Panasonic HD HW220 Wireless Config

Bought one of these HD Recorders for Xmas from John Lewis. Have just today got my BT Home Hub 3 Type A that I am using as a WAP (Wireless Access Point).

I have successfully got the HW220 to connect wirelessly to the hub and enabled double bandwidth (40mhz) on both the HW220 and the HH3. Unfortunately the HW220 is connecting to the Hub at 20mhz bandwidth. What am I doing wrong?

Wireless-N, WPA2 security and AES encryption?
Are there enough channels available without congestion if you look with Inssider?

Yes, yes and yes. Have channel selection set to auto and doing a refresh seems to enable it but it seems a bit random, oh well hd plays without buffering.

That sounds like you don't have many free channels, I think you need 6 adjacent for 40Mhz. Glad it's working well.

Basically don't bother with 40MHz bandwidth on 2.4GHz as some devices work and some don't ('n' gear in 2.4GHz does not have to support HT40), but mainly because there isn't really room in the band for it.
It's fine on 5.xGHz ('n' gear in this band has to support it)

If you insist, choose either channel 1 or 13 only.
If you scan with InSSIDer it's to check if the left or right half of the band is available for 40MHz.
(as BatBoy is basically right in it spanning nearly 7 channels )
if other stuff is only on channels 1 thru 6 then choose channel 13 (bonds 9+13)
if other stuff is only on on channels 8 thru 13 then choose channel 1 (bonds 1+5)

(anything seen on 7 will interfere a little either way)

Multiple 40MHz networks can coexist but only using 1/5/9/13 as above (to see transmissions and wait for the medium)

Edited by prlzx (Sun 06-Jan-13 04:28:21)

Thanks but I have only seen the HD recorder go into 40mhz mode once, it mostly drops back to 20mhz. I cant use Inssider just yet as I dont have any wireless adaptors (just getting started with wireless) and the HD recorder hasnt got an App for that yet, although it does list 3 other networks in my location of the BT Home Hub variety in the Network Search.

I have also discovered that the HD recorder prefers static addressing having lost it's lease probably with me messing around with wireless or a Billion DHCP problem.

If you have (or can borrow) a mobile with Wi-Fi, Wifi Analyzer on Android also provides similar function (I don't know if this type of app is allowed on iOS these days)

For a lot of users the 40 MHz option is useless unless you have most of the channels to yourself of course.

Routers are supposed to drop to 20 MHz after detecting other wireless users. It's like being polite to those other users Some routers allow forcing 40 MHz but that isn't a good idea.

In my area there are two close wireless users but fortunately the middle channels aren't being used so I'm able to have a 20 MHz fast WDS link between upstairs and downstairs. If someone forced 40 MHz the WDS setup would be useless.

Thanks for the tips everyone.