was only when I went to change DHCP etc that I messed things up. I disabled DHCP on the UPC router first and set up the DMZ IP, but I never set the IP address on the Archer. So when I reconnected to the Archer my machine just wouldn't connect as there was no internet access, or so the error told me. So when I went back to the UPC modem, I got the same, hence the hard reset.

It didn't take the first 2 tries, resulting in panic, but I figure I just wasn't holding down the reset button long enough. So also reset the Archer and this time set up the Archer first, then the UPC modem, and I seem fine.

I did have to go around and reboot my powerline adapters as they weren't appearing as DHCP clients on the Archer. But they then lost their connection to the 'home' adapter a couple of times requiring rebooting again before eventually settling down.

On the plus side, out here in my home office when they did drop I could still connect to my Archer in the living room so no more twiddling my thumbs waiting for the Develos to reconnect. The signal is quite good too, my internet radio still showed pretty much a full signal, in fact I had to switch off the wireless on the homeplug as I thought it was still connected to it rather than the Archer.

Response times in general seems much better, I use Flipboard on my tablet every night and I usually have to open it and let it load all the latest stories before I start reading, it was pretty much instant last night. Switching channels on the internet radio also appears quicker, little, if any, buffering compared to when they were connected to the UPC modem.

So despite my hardware limitations in achieving max speeds, I'm still seeing an improvement overall. So cheers for the recommendation and advice bk.

As a footnote, I had a €100 One4All voucher, and with the Archer down to €109.99 in Currys I thought I was getting a steal. Only to find out in store that my wife had used half the voucher to buy the kids some clothes. Still, I got the last unit in the store.

bk

ThisRegard wrote: »

As a footnote, I had a €100 One4All voucher, and with the Archer down to €109.99 in Currys I thought I was getting a steal. Only to find out in store that my wife had used half the voucher to but the kids some clothes. Still, I got the last unit in the store.

Pfftt! Your wife should know that joining the Archer C7 fanboy club is far more important then clothes for the kids :P

ThisRegard

I know, what was she thinking.

Incidentally, TP-LINK recommend this approach to setting up their routers simply as wireless access points, http://www.tp-link.com/en/article/?faqid=417

What's the pros of having the router managing the DHCP over the modem in our case, and not assigning the LAN address of the Archer in the same subnet of the UPC modem leaving the UPC to manage DHCP ?

srsly78

There is no pro. The thing is you should only have 1 dhcp server, otherwise things get messy. Doesn't matter which one acts as dhcp server - so long as there is no conflict.

bk

ThisRegard wrote: »

What's the pros of having the router managing the DHCP over the modem in our case, and not assigning the LAN address of the Archer in the same subnet of the UPC modem leaving the UPC to manage DHCP ?

I think you are better to use the Archer for DHCP.

The reason being the Archer is a far more advanced and powerful router then the UPC router. The C7 has a very fast CPU and lots of RAM.

Therefore it can handle lots of clients connected to it simultaneously much better then the UPC router IMO.

I'd set the IP of the C7 to 192.168.1.1 and set the C7's DHCP to issue addresses in the 192.168.1.x range. This avoids conflict with the UPC modems DHCP

Dave..M

[quote="

What's the pros of having the router managing the DHCP over the modem in our case, and not assigning the LAN address of the Archer in the same subnet of the UPC modem leaving the UPC to manage DHCP ?[/quote]

Double NAT is the real issue i.e. Your C7 is on a different subnet to the UPC router and effectively two layers of NAT to get through if you port forward etc, can also add a marginal modicum of latency which are both problematic for gamers.

Shane732

BK perhaps you might have a guide as to how to set up the router with the Horizon box.

I'm due to get the router tomorrow - yay!

bk

Shane732 wrote: »

BK perhaps you might have a guide as to how to set up the router with the Horizon box.

I'm due to get the router tomorrow - yay!

I'm afraid I don't have the Horizon box myself, but I assume it is similar to the UPC modem.

1) Switch on the Archer C7, but don't plug it directly into the horizon box yet.
2) Connect to the Archer C7 on IP 192.168.0.1
3) Change the IP address of the Archer C7 to 192.168.1.1 (on the LAN side)
4) Change the DHCP of the Archer C7 to issue IPs in the range 192.168.1.x
5) Now connect the Archer C7 to the Horizon box, you should now have access to the internet via the Archer C7
6) Turn off wifi on the Horizon box (reduces interference)

Optionally you can also:
7) Set the Archer C7 to a static IP address of 192.168.0.2 on the WAN side
8) Add the IP address 192.168.0.2 to the DMZ on the Horizon box.

Sounds complicated, but it should actually be pretty straight forward.

degsie

bk wrote: »

I'm afraid I don't have the Horizon box myself, but I assume it is similar to the UPC modem.

1) Switch on the Archer C7, but don't plug it directly into the horizon box yet.
2) Connect to the Archer C7 on IP 192.168.0.1
3) Change the IP address of the Archer C7 to 192.168.1.1 (on the LAN side)
4) Change the DHCP of the Archer C7 to issue IPs in the range 192.168.1.x
5) Now connect the Archer C7 to the Horizon box, you should now have access to the internet via the Archer C7
6) Turn off wifi on the Horizon box (reduces interference)

Optionally you can also:
7) Set the Archer C7 to a static IP address of 192.168.0.2 on the WAN side
8) Add the IP address 192.168.0.2 to the DMZ on the Horizon box.

Sounds complicated, but it should actually be pretty straight forward.

How do you connect the C7 to Horizon, ie using lan or wan ports?

Shane732

bk wrote: »

I'm afraid I don't have the Horizon box myself, but I assume it is similar to the UPC modem.

1) Switch on the Archer C7, but don't plug it directly into the horizon box yet.
2) Connect to the Archer C7 on IP 192.168.0.1
3) Change the IP address of the Archer C7 to 192.168.1.1 (on the LAN side)
4) Change the DHCP of the Archer C7 to issue IPs in the range 192.168.1.x
5) Now connect the Archer C7 to the Horizon box, you should now have access to the internet via the Archer C7
6) Turn off wifi on the Horizon box (reduces interference)

Optionally you can also:
7) Set the Archer C7 to a static IP address of 192.168.0.2 on the WAN side
8) Add the IP address 192.168.0.2 to the DMZ on the Horizon box.

Sounds complicated, but it should actually be pretty straight forward.

Ok I'm going to have fun doing this. Do I need to do anything with bridging?

bk

degsie wrote: »

How do you connect the C7 to Horizon, ie using lan or wan ports?

LAN port on the Horizon box to WAN port on the C7

Shane732 wrote: »

Ok I'm going to have fun doing this. Do I need to do anything with bridging?

You don't have to use bridging if you don't want or need it. It is really for extreme gamers and people running their own servers.

mass_debater

bk wrote: »

LAN port on the Horizon box to WAN port on the C7



You don't have to use bridging if you don't want or need it. It is really for extreme gamers and people running their own servers.

Double NAT is always a bad idea, not just for gamers, Skype and others software which use uPNP will be problematic as there will be two translations, two firewalls. Better to bridge.

bk

mass_debater wrote: »

Double NAT is always a bad idea, not just for gamers, Skype and others software which use uPNP will be problematic as there will be two translations, two firewalls. Better to bridge.

In theory yes, but to be honest in the 9 months when I had this setup and used double NAT, I never once noticed an issue.

I'm now bridged, but honestly I'm not seeing any real world difference.

dublinercheese

I have a ASUS RT-AC66U (which is quite old now) and I regularly get ~236 down/~23up on my iPhone with the UPC 240 plan. Highly recommended.

My basic config instructions:

1. Plug AC router into computer, connect to admin panel, enable access point mode, config security and radio settings* to your liking.
2. Unplug AC router (now access point) from computer and plug AC router into UPC box using only the LAN ports.
3. Login to UPC box admin panel, turn off all radios (keep DHCP on)
4. Connect clients to newly available AC access point SSID and enjoy the speed

* be sure you're only using AC clients to connect to your access point with radio settings appropriately set (e.g. no slower frequencies/bands)

Shane732

bk wrote: »

In theory yes, but to be honest in the 9 months when I had this setup and used double NAT, I never once noticed an issue.

I'm now bridged, but honestly I'm not seeing any real world difference.

So how do I bridge?

srsly78

You read one of the other threads on the topic, it may not be worth the hassle unless you specifically need it for some reason. Depends what router upc gave you.

Shane732

Wireless connection to my laptop having follow BK's steps above.

mass_debater

Shane732 wrote: »

So how do I bridge?

I don't think you can with a Horizon box, you'd need to get them to send you a different modem.

It's probably easier to bridge the Archer by setting it up as an access point. I'm not familiar with the firmware, if it has an access point mode of operation pick that.

Shane732

Shane732 wrote: »

Wireless connection to my laptop having follow BK's steps above.

Speed of 100 on my iphone. 202 on iphone 6.

Bog Standard User

wireless N never really gets better than 70mb

if you want to see 200mb on wifi you need the following

1x wireless AC standard router
1x (per computer) wireless ac standard adapter

wireless ac on 5ghz will reach speeds upto 900Mb/s average

Shane732

Right so my problems....

I have a TP-Link Powerline adapter connected to the router at the other end of the powerline I have a HP Officejet 8600 Pro. Unfortunately I can't establish a connection to the print.

The printer has an IP of 169.254.209.233. This was assigned to it automatically when the powerline line was plugged in. How was it assigned this IP?

If I try to change the IP manually on the printer will it work? I've tried but the printer doesn't like only using 1 digit in any part of the IP.

srsly78

That's the default address when it can't contact a dhcp server. You have a dhcp server on network right? The printer should get address from this. From what you have described there is no network connectivity.

Plug printer out, plug laptop into powerline in place of printer - see if that works first. Might need to enable dhcp on printer or something, should work by default tho.

Shane732

srsly78 wrote: »

That's the default address when it can't contact a dhcp server. You have a dhcp server on network right? The printer should get address from this. From what you have described there is no network connectivity.

Plug printer out, plug laptop into powerline in place of printer - see if that works first. Might need to enable dhcp on printer or something, should work by default tho.

Yea, it's connectivity problem. I've internet access or access to the Archer when I connect the powerline to the laptop. The IP of the powerline is 169.254.119.43.

I have DHCP enabled on the Archer.

The powerline worked fine with the UPC horizon.

srsly78

Use the powerline adapters configuration software and make sure it isn't running a dhcp server of it's own. Turn on dhcp relay if there is an option for that.

Shane732

srsly78 wrote: »

Use the powerline adapters configuration software and make sure it isn't running a dhcp server of it's own. Turn on dhcp relay if there is an option for that.

The powerline LED is off - looks like it's not to the powerline at the other end

mass_debater

srsly78 wrote: »

Use the powerline adapters configuration software and make sure it isn't running a dhcp server of it's own. Turn on dhcp relay if there is an option for that.

DHCP relay is for relaying DHCP packets to DHCP servers on other subnets, don't enable it.