Intel AC-7260 Wireless Card 5ghz Test

Got the Intel AC-7260 wireless card from GentechPC 2 days ago.

My Setup:
MSI GT780DX notebook.
240GB Sandisk Extreme SSD
16GB DDR3-1333
Windows 8 Pro x64 w/all updates
Avast Free Edition AV
Intel AC-7260
2 x Tyco Antennas

Netgear R6300 802.11ac Router

All testing was done from a position approx 5 meters from the router and in line of sight with no walls or floors between the notebook and router.

 

cool, do you have any jperf tests ?

i use multiple threads (5-10) to get the max out of the wifi tests.

https://code.google.com/p/xjperf/
or
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Network-Tools/Network-Testing/JPerf.shtml

 

Download speed seems not that great 80~90Mbps

 

Your testing methods are not ideal to truly see the performance of the 7260 because the internet is your bottleneck.

Bust out the stopwatch and do some local file transfers (upload and download) of a single large file (~2GB) and a folder with 1000s of small files (~500MB total).

How so? He is getting the full download speed over wireless. But as I mentioned above, 80-90Mbps is 1/10 of his wireless card capabilities so we aren't see the true benefit of the 7260 in his tests.

 

i'd really like actual LAN throughput numbers if someone can provide some. it would help to make a decision, i'd like to ditch the network cable for high speed lan transfers once and for all.

One would need a computer with a gigabit nic & 802.11ac router, to overload the ac-7260 right now @ 867mbps

Can someone do tests with jperf on their laptop+802.11ac and another wired computer ?

https://code.google.com/p/xjperf/

install java and jperf on both computers, 1 wired 1 wifi, then set up one as server and one as client and click the run button, see what happens. add a couple parallel stream or connections for overloading the bandwidth and wamo, max speeds baby !

 

Everyone in seoul have gigabit internet?

 

I agree with smitty123- LAN is where it matters. You can achieve 90-100mbps on 802.11n. Hell I get 10-12MB/s (80-100mbps) on a 300mbps Wi-fi card when uploading to NAS.
802.11ac needs to be properly tested on LAN both in terms of upload and download from a device that is wired into the router and fast enough to provide reliable source.

 

Pardon my jumping in here. Does anybody use LAN Speed Test?

LAN Speed Test

I've only used the free "lite" version, but it comes in handy when I want to check out my internal network.

 

i like it, but the only thing i can see is there could be some bottlenecking from the HDD or another subsystem/antivirus with the lite version since it uses a folder/share on the other computer, you might be able to alleviate part of that with an SSD on a SATA2 or 3 setup.

Or a ramdisk http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk

As far as ease of use goes, Lan Speed Test is hard to beat and at only 11$ for both client and server components, if its reliable, is not a bad deal.

JPERF has more options to tweak tho, can render graphs, and is pure network testing no other subsystems involved. And is free.

i wonder what other programs we can test, i'm open to suggestions

 

https://code.google.com/p/iperf3-cygwin-gui/

jperf gui with newer iperf code

 

Seriously though- it's supposed to be a practical test so let's not get into a debate of which tool is better.
As far as I'm concerned copying files to and from the NAS using TeraCopy is a perfectly valid test. Millage will vary anyway but it would be nice to know what sort of speed can be expected.

 

it depends what cpu you have in your nas. but if you have an ARM cpu like mine, forget about speed. mine has a dual core ARM 1.2ghz can barely do 40MB/s. i'd be better off copying ramdisk to ramdisk on both computers via the router.

i tried Iperf3-Cygwin-GUI v3.0b4-03, good find. it's in beta and has some options disabled, but it uses iperf3.

 

We're talking about Wi-Fi transfers here. If you get 40MB/s of actual data transfer it's gonna be awesome. Looking at smallnetbuilder it looks like 250mbps is an actual throughput of the fastest 802.11ac 1750mbps device they tested- that is around 30MB/s.

I'm going to be very pleased when (or rather if) my NAS ends up being a bottleneck

 

Anandtech did a test using the macbook air, I think they got pretty good lan result but Mac os is messing up the file transfer test.

 

I don't wanna sound like a naysayer but after the ridiculously unprofessional review of the Killer card they made I don't even wanna know.
Unless some reputable (networking-wise) source like smallnetbuilder provides some test results I would actually take tests made by our members over whatever Anandtech wrote.

Take this as a word of encouragement

 

From the arstechnica comparison of the MBA 2012 and 2013:

Source: Same wrapper, all-new candy center: The 2013 MacBook Air reviewed | Ars Technica.

The testing method Andrew Cunningham used is also listed in the article.

Those wired-wireless numbers for OS X on AC are seriously disappointing, no better than a good 450 Mbps N setup under Windows really. The Windows throughput is downright awesome on the other hand.

 

While the test methodology gives you the best case results (nothing wrong with that) it's still pretty impressive.
I was waiting for 802.11ac to upgrade. Goodbye to the wire...

 

Yeah, large file transfers are the best case, but still, it is pretty much double the throughput of 3 stream wireless N on 5 GHz and that is on two stream AC.

Give me an AC 7360 and I'm putting it in my M6700 and upgrading my router (again!).

 

here's the article in question:
AnandTech | The 2013 MacBook Air Review (13-inch)

interesting read indeed, so its a problem in OSX with the algorithm in charge of tcp window size not scaling above 64kb on demand.

i wonder if windows 7 is also afflicted with that scaling algorithm,i doubt it but if they followed the algorithm like apple did, it might have it. Just speculating. if so, i would hope for an update as well soon.

but in the meantime in JPERF you can set the TCP Window size to 256kb and other various settings.

i tested it myself just now in jperf on my Killer 1103-N
with a tcp window of 64kb = 108mbps (1 stream)
then 256kb = 147mbps

and even 512kb just for fun = 156mbps and up to 184mbps, it had a hard time going over 200mbps in that configuration but it manages a few times to go up to 204 and 207.

take these with a grain of salt, they're just simple tests and observations, and 2 antennas, not 3.

idk how much better an ac would do, double that speed would justify buying it right away, to me anyway.

 

How do you come up with 7360?

 

Just a guess on the model number, it could be a 7300 for all I know.

 

i would also wait for another ac card on the market and compare them.

its very disappointing that we can connect at these very high speeds (450/867mbps) but can't really transfer at these speeds.

it would take a lot of detective work to figure out all the causes of interferences .

Perso i'm starting to wonder if my antennas might be part of the cause, anyone know if there's a way to test for antennas quality ?

The WirelessMon program in WTP's 1st post, shows a signal strenght (shaped like a target), would that be it ?

 

It's not just interference, there is overhead involved due to the communication protocols used and that is not something that you can just make disappear. Those protocols exist for a reason, for example, to insure that there is no data loss. Basically, even with zero interference, you'd still get less than the link rate in actual usable throughput. Adding the overhead + throughput you get should give you the link rate in a zero interference environment.

 

I miss my internet from Japan. The internet where I am now is a joke by comparison. I would love to live in Korea for two reasons, first reason is amazing internet. second reason, hot girls.

 

I've been in The Land Of The Morning Calm a number of years and I can say that the Internet I have had is stellar and cheap.

My high rise apartment building complex is centrally wired.

My monthly package of Internet,300 channel Internet TV and Internet phone costs about $30 with a 3 year contract.I just switched from LG to SK service and got a $300 instant cash rebate for signing.

As for the hot girls....same percentage rate as anywhere else I imagine.On hot summer days there's some nice scenery to be enjoyed.Most of the women are slim and act feminine

EDIT:the grass always looks greener....

Definitely not all pluses living here

Food prices very high
130% tax on beer
$8 per gallon gas
Tax on almost everything you buy
20% duty on shipments

 

I agree. Japan was pretty similar on taxing and gas prices (didn't have a car so didn't bother me much). Another non-plus would be the terribly humid summers.

 

Windows 7 drivers anywhere yet? I have the card, but not ready to install Win 8 just to test. Come on INTEL!

 

Jarred Walton at Anandtech just did a small 3 page mini review of 802.11ac
it's just to wet your whistle while we wait

AnandTech | The Joys of 802.11ac WiFi

 

Agreed! This is not funny anymore! Product is out. Where is the support?

 

C'mon, we all know the Intel monkeys suck at drivers. They couldn't write a decent one even if their life depended on it.. Should've considered that before buying the cards guys XD
~Aeny

 

PandaboardES? I've tried the ramdisk method. I've even tried RAID0 USB flash drives. It won't ever be fast. Trust me. Overclocking it from 1.2 to 1.5 helped.

 

It is advertised all over the place as supporting Windows 7. This isn't a case of RTFM.

 

Don't expect any support from Intel on these cards. I have the AC 7260 and have experienced odd signal strength dropouts. I contacted them, and the response was basically "These cards are meant to be installed by OEM. If you installed this yourself, and it's not supported by your OEM, then we can't help you." So, if you want Windows 7 drivers you'll probably have to wait until an OEM gets around to providing new laptops that come with this card AND Windows 7. My bet is that when laptops are sold with this card, they will have Windows 8 on them, so the push is to get those drivers working first.

 

Sager has released Win 7 drivers for this card. Not sure if it will work with other machines though.

 

They don't work irrc, mentioned in other thread, the inf is still the windows 8 one.

 

There's a new driver v16.1.0.14 posted on the Sager site TODAY....July 15,2013

There's one listed for Windows 7 and one for Windows 8...enjoy(both are same driver)

I'm going to try them on my MSI.

Software Upgrade

EDIT:Varified that the 16.1.0.14 driver downloaded from Sager is working on Windows 7 in my MSI GT780DX with AC-7260 Intel wireless card.

The driver supports both the 32bit and 64bit versions of Windows XP,Vista,W7,W8.and Windows 8.1 Preview.

There's no included Bluetooth driver.

When I enabled Bluetooth on my MSi by pressing the Bluetooth button on the Touchbar basic drivers were installed

 

The sager drivers work on msi, excellent news !

i'm tempted, or should i wait for the next AC card , one that actually goes at 1200mbps or more...

 

Got them installed! it's funny but I am getting same Down and Up speeds with lower ping than with "advertised" Killer Wireless cards to the same server.

 

lower ping is always good, looks like you've got a + from installing these.

 

Wrong thread, whoops.

 

Any results with N-routers