Weird wireless issue

hamo31

I have an IBM Thinkpad X32 laptop with a built in wireless card. It connects to my Netopia wireless modem at under 1 Megabit speed. I recently installed a Belkin wireless range extender which extends the wireless range available from the Netopia. The weird thing is when I connect to the range extender, I get 3 Megabit speed and the internet pages, pictures open much faster. How can this be ? This is like saying Wexford -> Dublin -> Waterford is quicker than Wexford -> Waterford.
Hamo

PogMoThoin

What is telling You these speeds?

msg11

hamo31 wrote: »

I have an IBM Thinkpad X32 laptop with a built in wireless card. It connects to my Netopia wireless modem at under 1 Megabit speed. I recently installed a Belkin wireless range extender which extends the wireless range available from the Netopia. The weird thing is when I connect to the range extender, I get 3 Megabit speed and the internet pages, pictures open much faster. How can this be ? This is like saying Wexford -> Dublin -> Waterford is quicker than Wexford -> Waterford.
Hamo

Its a better signal. The better the signal the quicker it can complete tasks.

Physically it might not look quicker, logically it is quicker.

hamo31

No, it's not a question of stronger signal. I do the tests near the Netopia wireless modem, signal strength 100%. The repeater signal strength is about 70% and yet it measures 3 megabits/sec and browsing is actually much faster. I use smart to test speed
http://speedtest.smarttelecom.ie/
Hamo

cormon

Hi hamo31,

That certainly is a weird one as using an extender normally halves your preformance due to halp duplex.

Are the encryption parameters the same on the extender as the original ap ,not sure how the extender is setup , encryption via wpa2 instead of wep nailed my netopia when I was testing it a few years back.

Also bear in mind that long range wi-fi (extenber based) has an enhanced tech to get the most out of wi-fi , such as adding 10 MHz and 5 MHz OFDM modes to the 802.11a standard.

Still it is hard to reason why the original netopia wifi which in in the path of the extender can now get a 3Mb throughput , may be compression on the extender but that is a wild guess.

Let us know what you find out.....

Kevin

Capt'n Midnight

wireless is all about signal to noise ratio

a solid 1Mb is better than a flaky 3Mb



set the speed to 2Mb and see how it goes

a range extender won't extend range if it is noiser than your current card , also you the original may have diversity ( 2 antennas )

try moving the base station or changing the orientation of the antennas

hamo31

Thanks for the replies / suggestions. Let me give a bit more information and maybe more clues. Encryption is disabled, access security is done by limiting to devices with MAC addresses. I first discovered that my IBM's wireless was slow when a friend's laptop was downloading much faster in my living room via the netopia wireless modem.
I then got a USB wireless adapter and when I disable the IBM's internal wireless card and use this USB wireless adapter, I get 3 Megabits. Using the IBM's internal wireless card, I only get less than 1 Megabit. The difference is very noticeable while browsing, streaming etc. I came to the conclusion that the Intel wireless device used in the IBM laptop was an old type or something. So, anytime I wanted high speed, I disabled the IBM's internal adapter and used the external USB device. Last week, I got a Belkin wireless range extender so that I could use a PC for Internet wirelessly in a room on the other side of the house. The Belkin is very easy to setup, just put it near the Netopia and press a button on the back for 10 seconds. It picks up all the settings from the Netopia wireless modem and operates in the other room, extending the wireless signal. This worked perfectly, but while range testing with my IBM laptop, I noticed the laptop wireless connection was much faster. I did a speed test and it showed 3 Megabits. Now when I search for wireless networks with the IBM laptop, it picks up 2 with the same name, same channel, but with different MAC addresses so I can choose the main one or the repeater. Main router connection speed less than 1 megabit, repeater connecton 3 megabits / sec. Just doesn't make sense.
Hamo

hamo31

Problem solved, well kind of. At least I know where the problem is.
It's the stupid Netopia wireless dsl modem / router. I found out by chance that if my laptop is in the same room as the Netopia wireless modem, even though the signal strength and quality show excellent, the connection speed is under 1 megabits / sec. If I take the laptop to another room, the broadband speed is over 3 megabits. I tried the Netopia modem in a different room in case there was interference and it made no difference. So there, the Eircom wireless modem was the problem. I moved it to the room where my desktop is, and connected the desktop to the modem by ethernet cable and the laptop works in the living room, wireless, at over 3 megabits, so I'm happy.
Had another thought, maybe it's the Intel wireless card in the IBM laptop that's causing the problem, unable to handle a strong signal.
Hamo