I spent a couple of hours reading about wireless issues with Airport and various configurations, but I still don't have an answer.
I have a brand new 24" imac, sitting on a counter that separates my family room from my kitchen. I have AT&T DSL service, using a 2wire router to connect to the internet. When I put the router in the kitchen, my transmit speed was almost always 54. I moved it back to the basement (which is where I had it before I got my mac, and NEVER had any issues with a crappy Dell laptop), and my transmit bounces from 16 to 54.
Here are some other facts:
- I changed the channel on the router from 8 to 11.
- There are other wireless networks in my area, but none using channels 8 or 11.
- I downloaded AP Grapher and iStumbler. I'm not quite sure about some of the information AP Grapher was showing, but essentially iStumbler shows a signal strength of 55% - 58%, with noise from 7% to 15%, but usually the noise is in single digits (for kicks, I turned on my 2.4gHz cordless phone right next to the mac, and it had zero effect on noise).
- Other networks in the area show a much lower signal strength (20's to high 30's), with higher noise also. Again, they are all using different channels.
- My RSSI ranges from -58 to -67.
- My router page that shows my network performance shows downstream speed of 1,584 (I assume that's Kbps?).
My basic questions are:
1) How does the transmit speed of 54 Mbps relate to what AT&T shows as my downstream speed? For $5 per month, AT&T claims I can double my downstream speed to 3.0 Mbps. Is that a waste of money (i.e., is my router limiting that anyway, making the added performance worthless)?
2) I have read a couple of posts on various forums that say the 2wire router is the problem and I should get a Linksys or DLink. Before I plop down $70 on a new router, I just wanted an objective opinion as to whether that will make a difference.
3) Do I have to suck it up and put another router in the kitchen, or even worse run a cable across my kitchen for a wired connection? I love my mac, but so far my only disappointment has been that my wireless internet performance was more consitent on my Dell. Are mac's just not that good at wireless?
Thank you for your help.
I have a brand new 24" imac, sitting on a counter that separates my family room from my kitchen. I have AT&T DSL service, using a 2wire router to connect to the internet. When I put the router in the kitchen, my transmit speed was almost always 54. I moved it back to the basement (which is where I had it before I got my mac, and NEVER had any issues with a crappy Dell laptop), and my transmit bounces from 16 to 54.
Here are some other facts:
- I changed the channel on the router from 8 to 11.
- There are other wireless networks in my area, but none using channels 8 or 11.
- I downloaded AP Grapher and iStumbler. I'm not quite sure about some of the information AP Grapher was showing, but essentially iStumbler shows a signal strength of 55% - 58%, with noise from 7% to 15%, but usually the noise is in single digits (for kicks, I turned on my 2.4gHz cordless phone right next to the mac, and it had zero effect on noise).
- Other networks in the area show a much lower signal strength (20's to high 30's), with higher noise also. Again, they are all using different channels.
- My RSSI ranges from -58 to -67.
- My router page that shows my network performance shows downstream speed of 1,584 (I assume that's Kbps?).
My basic questions are:
1) How does the transmit speed of 54 Mbps relate to what AT&T shows as my downstream speed? For $5 per month, AT&T claims I can double my downstream speed to 3.0 Mbps. Is that a waste of money (i.e., is my router limiting that anyway, making the added performance worthless)?
2) I have read a couple of posts on various forums that say the 2wire router is the problem and I should get a Linksys or DLink. Before I plop down $70 on a new router, I just wanted an objective opinion as to whether that will make a difference.
3) Do I have to suck it up and put another router in the kitchen, or even worse run a cable across my kitchen for a wired connection? I love my mac, but so far my only disappointment has been that my wireless internet performance was more consitent on my Dell. Are mac's just not that good at wireless?
Thank you for your help.