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hakr100

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 1, 2011
967
113
East Coast
I have no idea of what this means...from the Apple site:

802.11ac. The new definition of fast.

"With three-stream 802.11ac technology, the AirPort Extreme Base Station takes Wi‑Fi speeds over the top. Now you can reach data rates of up to 1.3 Gbps1 — triple the previous 802.11n standard. Which means up to three times faster Wi‑Fi.2 You also get double the channel bandwidth, with 80MHz‑wide channels providing more room for more data to flow faster than ever. And if you have 802.11a/b/g/n devices, AirPort Extreme maximizes that connection as well. What you do with all that extra speed is up to you."

I have an "ac" device...my Macbook Air. But at the moment I don't have an "ac" router. So, how would I test the speeds I am getting with my current router against the speeds I might get with a new "ac" router? Running a typical ISP speedtest isn't the way because of the vagaries of the network connection once it leaves my cable modem.

So, is there a reasonably simple procedure I can follow to check speeds?

Thanks!
 
You would need to test file transfer speeds within your network. So you will need another (second) device of some sort (computer or NAS device) attached by wired ethernet to your existing router. Then transfer a large file with your MBA connected to AC wifi to that device and use OS X activity monitor to measure the speed.
 
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