[JaredAFX]

Hi all,

We recently switched over from our DSL service (yes, DSL. We were on a 6 Mbps connection for years) to a cable service with speeds up to 100 Mbps. I can confirm we are getting what we're paying for because on my dad's desktop, which is in proximity to the modem and router and connected through ethernet, gets speeds from the mid 80s up to the mid 90s. However, on my gaming setup which is across the room and connected to the internet via a Linksys 802.11ac USB adapter, I get at most up to 35 Mbps and sometimes down to the area of 20-25. I have confirmed that my BIOS, chipset, USB drivers, Windows, and network adapter drivers are up to date (I also realized the adapter was choosing 2.4GHz over 5GHz, so I forced it into only using 5GHz mode and it made little to no difference). Our router is an older 802.11n router so I get that there's no "same type attack bonus" or whatever going on, but a loss of ~50 Mbps is pretty significant.

I believe the problem is the security system that's connected to the router so my dad can look into the house remotely. How do I go about checking my network to see if the security system really is hogging the whole thing? I know how to troubleshoot my own connection, but I don't know how to examine the entire network.

This post has been edited by JaredAFX: 26 June 2018 - 04:53 PM

[Covarr]

How to check network bandwidth usage is going to vary by router model (and by extension, router firmware), but a security system won't generally put nearly that much strain on your wireless network.

What model is your router?

[JaredAFX]

My router is a Linksys WRT610N, hardware version 1. It's nearly 10 years old so I think it may be part of the problem, but we're not particularly looking to get a new one right now.

This post has been edited by JaredAFX: 26 June 2018 - 07:24 PM

[Flygon]

Given the age of the hardware, it quite seriously sounds like it might be the barrier.

Just because Wireless N states it has a 480MBits cap, doesn't mean most hardware - or conditions - can allow for it.

[Overlord]

My solution, speaking as someone who does sysadmin for a job, would be to put a wired connection in - lay an Ethernet cable and use a cheap gigabit unmanaged switch if you need to. Wireless is awful and has so many annoying-to-diagnose issues.

[JaredAFX]

Overlord, on 27 June 2018 - 12:19 PM, said:

My solution, speaking as someone who does sysadmin for a job, would be to put a wired connection in - lay an Ethernet cable and use a cheap gigabit unmanaged switch if you need to. Wireless is awful and has so many annoying-to-diagnose issues.

I would love to, but the problem is that my computer is at the opposite angle in the room from the modem and router and we have cement walls in here, so even if I wanted to string an ethernet cable across the room it'd look ugly and possibly be a tripping hazard. The only reason there's electricity on this side is because we wired an outlet from the same side of the room to this end.

[Flygon]

Those concrete walls can't be doing wonders for the house's Wi-Fi.

There's always solutions involving PVC pipes and putting cables in them onto the wall, but, that's ugly in itself.

More modern routers are a hell of a lot more powerful, but even then, those concrete walls worry me.

[Caniad Bach]

Solid concrete walls are going to suck up your WiFi signal. Since presumably drilling holes and laying cable isn't going to be the preferred option, have you considered powerline adapters?

[Jeffery Mewtamer]

Perhaps its my blind bias speaking, but considering that concrete walls are already very much utility over aesthetics is there any reason simply duct taping some cat6 cable to the wall would be unacceptable? Surely it wouldn't stand out that much if the cable was gray and the duct tape was classic gray. Might even look fairly nice if you could pull off a pseudo chair rail effect with the cable running horizontally with the tape running the length of the cable with the tape smooth except for the cable bulge along its center(granted, that might be more effort than you want to put in).

[Covarr]

Flygon, on 27 June 2018 - 09:35 PM, said:

There's always solutions involving PVC pipes and putting cables in them onto the wall, but, that's ugly in itself.

They make kits with the express purpose of being considerably less ugly than PVC. This or something like it could be a decent way to travel cable without creating a tripping hazard or uglying things up too much.

Although an additional adhesive may be necessary to get 'em to stick; I don't know how well screws are gonna do on cement.

[JaredAFX]

Caniad Bach, on 29 June 2018 - 03:42 AM, said:

Solid concrete walls are going to suck up your WiFi signal. Since presumably drilling holes and laying cable isn't going to be the preferred option, have you considered powerline adapters?

I have not considered powerline adapters. Thank you for bringing this up! I'm going to do some research into this.

For everyone else suggesting more involved ways to get ethernet over to the other side of the room, unfortunately my dad has the final say in situations like this, but I appreciate the suggestions, I really do.

This post has been edited by JaredAFX: 30 June 2018 - 10:53 PM

[winterhell]

Bandwidth aside, how is the latency compared to a wired connection? Do you have the exact same ping to Google and the servers you are playing on, or?
Most games don't require more than a MB/minute and you have several MB/sec.

[JaredAFX]

winterhell, on 03 July 2018 - 03:07 PM, said:

Bandwidth aside, how is the latency compared to a wired connection? Do you have the exact same ping to Google and the servers you are playing on, or?
Most games don't require more than a MB/minute and you have several MB/sec.

That's exactly it. My connection is perfectly fine (it is up to five times faster than what I had on my old service, after all), but if I should be getting speeds of around 80 Mbps and I'm getting a loss of 50 Mbps or more just a few feet away from the router, that's concerning to me. I knew before I made this thread that an upgrade is absolutely necessary to get what I'm looking for, but I wanted to see if anyone had solutions I hadn't considered, and I actually learned several things by seeing what people had to say.