Wireless Adapter for Online Gaming

Robe$h

Robe$h

Robe$h

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Joined
24 Sep 2006
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205
Hello there.

Currently my PC does not have an internet connection but I want to start playing online games mainly with Crysis but I'm not sure what kind of adapter I will need...

My current Wireless Router is a BT Home Hub 5712. What sort of adapter would you recommend to get a good wireless connection from my Router to my PC? My room is directly above the living room which is where the Router is currently placed...

Thanks for the help!
 
Forget wireless, get an ethernet cable. You'll just frustrate yourself to the point of insanity if you try gaming over wireless.
 
Well it doesn't have to be a mess. I've only got one cable that runs from the router downstairs to the upstairs rooms. From there it's easy. And if you plan your cabling well enough you should be able to keep the wire completely concealed. I mainly take advantage of cavities behind skirting boards and that sorta thing.
 
Wireless is indeed sucky for gaming :/


Dropping packets here and there will drive you nuts
 
Wireless can be faultless for gaming. Ive been online gaming via PC / 360 for 2 years now via my wireless setup and il get exactly the same performance as if it was wired. No lag spikes, no disconnects, no extra latency. It all depends on your setup and how far the signal needs to travel etc.
 
Frank Butcher said:
Wireless can be faultless for gaming. Ive been online gaming via PC / 360 for 2 years now via my wireless setup and il get exactly the same performance as if it was wired. No lag spikes, no disconnects, no extra latency. It all depends on your setup and how far the signal needs to travel etc.
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agreed i'm on wireless 2 floors above my router and I still mange good pings. How did I do it. easy we've got a 20 mb line that runs at half capacity during the day I normally manager about 8 meg from that which means good speeds. I know this may not be an ideal solutin for you yourslelf but when the hefty bill is spread between 3 or 4 of you it becomes a little easier :)
 
Yes some wireless setups can give an adequate gaming performance. However, the integrity of the connection will never match that of a wired one. The cabled method is going to be less of a risk anyway. As has been mentioned, the eventual performance of your wireless connection is going to come down to the environment in which it is operating. You will not be able to tell for sure whether it will be sutiable until you turn it on for the first time. Whereas the cable should work perfectly out of the box.

If you really must get a wireless adapter, make sure it doesn't use USB. You might also want to get one with a detachable antenna so you can place this away from your system to reduce interference.
 
Run a cat6 cable (or 5e if you have one already) down to your router. Seriously the only option I would consider.
 
i'm currently competing at a good level via wireless with a 8mb connection shared across 3 pc's and have 0 drop outs/dis-connects and get a ping of 7-15 on most uk servers.

i've played with and against some of the best players/teams in the world i'd say wireless is perfectly fine for gaming
 
harris1986 said:
i'm currently competing at a good level via wireless with a 8mb connection shared across 3 pc's and have 0 drop outs/dis-connects and get a ping of 7-15 on most uk servers.

i've played with and against some of the best players/teams in the world i'd say wireless is perfectly fine for gaming
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Its still crap compared to wired :/



cat6/5e > Ethernet over Powerline > Wireless ( that would be my order of perferrence )
 
As said, wireless can work fine, it depends on your situation. I wouldnt write it off straight away. Proof, heres a post a made on the subject a while back in another thread:

Frank Butcher said:
If you buy the right equipment (im using a Netgear WPN824 router and Netgear WPN311 wireless PCI card) and dont have walls 6 foot thick then Wireless can be flawless for things like gaming (Xbox live included). Ive been using wireless for nearly 3 years now and have never had any problems with pings. My router is downstairs and my PC is across the other side of the house upstairs and protected via WPA. Pings:

C:\Documents and Settings\Nick>ping 192.168.1.1

Pinging 192.168.1.1 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.1: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=64

Ping statistics for 192.168.1.1:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 1ms, Maximum = 1ms, Average = 1ms

And to ping a random game server:

C:\Documents and Settings\Nick>ping 85.236.100.241

Pinging 85.236.100.241 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 85.236.100.241: bytes=32 time=13ms TTL=119
Reply from 85.236.100.241: bytes=32 time=11ms TTL=119
Reply from 85.236.100.241: bytes=32 time=14ms TTL=119
Reply from 85.236.100.241: bytes=32 time=12ms TTL=119

Ping statistics for 85.236.100.241:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 11ms, Maximum = 14ms, Average = 13ms
Click to expand...
 
Hey!

Thank you all for the replies!

I understand using a cable would be a better solution but it's just not feasible in my current situation. The setup of my house is very awkward and adding a Mother who hates mess anywhere, I know she wouldn't approve...

So going wireless is the only option I'm afraid until I can afford a place of my own. So what's the best way to do it? Get a PCI Adapter for my PC? As I said my Router is directly below my room so getting a signal shouldn't be a problem. But what Adapter would you guys recommend?

Thanks a lot for the help so far!
 
I have been wireless gaming on my PC for 2 years now playing, WoW, CS:S, TF2 etc etc. Never had a problem with it. Pings were always low, connection to the router is rock solid and has never "just dropped off".

I use this wireless card with a PCMCIA adaptor in my pc (had to upgrade from the one that came with the router when I installed vista as the old one wasnt compatible but still no problems what so ever)

http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=184361


and the router I use is belkin also

http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=186900
 
tim80bwi said:
Forget wireless, get an ethernet cable. You'll just frustrate yourself to the point of insanity if you try gaming over wireless.
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Completely false, I have been using wireless with Cable broadband and ADSL for the past 5 years without a single problem. My pings on Virgin Media are 7-25 over wireless and with ADSL it was from 15-30.
In fact my UT3 ping is the best by far as it averages 7-15 at all times on Multiplay servers that I play on.

I am on a Linksys WMP54GS v1.1 wifi PCI card.

USB WiFi cards are quite useless yes but USB wifi cards do not account for ALL wireless cards.

I also have the 20MB package and get 20MB speeds when downloading. The ONLY thing slower than wired is network file transfers but since I don't transfer large files over LAN anyway this is a complete non issue and can wait until I upgrade to Wireless N.

People need to stop assuming and get informed to be honest.

Heck even my mouse and keyboard are wireless and it's made no difference to gaming.
 
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Obviously wireless is marginally better, but I haven't had any major issues with wireless once I was able to stop the windows polling causing PL spikes every minute or so.

Using my Linksys PCI card I ping my router at an average of ~1ms over 20 pings which isn't too much worse than a wired connection. I'd take a wireless connection with a good internet connection over a wired connection with a dodgy net connection any dayof the week. Sure, the odd packet may get delayed a tad longer on the local network, but that is relatively insignificant compared to the difference your actual ISP connection makes.
 
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