Wifi fast as in the Apple Store

[ighal]

Yesterday I went to an Apple Store and I restored my iPhone via Wifi and I noticed that the Wifi speed at the store is amazing fast. How can I achieve such a speed at home? Im not even close to that...
I should have done a speakeasy test or something like that...

Any ideas?

Right now Im using an Airport Extreme and Uverse with a 24mb service.

THANKS!!!

IGHAL

 

[paulrbeers]

Apple has a rediculous amount of internet bandwidth at it's stores so they can really show off their hardware (imagine someone testing the internet on one of their computers and it feels slow because of limited bandwidth). Hard to explain that to a perspective buyer. The only way to get that experience would be to buy an even faster internet connection (especially upload speeds).

 

[blevins321]

Apple Store probably has a specially-setup server with Apple updates stored on it. So when you use their Wifi to download a large update like iOS, it just gets it from the local server. Home wifi is limited by the ISP, but you can get similar speeds if you were to setup a local update cache.

 

[rgarjr]

for starters, they probably have 100Mbps (down) line as for the WiFi router, I don't know if they are running AEBS or TC's.

 

[416049]

I don't know the exact speed of the apple store but I do know that my school has around 120mb connection download and 100mbit upload and its blazing fast even with multiple machines on it so i am guessing apples should be around there somewhere if not faster.

 

[goMac]

Yesterday I went to an Apple Store and I restored my iPhone via Wifi and I noticed that the Wifi speed at the store is amazing fast. How can I achieve such a speed at home? Im not even close to that...
I should have done a speakeasy test or something like that...

Any ideas?

Right now Im using an Airport Extreme and Uverse with a 24mb service.

THANKS!!!

IGHAL

Get faster internet. As others have noted, they're probably on 50 megabit or 100 megabit.

 

[ighal]

Thanks for your replies.

I just got the 24mb from 12mb and I really don't feel the difference. I don't think Im using the full 24mb with wifi because when I connect via ethernet it is much faster.

 

[paulrbeers]

Thanks for your replies.

I just got the 24mb from 12mb and I really don't feel the difference. I don't think Im using the full 24mb with wifi because when I connect via ethernet it is much faster.

Either your router is crap, you are running an old wireless b connection (i.e. 11mbps), you have a lot of interference, or the speed is just perceived as faster connected via ethernet.

Even with security overhead robbing you of half your bandwidth, even a 54G router should have the bandwidth to take full advantage of 24mb net connection.

Do a speedtest (google it) and verify that you are truly getting the speeds you think you are....

 

[Badrottie]

At home I use Time Warner RoadRunner Cable modem (Motorola Surfboard 6520 model) the wifi speed is amazing FAST then 3G network on my iP4s

 

[skorpien]

At home I use Time Warner RoadRunner Cable modem (Motorola Surfboard 6520 model) the wifi speed is amazing FAST then 3G network on my iP4s

That's comparing apples to oranges (pardon the pun). 3G (or rather 3.5G) is nowhere NEAR as fast as you'll get with even a low end ISP provider. Cable Internet will blow 3.5G out of the water every time.

OP, test your connection using speedtest as paulrbeers suggested using both Wi-Fi and wired. That will give you a place to start. If it's slow all around, it may be either your router or your modem. If only Wi-Fi is slow, you may need to switch channels on your router to avoid interference.

Also, is your Extreme connected to a router/modem combo unit? If so, have you turned off DHCP on your Extreme?

 

[hafr]

I would assume they have got a lot more than 100 Mbps in the larger stores. I mean, having only a handful of people on the network would mean the clients are down to using the same bandwidth as they are at home.

When I worked at Dell in the late 90's we had somewhere in the lines of 500/500 (Mbps) for an office with about a hundred employees (it could have been more, but average download speeds were about 5-6 MBps). And this was when double ISDN (128 Kbps) was considered fast...

So considering it feels blazing fast, and they probably want it to feel lightning fast even if they have 30-40 clients on the network, I would not be the least bit surprised if the larger stores such as 5th Av. have their own T1 (1,5 MBps).

 

[DustinT]

I would assume they have got a lot more than 100 Mbps in the larger stores. I mean, having only a handful of people on the network would mean the clients are down to using the same bandwidth as they are at home.

When I worked at Dell in the late 90's we had somewhere in the lines of 500/500 (Mbps) for an office with about a hundred employees (it could have been more, but average download speeds were about 5-6 MBps). And this was when double ISDN (128 Kbps) was considered fast...

So considering it feels blazing fast, and they probably want it to feel lightning fast even if they have 30-40 clients on the network, I would not be the least bit surprised if the larger stores such as 5th Av. have their own T1 (1,5 MBps).

Lol, I think you are getting your bits and bytes confused. A T1 doesn't provide any kind of decent high speed internet now with just 1.5 Mbps. Compared to the 24 Mbps connection mentioned earlier in this thread a T1 would provide 1\16 of the bandwidth. It's probably a safe assumption that the Apple stores have more like the 50 or 100 Mbps connection mentioned earlier by rg.

 

[0000757]

Thanks for your replies.

I just got the 24mb from 12mb and I really don't feel the difference. I don't think Im using the full 24mb with wifi because when I connect via ethernet it is much faster.

It's most likely your router. What kind do you have?

 

[hafr]

Lol, I think you are getting your bits and bytes confused. A T1 doesn't provide any kind of decent high speed internet now with just 1.5 Mbps. Compared to the 24 Mbps connection mentioned earlier in this thread a T1 would provide 1\16 of the bandwidth. It's probably a safe assumption that the Apple stores have more like the 50 or 100 Mbps connection mentioned earlier by rg.

Did you get so agitated by me wanting you to produce a single valid argument against using home plugs for the ATV2 that you felt the need to read up on my old posts just to find something to complain about? I guess I should take it as a compliment...

Yup, I remembered incorrectly. I was under the impression that a T1 was a 1.5 MBps connection. But that doesn't change anything else that I said. I still think the larger stores are using faster connections than 100 Mbps to ensure a more than decent experience even when the store is full of people.

 

[Rigged]

I wouldn't be surprised if they even had a GigE fiber circuit in each of their stores with multiple access points. Just taking a guess.

 

[theSeb]

for starters, they probably have 100Mbps (down) line as for the WiFi router, I don't know if they are running AEBS or TC's.

They won't be running either. They are running commercial wifi routers and repeaters from the likes of Cisco.

----------

I wouldn't be surprised if they even had a GigE fiber circuit in each of their stores with multiple access points. Just taking a guess.

Yup. At the very least.

 

[pgoodwin1]

You'll only get max speed when you're close to WiFi router

You have to be fairly close to the wireless router and line of site to get max speeds on an N wireless. Run the speed test at TestMy.net to give you a real world rate. Most if not all ISP speed testers give you falsely high readings because they filter the data (I.e. dropping the lowest 30% and top 10% of the measurements). on Time Warner RoadRunner, their speed test will show you having 20-25 Mbps when the real rate is less than half of that.

On TestMy.net, my average iPhone 4 speeds over the last 60 days have been about 1.5 Mbps down, 0.5 Mbps up-this includes a lot of test that were not run close to the router. The max I ever achieved was 6 Mbps down and 0.95 up.

To compare, on my 3GHz i3 iMac on wired Ethernet thru a 10/100 router and modem, the average over the same 60 days was 8.3 Mbps down and 0.8 Mbps up. The max measurements were 11.6 Mbps down and 0.9 Mbps up. Time Warner's speed test always shows 20-25 Mbps down and 0.9 Mbps up when they are running fast.

The ISP traffic load has a significant effect if they've overloaded your local neighborhood too. Time Warner Cincinnati throughput has decreased significantly since before Christmas-lots more people with new toys and games.

They say you're guaranteed 10Mbps down and 1Mbps up. They're OK on the UP, but they only meet their promise on download speeds by using modified results of their speed tester. Most of the speed testers out there use the same software to crunch the data and just put a different look to the user interface. Read more about that on the TestMy.net site...interesting reading