Long story short:
With an N router from Apple, you can hold down OPTION while selecting Radio Mode while configuring the N's settings to select B only, G only, or B/G only. Or to otherwise view all options if they don't appear. (With no need for a remote disk, and mainly all G devices, "G only" helped me immensely)
For me, with a B/G and N Express extending through WDS, using the G as the main and the N as the remote has significantly sped up my network while connected to the remote.
Long story even longer:
For a while now I've had my 802.11b/g Express and it worked as expected for the entire time. A few months ago, I added an 802.11n Express to my house. I got it cheaper than retail at the time as otherwise I didn't truly have a need for it. There were, however, a few areas on the opposite side of the house where I couldn't get a signal, and some areas nearby outside where I couldn't get a signal (a smoker with an iPhone...) that were nice to fill with the discounted N. So, I replaced the G and put the N as the main router, and the G as the remote; figuring it was a logical decision to have the new one doing all the work.
One problem I had since adding that, other than the fact you can't use the easy network extender setting with all Apple N routers so you must use the clumsy manual WDS setup, was that my network speed seemed to drop considerably when a device was on the G side of the house (the remote/bridge router).
I had always wondered what the hell was going on, but didn't really care as I only had an already old and slow Inspiron to lug around and it was good enough for my iPhone. Well, today I finally got a MBP (Late 2008!) so I now have a good reason to figure why it is so slow when connected to the G.
Normal speeds I get during download with my cheap DSL is around 150KB/sec, however, I finally noticed that when connected to the G Express the speed capped out around 70KB. After some searching on the Web, I found some posts that claimed that signal with a WDS can drop by half through each remote connected. I didn't like that as I have personally seen two G Expresses connected to each other and the speed did not drop by any significant amount. I figured this must be something to do with the the two odd routers.
After finding a nice tidbit on some site, I found out that with the N routers from Apple, you can hold down the option key while selecting the Radio Mode to force all of the options that don't normally appear, along with the other "normal" modes that don't appear while the N is in WDS mode. More specifically, this let me choose G only for the N router, since my internet is slow, the other router's a G anyway, and only this MBP can use N while everything else I have is G.
This made the other side of the house connect a little faster and seemingly a little steadier at around 75-80KB as both were now running in G only mode. However, the speed still wasn't what it should be.
So, on a whim I decided to switch the G to the main router, and the N to the remote WDS client.
So far, while using Apple's download site as a loose guide (using random files/movie trailers and all of this happening past midnight), I am finally getting 150KB throughout the house. I have no idea why this worked , or why there is such a problem to begin with as I imagine old->new is better than connecting new->old, but so far I don't care why it works, just that it does.
With an N router from Apple, you can hold down OPTION while selecting Radio Mode while configuring the N's settings to select B only, G only, or B/G only. Or to otherwise view all options if they don't appear. (With no need for a remote disk, and mainly all G devices, "G only" helped me immensely) For me, with a B/G and N Express extending through WDS, using the G as the main and the N as the remote has significantly sped up my network while connected to the remote.Long story even longer:
For a while now I've had my 802.11b/g Express and it worked as expected for the entire time. A few months ago, I added an 802.11n Express to my house. I got it cheaper than retail at the time as otherwise I didn't truly have a need for it. There were, however, a few areas on the opposite side of the house where I couldn't get a signal, and some areas nearby outside where I couldn't get a signal (a smoker with an iPhone...) that were nice to fill with the discounted N. So, I replaced the G and put the N as the main router, and the G as the remote; figuring it was a logical decision to have the new one doing all the work.
One problem I had since adding that, other than the fact you can't use the easy network extender setting with all Apple N routers so you must use the clumsy manual WDS setup, was that my network speed seemed to drop considerably when a device was on the G side of the house (the remote/bridge router).
I had always wondered what the hell was going on, but didn't really care as I only had an already old and slow Inspiron to lug around and it was good enough for my iPhone. Well, today I finally got a MBP (Late 2008!) so I now have a good reason to figure why it is so slow when connected to the G.
Normal speeds I get during download with my cheap DSL is around 150KB/sec, however, I finally noticed that when connected to the G Express the speed capped out around 70KB. After some searching on the Web, I found some posts that claimed that signal with a WDS can drop by half through each remote connected. I didn't like that as I have personally seen two G Expresses connected to each other and the speed did not drop by any significant amount. I figured this must be something to do with the the two odd routers.
After finding a nice tidbit on some site, I found out that with the N routers from Apple, you can hold down the option key while selecting the Radio Mode to force all of the options that don't normally appear, along with the other "normal" modes that don't appear while the N is in WDS mode. More specifically, this let me choose G only for the N router, since my internet is slow, the other router's a G anyway, and only this MBP can use N while everything else I have is G.
This made the other side of the house connect a little faster and seemingly a little steadier at around 75-80KB as both were now running in G only mode. However, the speed still wasn't what it should be.
So, on a whim I decided to switch the G to the main router, and the N to the remote WDS client.
So far, while using Apple's download site as a loose guide (using random files/movie trailers and all of this happening past midnight), I am finally getting 150KB throughout the house. I have no idea why this worked , or why there is such a problem to begin with as I imagine old->new is better than connecting new->old, but so far I don't care why it works, just that it does.