Ppc iMac wireless connection slow

[brainwave89]

A friend of mine is asking for help on why his wireless connection on his iMac PPC powered desktop is slower compared to two Windows machines 6 ft away that operate on wireless.

I don't know how much RAM he has but the only thing I know that might help is if his version of Tiger is older than 10.4.8. If so, I will update him to the latest version.

Any suggestions on how make his wireless connection faster would be appreciated.

I am going to try some of the solutions posted at: http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=2005093011343164

I will let you know if any of these create a solution.

Will adding more RAM to a 2.1GHz PowerPC G5 (iMac) that currently has 512MB RAM help with internet speed?

 

[mkrishnan]

Please don't keep bumping your own thread.

RAM is not that likely to be an explanation when the specific problem described is slow network performance. Granted I've never run my iMac G5 or any other computer on Tiger with 512MB of RAM, it still typically will not manifest in a way that would cause someone to specifically complain about the network.

Details that would help...

1) What kind of router is being used? Is it 802.11b, g, or draft-n? What security standard is being used (WEP, WPA, WPA2, etc)?

2) Can you better characterize the slowness? Is it a poor ping time, or are up/down speeds unsatisfactory? If the latter, run some kind of diagnostic like this one:

http://reviews.cnet.com/7004-7254_7-0.html

On both the iMac and at least one of the other computers and post the results. If the former, post ping or whatever other results are relevant.

 

[brainwave89]

Sorry for the bumps.

Router is a Linksys WRT54G

2. Poor Ping time - when tested for speed it is for each wireless connection (including pc's) 2,523 kbps - there is just a delay in getting to a page - some worst than others

My PowerBook G4 had no packet loss - the iMac had %40 loss

Thank you for any suggestions you may have.

After I rebooted the Linksys router and have done ping twice on the iMac w/o any packet loss

 

[mkrishnan]

Hmmm, you rebooted the router and the Mac worked okay? It might possibly have to do with an overly busy WiFi channel, or some kind of interference... to be honest I'm not that up on the ping / latency / packet loss side of things. But that definitely clarifies and helps people try to help you.