Gigabit/Wireless solution for 150mbit internet?

[cpu killer]

Hey all, hopefully someone can help me out with some equipment recommendation. I currently upgraded my internet to 150mbit/10mbit with Cox in my area.

 

On my network currently I have:

 

Lenovo ThinkPad T420 (Wireless, Intel Centrino Wireless-N 1000)

PS3 (Wired, Gigabit Ethernet capable)

PS4 (Wired, Gigabit Ethernet capable )

WiiU (Wireless)

Vizio E500D Internet TV (Wired, not sure if gigabit or 10/100)

 

Router:

Linksys E-1000

Linksys WRT-54G (for my legacy/Wireless-G devices, being used as an extension of my E-1000 with a seperate Wireless-G network for things like my 3DS, wireless printer)

 

Now, I don't really have any need for fast internet on my WiiU. I only download things once in a while, and the speeds it is able to get is good enough. Having it connected to a good wireless router is good enough for me.

 

With that being said, I would like to maximize my speeds on my laptop (T420), and on the PS3/PS4. Both PS3 and PS4 are wired, but my laptop is wireless. The laptop has a Intel Centrino Wireless-N 1000, which is theoretically able to handle up to 300mbps.

 

With that being said, speed tests on my laptop only show about 50-60mbps on http://www.speedtest.net using wireless. I've yet to find a solid way to test my PS4's actual speed, but my router only supports 10/100 ethernet anyways.

 

What I'm lookng for is:

 

• A router that is feature-complete, preferably supports DD-WRT, and has at least 4 gigabit ethernet ports. Should also support Wireless-N so that I can use my 150mbit internet connection fully. It would be nice to actually get the 300mbps thoroughput advertised.
• Would be awesome if the router could also have a seperate Wireless-G network, which would eliminate the need for the WRT54G to be hooked up.
• Cabling that supports gigabit ethernet for the PS3/4
• A new wireless card for my laptop, if needed? Or should the Centrino card handle the 150mbit connection with a decent router? I use my laptop about 10ft from my router 99% of the time.

Basically, I'd like to make sure I can use all 150mbit of my bandwith at home without any bottlenecks, especially on the wired PS4/my laptop. I'd love to spend less than $100, or at the most, less than $150, on the router.

 

Thanks!

[+BudMan MVC]

"It would be nice to actually get the 300mbps thoroughput advertised."

You do understand that is RAW total bandwidth and does not take into account all the overhead, etc. Those numbers are pure marketing nonsense - you will never ever ever see 300Mbps in real world number.. ie moving a file for example.

Its the same with the 54 in G.. Do you get 54, no what you get is about normally 18 to 21, maybe spike to 23 if all the stars are in order, etc. Thats if your pulling from a wired source if your ever doing wireless to wireless keep in mind your /2 your bandwidth.

That being said I highly doubt that your e1000 can even route/nat at 150mbps anyway. You can take a look on http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/router-charts/view for a router that can handle 150mpbs wan to lan.

so took a look and show

Cisco Wireless-N Router (Linksys E1000) N300: 89.5

So yeah not going to see 150 with that device for sure.

As to seeing that over wireless -- yeah you would need to go AC not just N from what I see on the above benchmarks.. Use the dropdown and you can get numbers for 2.4 and 5 download and upload, etc.

If you want to see your full 150mbps your best bet is get a router that can handle that and then use a wire.

[Ambroos]

I've got a Linksys E4200 v1 with Tomato and a laptop with a Centrino Advanced-N 6200. On a very clean spectrum I get close to 120Mbps.

 

You'll have to upgrade both your laptop and your access point significantly to reach 150Mbps.

 

To put in your laptop: http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Network-7260-HMWG-Wireless-AC-Bluetooth/dp/B00DMCVKMU/

Router: http://www.amazon.com/RT-AC66U-Dual-Band-Wireless-AC1750-Gigabit-Router/dp/B008ABOJKS/

 

With that combo at 5Ghz you should be able to get 150Mbps comfortably.

 

Replacing the WiFi card is rather easy:

[cpu killer]

"It would be nice to actually get the 300mbps thoroughput advertised."

You do understand that is RAW total bandwidth and does not take into account all the overhead, etc. Those numbers are pure marketing nonsense - you will never ever ever see 300Mbps in real world number.. ie moving a file for example.

Its the same with the 54 in G.. Do you get 54, no what you get is about normally 18 to 21, maybe spike to 23 if all the stars are in order, etc. Thats if your pulling from a wired source if your ever doing wireless to wireless keep in mind your /2 your bandwidth.

That being said I highly doubt that your e1000 can even route/nat at 150mbps anyway. You can take a look on http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/router-charts/view for a router that can handle 150mpbs wan to lan.

so took a look and show

Cisco Wireless-N Router (Linksys E1000) N300: 89.5

So yeah not going to see 150 with that device for sure.

As to seeing that over wireless -- yeah you would need to go AC not just N from what I see on the above benchmarks.. Use the dropdown and you can get numbers for 2.4 and 5 download and upload, etc.

If you want to see your full 150mbps your best bet is get a router that can handle that and then use a wire.

 

Thanks! I do realize that the 300mbps advertised doesn't include overhead. I suppose I won't be getting 150mbit on my laptop via wireless any time soon, from the limited research I've done. Seems like my best bet is the RT-N66U:

 

http://www.amazon.com/RT-N66U-Dual-Band-Wireless-N900-Gigabit-Router/dp/B006QB1RPY

 

As far as Up/Down performance on the 5ghz band. Is it fair to assume, I could set it up so the 2.4ghz band is Wireless-G? The speed for the G network doesn't really matter. It would just be nice to use one router for both networks, instead of having two set up. I'm having a hard time reading these charts:

 

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-reviews/31687-asus-rt-n66u-dark-knight-dual-band-wireless-n900-gigabit-router-reviewed?showall=&start=5

 

What should I be looking at to see relevant results for using the 5ghz band for Wireless-N and the 2.4ghz band for Wireless-G? Does that mean I'd be looking at 5ghz 2-stream performance, since one stream is being used for 2.4ghz/Wireless G? Sorry, sorta confused.

 

I've got a Linksys E4200 v1 with Tomato and a laptop with a Centrino Advanced-N 6200. On a very clean spectrum I get close to 120Mbps.

 

You'll have to upgrade both your laptop and your access point significantly to reach 150Mbps.

 

That's impressive based on the benchmarks I've seen. Kind of given up to the idea that I'll have to use wired to get full 150mbit.

 

Edit: Saw your updated post, looks useful! I'm weary if my T420 will take that wireless card, though. I've heard rumors of it not taking any wireless cards that aren't "white listed" by Lenovo. I'll have to look into that! Would that router allow me to also simultaneously have a Wireless-N network? My iPhone/girlfriend's laptop needs Wireless-N, as does my WiiU..

[Roger H. Veteran]

Yeah i was gonna say you need to replace the wireless card on the laptop as well as replacing the router as mentioned.

 

I have the Intel 6300 in mine and i get 220Mbps with that, local speeds, don't have internet that fast :p - I do get 120Mbps though from my ISP which is my current plan i'm provisioned for.

 

Getting a AC router is a no brainer at this point to ADD to your older devices. Replace the E1000 with the AC and move the E1000 to the WRT54G spot and carry on :)

 

----

To answer your question yes you need the Lenovo versions unless you do the BIOS hack (not sure if it's available for your machine). 

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-Thinkpad-IBM-T420-T520-X220-W520-Intel-Advanced-N-6300-wifi-Wireless-N-Card-/260882380175?pt=US_Internal_Network_Cards&hash=item3cbdcd358f

 

With that though you can just use it directly. 

 

With your laptop on 5Ghz you can put your 2.4Ghz N devices on the same router with that ASUS and then spread off the E1000 as i mentioned before.

[+BudMan MVC]

"It would just be nice to use one router for both networks"

You could setup G on your 2.4 and then use N or AC on 5 for your dual band routers as one way to do it. There are some people on the board that feel there is no hit or very minor hit to running G/N on same radio.. I am in the other camp - The protocol fro G to N changed drastically. There will be a performance hit running G and N devices on the same AP on the same radio - there is just no way around it. Now depending on what you do, be it you have actual active G devices, etc. Maybe you won't notice or it will be minor for you.

But I personally would not put G/N on the same radio.. I currently run a dual band 2.4 and 5 N, and have another AP for my legacy G support.. This has worked well for me, and since you will be getting a new router it seems you will have 2 older devices you could leverage for G or N even if you went AC on your new device.

I think you will get best overall performance isolating your G, N, AC protocols to their own AP and would not run in any sort of compatibility mode where one radio allows for say multiple protocols.

What exactly do you not get from the charts - could you give an example of what is confusing you, and we can talk it through.

[cpu killer]

Yeah i was gonna say you need to replace the wireless card on the laptop as well as replacing the router as mentioned.

 

I have the Intel 6300 in mine and i get 220Mbps with that, local speeds, don't have internet that fast :p - I do get 120Mbps though from my ISP which is my current plan i'm provisioned for.

 

Getting a AC router is a no brainer at this point to ADD to your older devices. Replace the E1000 with the AC and move the E1000 to the WRT54G spot and carry on :)

 

----

To answer your question yes you need the Lenovo versions unless you do the BIOS hack (not sure if it's available for your machine). 

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-Thinkpad-IBM-T420-T520-X220-W520-Intel-Advanced-N-6300-wifi-Wireless-N-Card-/260882380175?pt=US_Internal_Network_Cards&hash=item3cbdcd358f

 

With that though you can just use it directly. 

 

With your laptop on 5Ghz you can put your 2.4Ghz N devices on the same router with that ASUS and then spread off the E1000 as i mentioned before.

 

Thanks for that link! I suppose if you are using that exact card and getting 220Mbit, then I would not need anything higher. What router are you using to get those speeds?

 

 

"It would just be nice to use one router for both networks"

You could setup G on your 2.4 and then use N or AC on 5 for your dual band routers as one way to do it. There are some people on the board that feel there is no hit or very minor hit to running G/N on same radio.. I am in the other camp - The protocol fro G to N changed drastically. There will be a performance hit running G and N devices on the same AP on the same radio - there is just no way around it. Now depending on what you do, be it you have actual active G devices, etc. Maybe you won't notice or it will be minor for you.

But I personally would not put G/N on the same radio.. I currently run a dual band 2.4 and 5 N, and have another AP for my legacy G support.. This has worked well for me, and since you will be getting a new router it seems you will have 2 older devices you could leverage for G or N even if you went AC on your new device.

I think you will get best overall performance isolating your G, N, AC protocols to their own AP and would not run in any sort of compatibility mode where one radio allows for say multiple protocols.

What exactly do you not get from the charts - could you give an example of what is confusing you, and we can talk it through.

 

Ok, thanks for all the explanation! I don't understand the difference in testing between 2 stream, 3 stream, and the 40mhz B/W. I am not sure what results I should actually be looking at to accurately predict wireless performance depending on if I'm using single band or dual band (2.4ghz+5ghz N).

 

For example, am I better off getting a really good Wireless-N router, or an AC router that can also do N? Do all AC routers allow you to set them up as N?

 

Furthermore, when it states "Wireless Downlink throughput", that's the maximum achieved download speeds? Does the Down/Uplink combined throughput mean anything to me? I realize the uplink throughput is often separate, but since I only have 10mbit upload, that shouldn't matter too much.

[+BudMan MVC]

Well the number of streams would depend on your card and what your router supports. What they are talking about is spatial multiplexing.. Where you can transmit data at the same time over multiple antennas.. From a quick google this seems to explain it fairly well in lay speak ;)

http://blog.merunetworks.com/blog/2009/08/what-is-a-stream-anyway-how-802-11n-works/

I would assume you have seen routers that list themselves as N150 or N300 or N450, etc. The 300 or 450 normally mean 2 and 3 streams.. But they can also be combining the bandwidth of a dual channel. For example a dual band 300 can mean only 1 stream on 2.4 and 1 on 5, so the overall router is capable of TOTAL 300, but only 150 on each band.

I know it can get confusing if your not into this sort of thing..

As to the 40Mhz vs 20 -- this is another way to get more bandwidth with N.. Where you actually use more than 1 channel - most routers will ask if you want to go lower or higher when you go with 40Mhz, this means should router use the channel below or above the channel you pick, etc. Using more channels can get you more bandwidth but it can also cause more overlap and therefore interference if their are lots of wireless networks around.

To predict your bandwidth you would have to know if your card is MIMO and capable of more than 1 stream, etc. I would go with the lower numbers with only 1 stream and 20mhz channels, this is going to be the lowest number but that way if you get more you will be happy vs thinking oh I should get 300Mbps when you only really see half that because your only using 1 stream.

I have never seen a router not be backward capable - if if your AC, then sure it should support both N and G as options. A N router would support both N and G and quite often even B still.

The current AC routers are going to be the ones capable of your wan lan bandwidth requirement of 150 for sure. Now what you see wireless is also going to depend on what your wireless client can do.. Lets say you got a 4x4 N router, N600 using 40mhz -- if your card is not capable of 4 streams, then there is NO way you would ever see 600 if not using 40mhz then no that type of RAW bandwidth would not be possible.

What I would prob be most concerned with is that the router you pick can do wan to lan well over your 150. And unless your going to change out your wireless clients cards as well.. Not worry so the your not going to see 150Mbps over wireless - that N66U router does get good reviews, and is supported by 3rd party so prob a good overall choice. If you don't want to pay the extra AC price to maybe future proof yourself, etc. That being said even if you don't have any AC clients - AC router will do N and G, etc. So what you end up getting really comes down to how much money you want to spend :)

[+Raze Subscriber²]

I can vouch for the Asus RT-N66U.  I use it both wired - 1 desktop and blu-ray player and wireless - 1 desktop (5 ghz), 1 laptop (5 ghz), 3 tablets (2.4 ghz), 1 Kindle (2.4 ghz) and 1 smartphone (2.4ghz).  I use Merlin's firmware and I haven't had any problems with the router, it has been reliable and fast.

[+Fahim S. MVC]

Edit: Saw your updated post, looks useful! I'm weary if my T420 will take that wireless card, though. I've heard rumors of it not taking any wireless cards that aren't "white listed" by Lenovo. I'll have to look into that! Would that router allow me to also simultaneously have a Wireless-N network? My iPhone/girlfriend's laptop needs Wireless-N, as does my WiiU..

This is quite true. ThinkPads will only take white listed cards (one with a Lenovo FRU compatible with your machine, not just any FRU or even the non-Lenovo version of the same card that is compatible with your machine won't work unless you install a hacked BIOS). They aren't hard to get hold of though.

[cpu killer]

Just wanted to update everyone on what I ended up doing, as someone might have the same question/want to achieve the same result.

 

I went with the following router:

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CUD1KJK/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

And the following card:

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833106190

 

And the following hack to allow ThinkPad T420 to use any WLAN card:

 

Source: http://www.bios-mods.com/forum/Thread-REQUEST-Whitelist-Removal-Lenovo-ThinkPad-T420-ver-1-45

File: https://app.box.com/s/bc5hsqosphd3zos8x50c

 

And am now getting at least the full speed given to me by my WAN.

 

 

I have the router set to A/G/N on the 2.4ghz band, and A/N/AC on the 5ghz band. Working flawlessly, I was getting about 80mbit on the A/G/N network using my old Centrino Wireless-N 1000.

 

To add, my girlfriend's Acer Aspire S3 is also getting the same speeds on a Qualcomm Atheros AR5BMD222 .These speeds are identical to speed when I'm wired directly to the modem, so I am seeing almost no loss in speed.

 

Thanks for all the help!