Wireless router or powerline adaptor for speed

GWillow

GWillow

GWillow

Associate
Joined
16 Jun 2003
Posts
818
Location
Romney Marsh, Kent
Hi,

I'm trying to stream video from my PC to a WDTV Live. Unfortunately videos play for a while but start stuttering after 10 seconds or so. I could re-encode the videos (they are home recordings) to a lesser rate but don't want to lose any quality.

The WDTV is currently connected via a 200Mbps powerline adaptor. I only have an old Netgear DG834G (v1) that offers 802.11g.

If I was to get a new router that offers 802.11n (have been looking at the Billion 7800N), can I expect this to be quicker than the powerline adaptors?

I appreciate there a lot of variables involved with respect to signal quality but in a typical world, which would be better?

Thanks for any assistance.
 
More reliable would be the Powerline adaptors, though I also have the Billion which is rock solid for me when streaming to my iPad. 200 Mbps pl adaptors should be plenty for streaming - they work well form me streaming Netflix in hD. Sure yours isn't faulty?
 
The_Baron said:
Btw there are 500mbps ones available now too.
Click to expand...

I thought I read that when crossing over ring mains that anything faster than 200 can cause a reduction in speed. I'm as far from an expert in this that you can get so believe what I read (usually).

I have streamed a 720p video without problem so maybe I need to look into how I am encoding my videos. I've never got to grips with this so maybe it's just e at fault here.

If the 500+ Mbps adaptors WILL be quicker then I'm quite happy to upgrade.
 
You get a reduction in speed on all powerline adaptors depending on distance / line quality... whatever the situation 500mbps adaptors will be at least twice as fast as 200mbps ones

i get faster speeds on powerline than i do 802.11n at the opposite end of my house
 
Powerline in my opinion is always faster than wireless. Wireless just plain sucks for anything but browsing and non-critical downloads :)
 
I've done some basic testing on transfer speeds using my laptop.

I tried transferring a 3.5Gb (22.5 minutes in length) video file from the main PC to the laptop (all figures taken from the copy file dialog box)

Using 802.11g wireless
Transfer speed of 808 KB/second - 1 hour transfer time

Using 200Mbps powerline
Transfer speed of 4.30 MB/second - 13 minutes transfer time.

If it only takes 13 minutes to copy the file then logic says that it should play fine on the WDTV.

(I also think I need to re-encode as 3.5GB sound a little large for 22 mins of footage)
 
There must have been something up with one of the bits of equipment as I've just tried streaming the file again today and it appears to be working OK now.

(I have also re-encoded the video so it is now half the size with no notice in drop in quality)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom