Wireless adaptor for my laptop.

Robzere31

Robzere31

Robzere31

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I'm looking for a 300mbps 802.11n mini card wireless adaptor to upgrade my current 54mbps adaptor in my Advent laptop.

I'm on 50mb Virgin broadband and only ever get 20-25mb dowload speeds whilst on wireless.
However on wired, I get the full 50mb, hence why I'm thinking it's my adaptor card.

I'm not really up on wireless specs so any suggestions would be appreciated.
 
Reading reviews on Virgin 50mb broadband you should be getting around 45 - 50Mbps speeds.

As wireless G is 54Mbps you should be able to get max speed with your current adapter.

I would expect that the reason your getting lower speeds on wireless, is signal strength, the lower the signal strength the slower the wireless link
(e.g. 50% signal strength might only be 27Mbps, half the 54Mbps bandwidth the card is capable of).

Easy way to test is download something on the wireless connection while your closer to the router and the signal strength is at Max.

I'd think that would be the best thing to test 1st and if you get max download speeds then, relocating the router closer to where you usually use the laptop to download, too increase the wireless signal strength, would be the next step.
Also the cheapest option.



Changing the wireless card in the laptop to a 300Mbps wireless N card, as long as you have a wireless N router, should give you higher download speeds even with a weaker signal, you will however 1st have to find out if the laptop uses the Mini PCI or Mini PCI express interface and purchase the correct card.
220px-MiniPCI_and_MiniPCI_Express_cards.jpg


Doesn't look as though OcUK stock either version, but i'm sure Google would find them.
 
Thanks for the reply.

Signal strength is already at maximum, & speeds don't seem to change much wherever I am in the house.

The router is a DIR 615 D4, wired is 100% fine, but wireless seems to be the weak part as when I was on 20mb I could max out at 20mb on wireless,
on 50mb though there's not much increase on wireless, although wired is 50mb.

I'll look into a bit more over the weekend.
 
Had a quick search for the DIR 615 D4 router.

Found this thread on AVForums

http://www.avforums.com/forums/virg...126593-virgin-50mb-d-link-dir-615-router.html

Which appears to say the Dlink D615 isn't very good and there are other people having problems with it.
From what I've read on that and another few sites I take it that's a free router from Virgin , I guess the freebie's just arn't that good. (In all the years I've had broadband, from the 1st days of Blueyonder, they have never given me anything free, from the sounds of it I was lucky :p)

Just thought I'd mention it as if its the router, might not help that much getting a new wireless card.
 
Thanks,

Read that thread a while ago, I've even tried flashing the router to the WRT firmware but it was rubbish.
Dropped my wireless speeds down to between 4-10MB, so went back to the original 1.0 firmware which holds around 20-25MB.

May try & bag a new router to see if it helps, I know the DIR 615 isn't the best in the world as it's free, but hoped it would be a bit better.
 
ms2010 said:
Reading reviews on Virgin 50mb broadband you should be getting around 45 - 50Mbps speeds.

As wireless G is 54Mbps you should be able to get max speed with your current adapter.
.
Click to expand...

Even though the adaptor is 54G and showing connected at 54Mbs with an excellent signal, it is very unlikely that you will get anything near that when it comes to data throughput. You'll be seeing around 20-25Mbs max, even with an N class adaptor with a 144Mbs signal dont expect anything over 70Mbs (ish).

As a rule of thumb when it comes to wireless, you usually get half its quoted bandwidth when connected at maximum speed to the router with a good signal.

Have a look for a 150Mbs wireless adapter, might be slightly cheaper and need only two aerial points which is all your current laptop will have.
 
Rabtech said:
You'll be seeing around 20-25Mbs max.
Click to expand...

Well they say assumption is the mother of all mistakes, this got me thinking so I decided to test it

Downloaded LAN Speed Test 1.1.3 build 142 and regardless of how close the wireless NIC is to the router, I get a consistant 20Mbps using wireless G.

Max speed i've had broadband is 20mb and always had max download speeds on wireless, always assumed 54Mbps actually would deliver what it says, guess i should have known it would be less than claimed.

So I stand corrected.
 
My post was meant with no disrespect at all matey, please dont take any offence.

You asked for help and you got it, the best thing about the forums is that other people who have had wireless issues now know also.

As I mentioned get yourself a 150Mbs wireless adaptor, I'm sure you'll be able to get one and enjoy the full 50Mbs Virgin cable broadband speeds :)
 
Quick update, picked up a new Atheros 300mbps wireless card and after a bit of tweaking now getting the following speeds on wireless.



Not a bad upgrade for £15 :D
 
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