Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

[Tomekeuro85]

Did limited searching so far, but here's my problem..

I have a comcast modem, where I get a consistent 25mbps with a wired connection to any device (ps3, laptop, desktop, etc)

I also have a Cisco wrt210N wireless router. Speeds typically hover around 10mbps. On rare occasion they go up to 18-20mbps.

Connection is secure, WPA 2 personal.

Last 3 or 4 days, my connection has been at .3- .5 mbps, terribly slow. The modem wired connection is still 25mpbs.

Ive tried to unplug the router and reset it, and that has not helped. Any ideas?

 

[gimpy]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Is there an available firmware update?

 

[Tomekeuro85]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

I'm not sure, but I can say i Haven't updated it in the 3 years I've had it.

 

[turbohardtop]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

When it is slow log into the router and see if anything else is associated to the wireless router. Wireless is weird in that sense that if someone is associated at a lower rate, it would take a lot of airtime to transmit something and that could be one of the reasons why you see slow transfer rate. Also, are you running 2.4GHz or 5? There are lots of devices that could cause interference on the 2.4GHz spectrum. Microware or bluetooth devices are notorious for causing interference.

 

[Palehorse68]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Get a new wireless router..was have similar issues and went to best buy and bought an $80 router...no problems since. I also for shits & giggles named my wireless "FBI Van #2"...haha

 

[BALLISTIC]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

WLANs are not as fast or as reliable as a hard line, they are for convenience. I have had trouble with USB WLAN adapters cycling, and some interference issues, but definitely update the firmware of your router, and while you are at it, update your WLAN adapter's driver.

 

[Jayne]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Try to ping the router from your laptop or something on the wireless and look for packet loss and latency. It should look something like this:

$ ping 192.168.0.1
PING 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=1.298 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=1.441 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=1.469 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=1.199 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=64 time=1.364 ms

those 1.x ms responses are good. If you start seeing 10,100,1000 or more ms between packets, you know there is a congestion problem but your packets are getting through.

If you see something lots of lines like this:

$ ping 192.168.0.1
PING 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1): 56 data bytes
Request timeout for icmp_seq 0
Request timeout for icmp_seq 1
Request timeout for icmp_seq 2
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=223.497 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.0.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=64 time=156.469 ms
Request timeout for icmp_seq 5

then you're dropping packets all together and that's bad for a lot of reasons I won't go into here.

Wireless is a shared resource so if latency is high but packets are flowing it can just mean that all your neighbors are streaming porn too and using up the fixed bandwidth of the wifi spectrum. Dropping on the other hand usually means something is really wrong such as interference from other sources, etc.

I had the second happen at the house and it took me forever to figure it out. The antennas on the wifi router got bumped just a little off and mac book airs are super sensitive to wifi. My MBP worked fine sitting right next to the wife's air. I spent a good couple hours doing packet dumps and all sorts of chicken sacrifice before I realized the antennas had been flatted out in a fit of cleaning earlier in the day.

And/or, buy a new router. The radios in these cheap ass routers do eventually die. Yours might be on the way out. I've cooked a few routers over the years, they are TXing pretty much 24x7x365 and aren't exactly built from the best components out there.

Or there could be too much lead in your house, send me half your ammo. If that doesn't clear it up, send me the other half.

 

[gimpy]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

I'm not an Apple lover, but if you do buy another router, look at their $99 router. It will be one of the most user-friendly ones you can get. I just picked one up after my other router started to give me hell. I have no desire to do my job at home.

 

[Queequeg]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Sorry, thought you meant Cordless

 

[Tomekeuro85]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

I'm surprised that at my age I'm this illiterate in the world of relatively basic computer issues.

Most of the replies are way beyond my knowledge... Firmware? Ping? doesn't ring a bell haha.

I'll try to do what Jayne said. if that doesn't work, I'll get a new one and be done with it.



Thanks fellers. I'll be back with more questions I'm sure.

 

[xray9]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

I'm with you, for myself I just hire a $50/hr. computer guy who does this for a living and it's solved. xray9

 

[zmann]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Make sure you are connected to your AP and not the neighbors 'new' AP that has a SSID that you might have connected to at the coffee shop. Rare case, but never know.

 

[Tomekeuro85]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

ok so looks like it sent 4 packets, all were received, none were lost. slowest time was 98ms.


Speed test right now from speedtest.net shows me 1.4mbps download, .2 upload.

I'm just gonna go grab a new router.

 

[Inogame]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Tomekeuro,

I was in the same boat as you about 6 months ago. I turned my modem into the cable company and bought a new one myself (save on the rental fees they get you with)

Motorola makes a really nice cable/wifi modem/router combo that solved all my problems.
My old modem was way old.

Here's what I bought its pricy but even though I downgraded my internet speed through the cable company it runs faster @ my PC.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16825122014

There might be better stuff available now, like I said I picked this up a while ago.

 

[jayd4wg]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

I'll second the "replace the cable modem with a combo wireless router/cable modem combo", try to stick with the motorola surfboard line.

Also, all encryption is hackable, albeit some easier than others. WPA2 should suffice in a residential area unless you have a kid with a propensity to try to screw around a couple doors away.

Things i do to lock my stuff down - obscure SSID names, and DO NOT BROADCAST. Also, the stronger your encryption, the less perceived bandwidth you will have. Also, DHCP is nice when you want others on your network, but i rarely enable it as it's just me, my wife, 2 kids and our dozen or so wireless devices around the house. I chopped my IP block into a much smaller /28 in the middle of a 172.30.x.x range and only a small subset of this range, with all devices on the network statically assigned. I also mac filter on the router itself. I take my home network pretty seriously and leave very little available to hack.

what sounds like is going on in your case though is you probably have an interface mismatch with the duplex and speed of the ports. if both are set to auto auto from the beginning and you suddenly lost speed, something is wrong and you should manually reset the wireless router. if you can, hard code the interface to 100/full or gig/full if possible and ensure the cable modem is the same. mismatch like this is what brings corporate networks to a screaming halt when a router jockey gets on the phone with me and screams about bandwidth, this is generally where I find the errors. I can likely help but not from here and i don't want the liability of remote access to the hardware in question. I wish you luck and wish you were in Pittsburgh, i'd be more than willing to assist, this is one of the things i do to pay for my "habit"

 

[Jayne]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: JasonB</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> Also, the stronger your encryption, the less perceived bandwidth you will have.</div></div>

Is that just due to the delay as the router encrypts/decrypts the traffic?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">/28 in the middle of a 172.30.x.x range and only a small subset of this range </div></div>

damn, hard core. I thought I was taking it up a notch only doing static DHCP and mac filtering. I have left a non-static dhcp block though for visitors so I can just give them a password and not have to dork with the router, but those IPs are firewalled from my internal servers. No reason for any guests to get to my internal hosts.

If you're worried about the local kid cracking the encryption and sniffing traffic, you can always setup an ssh tunnel to a wired server and pass your web traffic through it to a proxy/cache on the wired host. I actually set that up when I was out of the US in a country that really censored the internet. One quick ssh tunnel and I was browsing from home. Take that communist censors!

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">what sounds like is going on in your case though is you probably have an interface mismatch with the duplex and speed of the ports. </div></div>

If no hardware was changed how would that come about? I've seen that happen when one end or the other is changed and the autoneg gets bungled up but never without some sort of change.

 

[Jayne]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: zmann</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Make sure you are connected to your AP and not the neighbors 'new' AP that has a SSID that you might have connected to at the coffee shop. Rare case, but never know. </div></div>

That's why you go with JasonB's suggestion and make your home ssid some nonsensical string that isn't likely to match FreeWiFi or the ever popular "netgear" that I see around so often in my neighborhood.

 

[Tomekeuro85]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

hahah I'm so lost with those posts... I don't know what any of that stuff means.

Luckily I bought myself a new router and it works like a charm now.

 

[Jayne]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Tomekeuro85</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Luckily I bought myself a new router and it works like a charm now.
</div></div>

Can you re-run your ping test now just to see if it's better? 98ms sucks.

 

[redirt78]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

Tagged for info. I called Windsteam because my download speem was 1.6 and upload was .6

They said too many people are running off of the same equipment in my area and have been working on it since September. I got two free months and $10 off per month for a year.

You might have the same sort of problem, call whoever your service is with and check. Never hurts to ask.

 

[Tomekeuro85]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Jayne</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Tomekeuro85</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Luckily I bought myself a new router and it works like a charm now.
</div></div>

Can you re-run your ping test now just to see if it's better? 98ms sucks.
</div></div>


Yea I'll take a look when I get home today

Pardon the poor phrasing of this, but hopefully you get an idea of what I'm asking.... Is there a way to change to a different "channel" or "frequency" that, like you said, is not the default and is less commonly used and therefore faster?

Most locations in my house are back up to fast normal speeds, except one location that is literally on the opposite end of the house from the router. The wireless dvd/netflix/tv player is getting a bit slow from time to time, and signal strength is a bit lower than everywhere else. My neighbor's signal strengths are more than mine in some cases in that room.

I bought this: http://homesupport.cisco.com/en-us/support/routers/E2500

 

[Jayne]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Tomekeuro85</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Pardon the poor phrasing of this, but hopefully you get an idea of what I'm asking.... Is there a way to change to a different "channel" or "frequency" that, like you said, is not the default and is less commonly used and therefore faster? </div></div>

Yep, in the manual that's available at that link you sent (page 28) it says to go to the wireless tab in the GUI and you can change the channel, however, it also says:

<span style="font-style: italic">Channel—Choose the operating channel for each band . Your router will automatically select the channel with the least amount of interference if you leave the default Auto or Auto (DFS) setting . We recommend keeping the default settings for both bands .</span>

So, it sounds like it does the right thing out of the box, although what does it mean by "interference"? Other users or does it just measure the noise floor and pick the quietest one even if it's got other wifi users on it? Maybe something you can play around with when you've got nothing better to do.

All this work talk is making me feel like it's Monday and I'm in the office. I'm going to go load some shotgun shells to make myself remember it's the weekend.

 

[zmann]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

If you have a android device, download "Wifi Analyzer" and run that app.... it will show you what channels the other AP's are running.... Channel 1, 6, and 11 are the non-overlapping channels.

Z

 

[Tomekeuro85]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

I don't unfortunately have anything android.

Most recent ping test was:

4 packets sent, none lost.

1ms
1ms
1ms
25ms

Speed is in the 10mpbs +/- 1mbps range.

Howcome some times its 20, and hours later its 8? Any reason for that? Assuming no other devices are being used.

 

[zmann]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

If your internet provider is a cable company, you basically "share" your bandwidth with the other households (Modems) in that Node/area.

One thing most people don't understand is that, for example, my city is getting Google Fiber (700 MB/s real world speeds)...however, you will very rarely use that type of bandwidth.

Streaming a movie on netflix for example is less than 1 Mb/s...

 

[Strykervet]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Palehorse68</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Get a new wireless router..was have similar issues and went to best buy and bought an $80 router...no problems since. I also for shits & giggles named my wireless "FBI Van #2"...haha</div></div>

That is fucking hilarious. I may have to do that.

 

[svons7]

Re: Anyone here good with wireless router issues?

ultimately the wireless radio is the first part to fail on most routers. It will start with intermittent speed loss or dropping the connection all together.

Rarely wireless interference on a certain channel will cause this like others have mention above.

If you don't want to try replacing the router just yet i would try different channels to see if any test better.

also are you testing the wireless connection with multiple devices or just one?