Best router for sharing connection.

[Lalato]

I'm sure my situation isn't unique. I live in an apartment and am sharing a connection with my upstairs neighbor. Everything is working fine, but there are times when performance lags a bit. I'm wondering if getting a different router might help the situation.

Currently have a Linksys WRT54G v6. This is the so called "neutered" version of the WRT line of routers... so installing all of the features of DD-WRT or OpenWRT isn't really an option. I think there is a "micro" version of DD-WRT that could work, but I have doubts that installing it will increase performance appreciably.

All but one of the current devices are Macs. It's a mix of B/G/N devices. I think my neighbor is B/G (not 100% sure if it's just G or if he also has a B device floating around). In my apartment it's G/N.

Would it make sense to get a dual band dual radio N router? Put my apartment on the 5Ghz radio and the neighbor on the 2.4Ghz radio? If I verify that I have nothing slower than G on the network, maybe just getting a better G router would be best?

Thanks for any advice you might have.
--sam

 

[thiggins]

What do you mean "performance lags a bit". Wireless? Yours? Your neighbors?

11b devices will definitely slow things down when they are transmitting.

 

[Lalato]

What I mean by that is that streaming video gets stutters. Download performance isn't as good as it could be at times.

I have the fastest service Comcast offers so I'm pretty sure it's not an issue with the pipes coming into the router. That said, I'm not sure how I would test to rule that out.


If it's a B client, then I'm not sure there is much I can do about it other than tell my neighbor to get a better adapter. Hmmm...

Let me know if you have any other questions.

--sam

 

[thiggins]

Streaming video to the upstairs apartment or to your network? What kind of video, web or HD?

I'm trying to figure out if it's just a bandwidth issue.

To keep B clients from slowing things down, you'd need to put them on another AP, set to a different channel and with a different SSID.

 

[Lalato]

sorry about the delayed response. I've been in Portland doing some brewery tours. What a great town.

Anyway, as to your questions. Video streaming in my apartment has stutters. Stuff like Hulu and other services. Come to think of it I guess it could be a problem with those services and not my setup.

Your comment on setting them up on a different AP leaves me wondering if I could convert my current Router into an AP for the upstairs neighbors should I decide to get a new router for downstairs. As noted above, I have the neutered version of the WRT54G line of routers.

--sam

 

[thiggins]

If you're having trouble with Web video in your own apartment, first try a wired connection to rule out problems with the sites themselves or your Internet connection.

Then get your neighbors clients disconnected and all your B clients disconnected and try just streaming with a G client.

If that works, then set up a separate router to handle B traffic or upgrade those devices (if possible) to at least G.

 

[Lalato]

Thanks for the tips, Tim. You're the best.

--sam