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poor wireless performance on laptop
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Posted by: oderus1671
hey all, my wifes laptop is slowly but surely causeing me to want to bash my head against the wall! Shes got an HP pavilion zt3000, with the Intel PRO Wireless 2200BG wireless lan built in. She always has a perfect signal, 50-54mbps, no lower than 40's. Runs spybot and adaware twice a week, full virus scan every week, she uses it at the kitchen table which is in direct line of site to the router, a Micro$oft router by the way. (Thinking this is my problem.) Anyways, I will get the model # of the router in a while. So has anyone ever tweaked the wireless settings i their laptops? I am currently using all the default settings in the configuration screen of the wireless adapter. Was wondering if anyone knows where to find a tweaking guide online to maximize performance of this wireless dog turd of hers!
OS is current, drivers are current, Im at a loss here... Got any ideas?
Posted by: thtadthtshldntb
Just because she connects at 11G bandwidth does not mean that the router traffic using it. For example if there is also an 11B adapter connecting with it, overall traffic will be slower.
One other thing, make sure that the router firmware and the laptops firmware and bios and drivers are up to date.
Stupid question, are you sure that she is connecting to your Microscam router...
Posted by: oderus1671
yea, it connects to the connection that I created to the home network. Windows XP doesnt find any others than mine, guess its because I live around a bunch of hillbillys that prolly never seen a computer before.  Works out for me!
Posted by: PsychoMonkey
I see that you have cable with a 3MB connection. What kind of speed is your wife's laptop running on average with a speed test?
Posted by: oderus1671
usually she gets about 3/4 of what i get on my wired pc, so it would usually be about 2mb. but when it gets slow, it REALLY dies. takes minutes to open google... I use dslreports.com for speed tests.
Posted by: PsychoMonkey
Sometimes slow connection on wireless can be due to interferance. Do you have any 2.4Ghz wireless phones in your home? Any microwaves near the computer or router? Any Fish tanks? 
Posted by: thtadthtshldntb
Is anyone else, that you don't know of, connecting to your router? This would be similar to what I said above?
Next time you are having the problem, go to your desktop and look in the router, see if there is anyone else using bandwidth.
Also, is the laptop bios and drivers up to date?
Posted by: oderus1671
we have a 5.8 ghz phone, 1 microwave in the next room, but is used rarely. drivers, bios, ect recently updated. Will the microwave interfere even when not running? also, how do i check to see who is connected to my router?
Posted by: PsychoMonkey
Usually to log into your router, you open a web browser and go to
http://192.168.0.1
or
http://192.168.1.1
(actual ip address may vary)
It allows you to log into your router and usually gives you a "connected device" table.
(again, varies by router)
Also it will allow you to check the current firmware on the router to make sure its up to date. (Props to thtadthtshldntb)
Posted by: thtadthtshldntb
thanks...
anyway, my other firmware/bios/drivers question pertains to your wife's laptop. Is it up to date?
Interference from a microwave or cordless phone is unlikely unless they are right next to the device.
One other thing, look in you wife's laptop wire device settings and see what power level it is running at.
Posted by: lcousins
power to the wireless router itself?? i've had similar problems with a laptop connecting to a wireless access point, couldnt figure out why, ended up using a multi adapter at the voltage (or ampage, whichever you can change, im no electrician :P) setting that the access point suggested and it works fine, it appeared that the power supply it shipped with wasnt doing what it was supposed to.
another reach in the dark, at work we were having problems getting laptops to connect to a particular wireless router, all the laptops that came with its own wireless management software was fine but all the ones that just used the built in xp tool couldnt connect. ended up installing the software that came with a wireless card for one of the desktops on all the laptops and they all connected and stayed connected fine
good luck!
Posted by: webknowhow
just another quick shot in the dark..is your wireless encrypted or open. I know some routers wont work at full speed on wifi unless its encrypted with a PSK...
Posted by: DemonBob
Also, try changing the channel that the wireless router uses, some wireless devices work better on a different channel. I had this problem with my desktop PC when i put a wireless PCI card in it. It would connect sometimes, and when it did, it was painfully slow. So I ended up switching the channel that the wireless uses in the router, and now everything works great.
Posted by: Ion Silverbolt
Indeed. Most people leave their wireless at the default channel. So if there is a lot of nearly wireless traffic, I would switch to a different channel.
You also might check the wireless card settings in the device manager. It's not uncommon for the Intel wireless cards to run in powersave mode even when connectd to AC power. I had the same problem with an earlier linux driver and the default settings in windows 2000. ALthough i'm using a centrino wireless minipci card in a non-centrino laptop. It runs awsome now.
Posted by: matt.modica
You can change the settings of the wireless network adapter for higher bandwidth or greater range. Thats all I've done to mine.
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