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    Visibly Fluctuating Wireless Connection Speeds

    Discussion in 'Networking and Wireless' started by robastewart, Apr 4, 2007.

  1. robastewart

    robastewart Notebook Geek

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    Over the past few days I have noticed considerably decreased efficiency in my wireless connection. Normally, the signal strength indicates speeds of between 24 and 36 Mbps, with only occasional drops to 18 Mbps. Lately it has maintained in the single-digit Mbps speeds, even as low as 1.0 Mbps. I opened XP's wireless network connection status window to check the speed, and can actually see the counter fluctuating, from 8 Mbps down to 1, up to 11 back down to 2, up to 9, back to 1, etc., and so on.

    The components are:
    wireless adapter: 802.11g MiniPCI Wireless Adapter
    router: Linksys WRT54G
    modem: Cable
    computer: Sager NP9750 (Clevo D900K) notebook, OS: WinXP Home SP2

    I have done the "Repair this connection" click in Windows network connection profile, with no improvement. What might be the problem here? What can be done about it?

    Your good ideas are much appreciated, in advance.
     
    robastewart, Apr 4, 2007
    #1
  2. Ethyriel

    Ethyriel Notebook Deity

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    What's the wlan chip, Intel 3945ABG?
    How far are you from the router?
     
    Ethyriel, Apr 4, 2007
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  3. robastewart

    robastewart Notebook Geek

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    It is a Ralink device. The router is about 50ft away, with a couple of walls between, but open doorways directly along the path.
     
    robastewart, Apr 4, 2007
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  4. WackyT

    WackyT Notebook Deity

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    Have you tried changing your wireless router to another channel?
     
    WackyT, Apr 4, 2007
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  5. andrew.brandon

    andrew.brandon Notebook Evangelist

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    I second that. sounds like someone might be running somehting on the same channel and its messing up the signal.
     
    andrew.brandon, Apr 4, 2007
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  6. blue68f100

    blue68f100 Notebook Virtuoso

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    The Raylink card is junk, at least my 2500 is. I have one and it want maintain a connection 10 ft from the router. Check to see if Raylink has any newer drives. They had 1 a year ago which fixed the constant drop connections. But the speed and distance was nill.

    At those distance you should have a 54mpbs connection. I bought a pcmci card to fix my problem. But I have considered replacing the mini-pci card.
     
    blue68f100, Apr 4, 2007
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  7. Ethyriel

    Ethyriel Notebook Deity

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    If the channel switching and driver upgrade don't fix it, I suggest booting into an Ubuntu live CD and seeing how things go there. It should detect the ralink card automatically, and the drivers are really quite good (I use an rt2500 in an old desktop.) This should tell you if you have a software or hardware problem.
     
    Ethyriel, Apr 4, 2007
    #7