Tech: Wireless

Subject: Tech: Wireless
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 02:13 AM

While I have been ill for a couple of days I decided to tidy up our wireless netwrok.

The WAN connection is 3Mb to a cable provider. The router is a Belkin 54g. The cards are a mixture of Belkin 54 for the 'workhorse', a couple of old USR 11Mb ones for an old machine that is not used much and an old laptop and an Intel 54g in a new laptop. The machine nearest the router is hard wired at either 100 mb or a gigabit can't remember but it doesn't realy matter:-)

I tried WEP security once but it seemed to slow everything down - Mind you that was on an old 22Mb router I had. Not tried it yet on this one but I have enabled MAC address filtering so no-one can 'piggy back' our network.

OK - First things first. I found that I was getting a poor connection around 1/2 the time. Found out that was because I was connecting to someone elses router! Fixed that. Changed the SSID and IP address range.

I have also had a play with the channel ID until I have now got a reasonable connection most of the time. Signal strength seems to be good but the speed goes up and down like a fiddlers elbow from the 2 54g cards - Most of the time it is 36 - 54 but occasionaly drops to 1! The 11Mb ones seems to be consistent.

Any advice or comments would be much appreciated.

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 02:21 AM

Oh - one thing I nearly forgot. I have been trasfering aroung 30GB of data from the 11mb desktop to the 54Mb one prior to upgrading to XP. It has taken an AGE. When I tried to transfer the whole of 'My Documents', some 25GB, it said it was going to take something like a day. It didn't - It kept crashing out when the network share dissappeared. I have managed it by transfering a bit at a time but If I try to do more than 1GB I do get problems. When I transfer lGB or less it not only speeds up throughput but the network share stays put!

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 10:14 AM

"I have been trasfering aroung 30GB of data"
Firewire....

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: jeffp
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 10:37 AM

Clinton, please elaborate.

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 10:52 AM

Get a Firewire connection... it's the best, fastest way I know to transfer that much data......

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: 8_Pints
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 11:00 AM

Dave,

For what its worth I found wireless so frustrating with the link going up and down like the proverbial "bride's nightie" that I eventually bought some ethernet cable and plugged it between the router and the desktops. This alleviated the connectivity problems immediately.

I still use the wireless connection with my laptop occasionally, but it it is still temperamental!

Good luck

Bob vG

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 11:18 AM

Yea - I thought at first a firewire backup device could well be the answer - Trouble is not all my PCs have firewire:-( So I would have to buy at least 1 firewire PCI card. I have just seen a 250Gb external USB2 HDD for £60. Could be worth a visit...

My other alternative is just shunt the devices around and use my X-over ethernet cable. But it seems so low tech;-)

Any suggestions on making the wireless run better would still be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 11:22 AM

Maxtor... External Hard Drive.... 300 gigs.... Costco.ca has them for 250 bucks....

After using the Firewire connection on mine, I'll NEVER go back to usb file transfers... nor will I ever own a PC that doesn't have a firewire connection

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Amos
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 11:34 AM

They make those? Sigh. When you're used to Macs, the stages of obsolescence available out there boggle the mind.


A

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 11:46 AM

Who make what?

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 11:54 AM

I can have the wireless connection ranging from good to dropping here too. Ny guess is some other device is interfering but I don't know what it is.

As the PCs are wired and it's only my laptop and only then if I use it in the living room (the only other rooms I use it are Pip's study - no problem a couple of feet from the access point - and my room where I go wired anyway) that is affected, I haven't spent much time trying to work it out.

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 05:48 PM

As a practical suggestion, hard wired connections, once sorted out, are reliable - wireless MAY be flaky (for an enormous number of reasons). If it is flaky, logic suggests using a reliable alternative.

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 05:59 PM

Funny thing is for all general purposes it is now fine - The flakyness only manifests itself in transfering lots of data. Makes perfect sense when I think of it. I think the only way round is to use either an induction loop - Which I don't think I will install at home! Or almost line of sight remote access stations dotted around the place.

Useful excercise for me - I was recently asked by a job agancy if I would recommend a wireless network. I put them onto someone else. Glad i dropped it now:-)

Thanks anyway one and all.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: Tech: Wireless
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 06:32 PM

A remote (from the main) wireless access point hard wired to the LAN would be the recommendation - but only you can do the cost/benefit analyses.