ADVICE NEEDED: WiFi Adpaters

Hello,

I am looking for some advice on WiFi Adapters...

I have a BT home Hub 3 with BT Infinity 2 @ 76Mbps and am looking for the best Wireless adapter / alternative method i can for best speed.

Am i right in saying that if i set my Home Hub 3 to 40Mhz only and purchase a 600Mbps Wireless N Dual Band adapter, i would get around about the 300Mbps internal transfer rate (PC to PC) minus the Wireless overheads and the full capacity of my Fibre Speed (76Mbps - in real terms around 65bps as my IP Profile is 73.43Mbps)

i am currently using a 150 Mbps wireless Adapter with an average link speed of 72Mbps (which is correct as half for Up and half for down) and my speed tests are coming back around 15Mbps.

Any help would be greatly appreciated...

Many Thanks
FractalFragger

In reply to a post by FractalFragger:

Am i right in saying that if i set my Home Hub 3 to 40Mhz only and purchase a 600Mbps Wireless N Dual Band adapter, i would get around about the 300Mbps...

Not if you have nearby base-stations competing for bandwidth. You may get higher throughput with dual 20MHz channels since there is more scope for avoiding channel overlap. See here. Check for nearby base-stations with a utility like NetStumbler.

If you want fast PC to PC transfers, use a wired LAN.

Edited by micksharpe (Sun 27-Jan-13 20:45:04)

Hi micksharpe,

Thanks for the quick response, i have been using INSSIDER2 and all i am seeing is My wireless, My BT FON, and BT WIFI, and one Sky Broadband on my channel (6) other than that there is nothing else at all...

you refer to "base-stations" do you mean other peoples wireless routers? and when you say dual 20MHz channels what would i need to do to accomplish this...

Regards
FractalFragger

You may need something better than a Home Hub 3. See here. There are some router reviews on the main site. I suggest that you get a dual channel 802.11n adapter and work your way up - single and dual channel at 20Mhz, then single and dual channel at 40MHz. Everyone has their favourites but TP-Link do good routers and adapters. I can't really give any recommendations since I am quite happy to pootle along on 11g, even though I have an 11n router.

Do not expect to get 300Mbps, no matter how good your kit is. Wireless always disappoints. If you're close enough to get max speeds, you're close enough to use a cable.

Edited by micksharpe (Sun 27-Jan-13 21:04:59)

well thats seems fair enough i have been looking at a 600mbps dual channel wireless adapter, that is my original plan.

the home hub suits its purpose i just need something that will take the higher transfer rate.

you information and advice has been extremely valuable

Many thanks

You could have a look at this router- the Asus RT-N66U.

I've got one, and although I haven't checked it for sheer speed, it easily manages speed tests using wireless from the MacBook at 70Mbps. That's using 40MHz with anything up to a dozen or more other WLANs visible using iStumbler (the Mac equivalent of NetStumbler, I think).

They also do an ac version (Amazon link) which I assume is even faster, but I know nothing about it.

Edited by billford (Sun 27-Jan-13 21:18:52)

and that would work over VDSL for infinity fibre?

It's purely a router (there's no modem in it) so you'd still need the OpenReach modem (or other VDSL2 modem). I use it with an 80/20 FTTC connection, but I'm with IDNet not BT.

thanks for this information, i will start with a dual band adapter first and then work up if needed

Many Thanks

In reply to a post by FractalFragger:

well thats seems fair enough i have been looking at a 600mbps dual channel wireless adapter, that is my original plan.

There is no such thing as 600 mbps wifi adaptor for each band, they only go up to 450mbps per band. I've got the TP-Link WDN4800 450 mbps dual band PCI card installed on my desktop and its amazing....actual wireless speeds are ~100 mbps on 5 GHz from my Cisco EA4500 router 2 floors down. The homehub 3 is known to have poor wireless throughput, you're better off getting the Asus RT66U (as suggested by Billford) or go for the Cisco EA4500...both are far, far better that the BT home hub for wireless.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/TL-WDN4800-450Mbps-Wireless-...