Trying to get above 4mbps with 802.11b (old equip). Help.

Router: Netgear BEFW11S4, firmware=1.45.10 (802.11b)
Client: 2wire Wireless Ethernet Client (802.11b)

Problem: router is one story above client. Exactly above it, give or
take 2 feet. The fastest I can get is 4.3mbps. I've tried Channels
1,3,5,6,9,10,11 and 4.2 steady is the best I can get. According to
the 2wire manual it can go up to 22, whereas the ancient BEFW11 can go
up to 11. Either way, 4 seems really low. I've tried putting the
antennas perpendicular to the other, parallel to each other, even both
facing straight up and down, both North-South, both East-West. I've
tried putting the boxes parallel to each other, perpendicular to each
other, even both sitting up & down. No dice. I can get lower speeds,
but 4.2 appears to be it.

What should I be trying next? The only wire in the floor (residential
house) are the speaker wires in the floor, and I've tried moving a
couple feet away from them, no dice.

Any help greatly appreciated.

On 14 May 2007 21:06:11 -0700, bourgon@gmail.com wrote:

>Router: Netgear BEFW11S4, firmware=1.45.10 (802.11b)

I have a BEFW11S4v4. Piece of junk. Hangs all the time.

>Client: 2wire Wireless Ethernet Client (802.11b)

>Problem: router is one story above client. Exactly above it, give or
>take 2 feet. The fastest I can get is 4.3mbps.

Under ideal conditions, 802.11b at 11Mbits/sec will do 5.9Mbits/sec
maximum TCP thruput. 4.0 to 4.5 is more typical.
<http://wireless.wikia.com/wiki/Wi-Fi#Performance_and_Speed>

>1,3,5,6,9,10,11 and 4.2 steady is the best I can get. According to
>the 2wire manual it can go up to 22, whereas the ancient BEFW11 can go
>up to 11.

Nope. That's the wireless connection speed. There's all kinds of
overhead involved in 802.11 wi-fi. A good rule of thumb is that your
TCP thruput will be half your connection speed. You're connecting at
11Mbits/sec so your max thruput is about half that.

>What should I be trying next?

All new hardware. Get 802.11g hardware that will do 54Mbits/sec
wireless connection speed, and about 22-25Mbits/sec thruput (under
ideal conditions).

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558 jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

On May 15, 12:21 am, Jeff Liebermann <j...@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us>
wrote:
> I have a BEFW11S4v4. Piece of junk. Hangs all the time.

Hmmm... wonder if that's the other problem I run into from time to
time, where I can't hit the net. I'd thought it was the

> Under ideal conditions, 802.11b at 11Mbits/sec will do 5.9Mbits/sec
> maximum TCP thruput. 4.0 to 4.5 is more typical.
> <http://wireless.wikia.com/wiki/Wi-Fi#Performance_and_Speed>

Ah. Damn.

> >What should I be trying next?
>
> All new hardware. Get 802.11g hardware that will do 54Mbits/sec
> wireless connection speed, and about 22-25Mbits/sec thruput (under
> ideal conditions).

Fair enough. Thanks for the help.

Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
> On 14 May 2007 21:06:11 -0700, bourgon@gmail.com wrote:

> >Router: Netgear BEFW11S4, firmware=1.45.10 (802.11b)

> I have a BEFW11S4v4. Piece of junk. Hangs all the time.

I have one that is about four years old. I don't think it has ever hung.
It didn't even blow up with the one test that you said hangs yours all
the time. Mine seems like a good stable router. Multiple VPN connections,
a little bit of port translation inbound, some gaming trigger ports. It
does everything it's supposed to do.

--
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley Lake, CA, USA GPS: 38.8,-122.5

dold@12.usenet.us.com hath wroth:

>Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
>> On 14 May 2007 21:06:11 -0700, bourgon@gmail.com wrote:
>
>> >Router: Netgear BEFW11S4, firmware=1.45.10 (802.11b)
>
>> I have a BEFW11S4v4. Piece of junk. Hangs all the time.

>I have one that is about four years old. I don't think it has ever hung.
>It didn't even blow up with the one test that you said hangs yours all
>the time. Mine seems like a good stable router. Multiple VPN connections,
>a little bit of port translation inbound, some gaming trigger ports. It
>does everything it's supposed to do.

Miracles happen. Is yours a v1, v2, v3, v3.2 or v4? As I understand
it, only the v4 mutation tends to hang. v2 seems to blow up after a
few years but doesn't hang. No experience or history on the others.

Also, try the router exploits test. My BEFW11S4v4 hangs on two of the
tests. Methinks targa3 was one of the problem tests. I forgot the
other one.
<http://www.pcflank.com/exploits.htm>

I lied, slightly. I "retired" my BEFW11S4v4 about 6 months ago
because I got tired of the weirdness. It's sitting in a pile
somewhere in my palatial office waiting for a good excuse to send it
as a burnt offering to the radio gods.



--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
> dold@12.usenet.us.com hath wroth:
> >Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
> >> I have a BEFW11S4v4. Piece of junk. Hangs all the time.

> >I have one that is about four years old. I don't think it has ever hung.

> Miracles happen. Is yours a v1, v2, v3, v3.2 or v4? As I understand
> it, only the v4 mutation tends to hang.

BEFW11S4v4

> Also, try the router exploits test. My BEFW11S4v4 hangs on two of the
> tests. Methinks targa3 was one of the problem tests. I forgot the
> other one.
> <http://www.pcflank.com/exploits.htm>

I ran all that junk. No hangs.

> I lied, slightly. I "retired" my BEFW11S4v4 about 6 months ago
> because I got tired of the weirdness. It's sitting in a pile
> somewhere in my palatial office waiting for a good excuse to send it
> as a burnt offering to the radio gods.

I can certainly believe that you have a bad one. I don't have a bad one.
It has been powered up constantly except for site moves for years.

--
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley Lake, CA, USA GPS: 38.8,-122.5

dold@12.usenet.us.com hath wroth:

>Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
>> dold@12.usenet.us.com hath wroth:
>> >Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
>> >> I have a BEFW11S4v4. Piece of junk. Hangs all the time.
>
>> >I have one that is about four years old. I don't think it has ever hung.
>
>> Miracles happen. Is yours a v1, v2, v3, v3.2 or v4? As I understand
>> it, only the v4 mutation tends to hang.
>
>BEFW11S4v4

Same as what I have. I sold mine to a customer when new. He got
tired of the tendency to hang or not allow new connections, so he
demanded that I get him something else. That was a Netgear WGR614
which has been working fine for about 2 years. I used this BEFW11S4v4
for about a year at my house, with erratic hangs.

I also had customers with BEFW11S4v4 routers that have been problems.
I'm guessing, but I think there were a total of 3 of these that I
replaced with different models. I didn't keep or want the old
routers. There have also been similar complaints in this newsgroups
about BEFW11S4 oddities. I've been through at least 3 firmware
updates on mine, none of which offered or exhibited an improvement. I
just got a newer firmware version from Linksys, but don't have time to
do testing immediately, or have a live system on which to try it.
We'll see if that helps, but later.

Incidentally, at one point, Staples was selling these router for $10
each. Don't ask why I'm spending time working on an obsolete router
worth $10.

>> Also, try the router exploits test. My BEFW11S4v4 hangs on two of the
>> tests. Methinks targa3 was one of the problem tests. I forgot the
>> other one.
>> <http://www.pcflank.com/exploits.htm>
>
>I ran all that junk. No hangs.
>
>I can certainly believe that you have a bad one. I don't have a bad one.
>It has been powered up constantly except for site moves for years.

Amazing. Every one that I replaced failed the exploits tests. Mine
would also hang consistently on streaming video. There must be
something different about yours. My guess(tm) is that there are
manufacturing or die lot differences in the chipsets used.

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558