Forum Discussion

GabeU's avatar
GabeU
Distinguished Professor IV
8 years ago

Laptop and now reduced speed while using the 2.4Ghz WiFi band... (nothing major)

Something interesting I noticed.  With my Dell laptop, which can only utilize the 2.4Ghz band, the speeds were the same as my desktop.  Since the software upgrade to the modem, the speeds on my lapto...
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  • MarkJFine's avatar
    MarkJFine
    8 years ago

    russyoung2676

    If it's intended to work this way, I'm not sure it's an issue to fix.

    If you're looking for the maximum speed possible, open the wifi settings and go to Advanced->WIRELESS.
    1. See if you can use 5GHz, set the Wireless Mode to 11a/n/ac and set the Bandwidth to 20/40/80MHz.2. If you have to use 2.4GHz, set the Wireless Mode to 11n-only and the Bandwidth to 20/40MHz. I don't recommend the 11b/g/n setting because I know the "b" part confuses some boxes like the XBox 360.

MarkJFine's avatar
MarkJFine
Professor

russyoung2676

Has to do with the available bandwidth on the wifi network wrt protocol.

 

For example:

Unless the 2.4GHz wifi is set for n-only, you will have only a 20MHz wide network with only one channel.

n-only on the 2.4 GHz network spreads it across 2 wifi channels for a 40MHz network.

Compare that to the 5GHz network that potentially spreads it across 4 wifi channels for 80MHz in ac mode.

 

russyoung2676's avatar
russyoung2676
Sophomore
8 years ago

Thanks for the respose but you lost me! How do I fix my issue? Do I need to change some settings on my devices or in my modem? Do I need to buy a more current router?

  • MarkJFine's avatar
    MarkJFine
    Professor
    8 years ago

    russyoung2676

    If it's intended to work this way, I'm not sure it's an issue to fix.

    If you're looking for the maximum speed possible, open the wifi settings and go to Advanced->WIRELESS.
    1. See if you can use 5GHz, set the Wireless Mode to 11a/n/ac and set the Bandwidth to 20/40/80MHz.2. If you have to use 2.4GHz, set the Wireless Mode to 11n-only and the Bandwidth to 20/40MHz. I don't recommend the 11b/g/n setting because I know the "b" part confuses some boxes like the XBox 360.

    • GabeU's avatar
      GabeU
      Distinguished Professor IV
      8 years ago

      MarkJFine

       

      I'll give those settings a try, too, to see if it makes any difference with my Dell laptop.

       

      I went to try my Netgear router to see if that would make any difference, but for the couple of hours I had it connected the overall speed dropped to the 30s, so that blew that experiment.  :p

       

      I'll give the HT2000W settings a try later.  I can't utilize the 5Ghz band, but perhaps those adjustments will kick the speed back up to where it used to be when utilizing the laptop, or even my notebook, for that matter.    

      • maratsade's avatar
        maratsade
        Distinguished Professor IV
        8 years ago

        I'm curious to see how/if this worked for you. I tried it and it completely wrecked my Internet access.

         

         

        GabeU wrote:

        MarkJFine

         

        I'll give those settings a try, too, to see if it makes any difference with my Dell laptop.

         

        I went to try my Netgear router to see if that would make any difference, but for the couple of hours I had it connected the overall speed dropped to the 30s, so that blew that experiment.  :p

         

        I'll give the HT2000W settings a try later.  I can't utilize the 5Ghz band, but perhaps those adjustments will kick the speed back up to where it used to be when utilizing the laptop, or even my notebook, for that matter.    

         

    • russyoung2676's avatar
      russyoung2676
      Sophomore
      8 years ago

      That did it!!! Just making them couple changes to the 2.4 channel fixed the speed differance between the two. Thanks everyone!

      • russyoung2676's avatar
        russyoung2676
        Sophomore
        8 years ago

        Not that I need it now since I have great coverage on 2.4 and my speeds back my external router which is an older frontier (actiontech mi424) still dont work well plugged into the ht2000. Just curious, might want to expand coverage someday and buy a decent router but wouldnt want to do that if the ht2000 dont like things plugged into it.