I'm about as new as it gets to DD-WRT. I bought a Netgear because I was tired of .11g speeds and this one is supposed to provide better coverage as well. The stock firmware was ok for me but whenever I opened BitComet the router would feak out and reboot. I put King's 23430M firmware on it and now it doesn't reboot.
I spent a few hours tinkering with it last night and getting some settings changed and adding a guest network. I noticed that the rate for the 5Ghz int is only 144Mbps and the 2.4Ghz is 218.5Mbps. When I connect to the 2.4Ghz the rate drops to 144/130. Sometimes I'll see the 5Ghz rate go up but when I connect it immediately drops similar to the 2.4Ghz 144/130. With the stock firmware I could connect between 144/300Mbps. I'm viewing these speeds on the WLAN adapter on my laptop which is right next to the router and on the status page.
My wireless settings are as follows:
2.4Ghz
- Security Mode: WPA2 Personal / AES
- Network Mode: Mixed
- Channel: 8 (40 Mhz / Upper)
5Ghz
- Security Mode: WPA2 Personal / AES
- Network Mode: Mixed
- Channel: Auto (40 Mhz / Lower) (not many people have 5Ghz around me)
- Explicit / Implicit Beamforming: Both Enabled
Everything for both radios is default on the advanced tabs including power (71mW). I fooled around with some of the channel settings in the Basic Settings tab which sometimes made the rate drop but I can't get connected above 144Mbps. I've seen stuff about ACK Intervals but I don't see that setting in the GUI. If it is a manual command then I will insert it into the config if someone tells me what the command is and what the settings should be.
So to recap, I have a laptops with an A/G/N WLAN card that used to be able to connect at 300Mbps with stock firmware. Now with DD-WRT the advertised (in status page) and actual connection rates seem to be capped at 144Mbps at best. Any help would be awesome.
Just some info on me. I'm an IT guy who primarily works with Windows/Citrix/VMware. I know basic networking and wireless. The stuff in the advanced tabs is foreign to me so I don't usually mess with that stuff unless told to. I love command line (strange for a Windows guy) so if I have to telnet into it I'm fearless.
Thanks for the help. If anyone needs screenshots just let me know.
Auto channel does not work for channel width other than 20Mhz.
Thus for 40/80 Mhz width you must set the wireless channel.
While the radio can be told to force 300mbps connection rate it will produce lots of errors if the signal is bad or if there is interference or signal overdrive, thus throughput can drop.
If the client is right next to the router, then 71mW is way to high, you can compare that to someone screaming in your ear.
Also for intel centrino clients (e.g. INtel 6250/6300) right now beamforming should be turned off, as intel drivers are buggy right now.
How can you force a specific data rate?
I disabled Beamforming and the data rate went up to 300Mbps on the 5Ghz. I ran some file transfers and monitored the bandwidth graphs. While it wasn't ever a consistent line, more like a sine wave, I could get throughput up to ~180Mbps which I was happy about.
I was running InSSIDer and found a decent channel for the 2.4Ghz radio and the 5Ghz was pretty much wide open around me.
On another note and this is just something I noticed. When there is no connection the wireless rate might show a value that isn't sustainable. Like once the 2.4Ghz showed over 200Mbps and the 5Ghz showed 600Mbps. When a connection is established, the rate changes to the max rate of that connection. I connected my .11g phone and the rate dropped to 58Mbps and stayed there after disconnect but my laptop still connected at 144Mbps on the 2.4Ghz. This was just something I noticed.
If you can tell me how to force a specific data rate I'd be interested in playing around with it. As you stated, I'm fully aware that it could adversely affect the connection.
Thanks for your help. Disabling Beamforming is what got the 5Ghz throughput increased for me.
Kong, any further guidance on txpwr and other WL0 and WL1 Advanced Settings on the R7000? Or point me to an authoritative guide or post for where this is listed?
Thanks in advance...
http://tips.desipro.de/