Network to stream HD mkv's

[hussain]

Guys I am new to networking but not new to computers. I think of myself as quite tech savvy so here is my problem

I want to build wireless network in my home and the equipment that i have are:

Linksys WRT54 G Router
3 Laptops with G wireless adapters
One Storage Computer in study with 2TB Harddive
One HTPC in Living Room
Linksys DMA 2100 media center extender in bedroom

I want to stream mkv movies to my htpc as well as media center extender.

I want to keep my budget as low as possible because I am student? preferably under 100$.

Should i get a router like dlink 628 for both my N and G devices or should i buy an N router and add my existing G router to setup a dual netwrok.
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[pender]

Keep the 11g router and buy an 11n router. Make the 11n primary and the 11g a secondary WAP. If you use a 11n router in mixed mode (operates in 11n and 11g mode at the same time), any 'N' clients will operate at 'G' speeds if the there are any 11g laptops connected to the 11n.

So buy a new 11n router and make it 11n only and keep the 11g router on a different channel (say 11) and on the same IP subnet - also do not plug a cable into the the 11g's WAN/Internet port. The ethernet cable should come from a LAN port on the 11n to a LAN port on the 11g to avoid double NAT issues, which will prevent SMB file sharing.

Also, to get the best Wireless performance, use WPA-PSK or WPA2-PSK with an AES cipher. Do not use WPA-PSK TKIP or WEP or WPA TKIP/AES mixed mode. You can use, however, WPA1/WPA2-PSK AES mixed mode (but not TKIP cipher). Using TKIP or WEP will reduce the bandwidth by almost 70% compared to an unencrypted channel (so you get only 30% bandwidth). WPA1 or WPA2 AES only reduces by 5-8%.

Also, 2.4Ghz 802.11n with 40Mhz channels gives the best performance and range, but since you will be using a neighboring 802.11g AP, only use 20Hz 802.11n channel width.

Also, the DIR-628 is an excellent choice, but it can not operate in both 5ghz and 2.4Ghz frequencies at the same time. It is one or the other. The DIR-825 is the only simultaneous dual band router from Dlink. Linksys/Cisco have the WRT400/410N and WRT320N and I think both are simultaneous dual band routers but I find stock Linksys firmware too basic.

Also, if you have no 11n clients, just keep the WRT54G router and install DD-WRT or Tomato Firmware (if possible) to get nice features like QoS, Static DHCP by MAC address (handy for network streaming) and boost RF transmit power. Save your money if you don't need a new router.


Also, Media Extender can only play WMV's if I'm not mistaken and not MKVs. Use XBMC or Boxee on your HTPC instead. XBMC in Linux now supports VDPAU GPU decoding.

 

[hussain]

Wow

Wow that is one healthy dose of information. Just three more questions.

1. Will my linksys G router be able to stream high definition mkv after firmware update?????
   
2. Which is the cheapest router available in the market which can handle both g and n devices without any performance loss.
   
3. Would it be problem if i use a 2.4 ghz N router as well as 2.4 ghz G router.

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[thiggins]

Before you do anything, realize that trouble-free HD streaming is not guaranteed, even if you use draft 11n gear. The lower the bit rate of the stream, the more likely you'll have a good experience.

Wireless is not as reliable as Ethernet and especially has higher speed variation. It also has periodic "dropouts" where throughput drops virtually to zero for over a second. Unless you have a lot of buffering in your player, you'll see problems in the video. Read through these articles for more background:
Video Streaming Need To Know: Part 1- Encoding, Bit Rates and Errors
Video Streaming Need To Know: Part 2 - The Real World
HD Streaming Smackdown: Draft 11n vs. Powerline

Using a mix of 11g and draft 11n clients connected to the same router will drop the throughput of both when both are transmitting /receiving. But the draft 11n client doesn't necessarily drop to "11g speeds". See Add, Don't Replace When Upgrading to 802.11n for actual plots.

To answer your follow up questions, it's not likely that 11g will provide enough throughput for reliable HD streaming. But, again, it depends on the requirements of the source material. The "Need To Know" articles linked above show how to determine the source material bandwidth.

You can use multiple n and or g routers as long as you set them to different channels (1, 6, 11), separate them by at least 6-10 feet and don't use 40MHz bandwidth mode on the draft n router.

Finally, there is no router that handles mixed n and g without throughput loss. The loss is cause by the fact that when both are active, the 11n device must wait for the slower 11g device.

 

[hussain]

Just to clarify, if i buy WRT610n router, connect my storage computer to the router via cable, connect my htpc to the router via 5ghz adapter and connect my laptop with G wireless to the router, Am I still going to face performance drop while streaming videos from my storage computer to my htpc???

This very contrary to what i have been reading around???
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[pender]

Asymmetrical uplink and downlink rates of every wireless router will determine the effective throughput in your setup. Even though a two radio router's 5Ghz performance will generally decrease if both radios are in use - slight to moderate depending on the number of clients connected to the AP.

Since you're using a laptop with 11g in your setup, it won't matter anyway, because that is the slowest uplink in the Video Stream route.

HD MKVs cover a broad range of media. For TV show rips that you find on trackers, they usually have an average bitrate of 3.5Mbps with 5-6Mbps peaks. Of course Blu-Ray Rips can be as high as 40Mbps usually 36Mbps). Won't wireless 11n solutions won't work for the latter if you are far away for the AP or there are many walls between the devices.

11g generally maxes out at 16Mbps at appreciable range.

Like Tim suggested, use ethernet where possible especially on devices that are uplinking the video stream. Instead of a laptop, perhaps purchase a Cheap NAS that supports SMB file sharing and has a DLNA Upnp server and attach it directly to your main router via ethernet.

The HTPC as an 11n client should suffice for average bitrate content. You can test throughput easily if you have two PCs or laptops and Jperf.
http://code.google.com/p/xjperf/

Some routers like the 610n you suggested have SMB and uPNP servers built-in if you attach a USB HDD. It won't be able to write to NTFS drives (no NAS can write to NTFS) but can write to ext3 or fat32 file systems. Fat32 does not support files larger than 4GB, which may be a problem for HD long high bitrate HD content. The max SMB throughput on the WWRT610n's HDD read and write may be between 25-40Mbps so it may not be suitable for some HD content.

 

[hussain]

man seriously i am way out of my league

man i didn't understand about 30 percent of what you wrote; so i know i am way out of my league.


Just tell me based upon my first question what router should i buy, a dual band one or single N band and use my existing router to transmit for 11g networks. the article higgins listed was about 2 years old and one would expect that technology has moved forward in the last two years.

So a simple answer for me would be which specific brand and model would you people have buyed if you were faced a similiar position like me following are my options.

dlink 655
wrt 160n
netgear 3300
wrt 400n
dlikn 825
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[pender]

Tim is saying to add a 802.11n router as an access point to your existing 11g network and operating the 11n router in 11n only mode and let all 11g traffic use the old 11g router. He also suggests to use ethernet as much as possible, especially from the device where the media is stored to the AP (use ethernet between the file server and 11n access point).

As far as router selection, you are right that it is better to keep 11n traffic on the 5GHZ band and use 40Hz channels.
$130 DIR 825
$70 DIR 628 (not simultaneous - operates either 5ghz or 2.4ghz, but inexpensive).
$115 WRT400N
$95 WRT320N
$140 WRT610N
$180 Airport Extreme Base Station

I would get a Linksys for an Access Point - not the 610n. If your new 11n becomes the gateway and the old 11g router is the access point, I'd buy a Dlink.

Remember than not all 11n client adapters are dual band though. You can tell it is dual band if it supports 11a (so 11a/b/g/n). If it supports only 11b/g/n, it is likely only 2.4Ghz.

The WET610N and WGA600N are dual band adapters for the HTPC and will work for any other ethernet enabled device like a gaming console too.

 

[hussain]

Okay i get the hang of it

Okay guys i am getting this incredible deal on wrt160n refurbished where i can buy two of them for 65 bucks.

If i buy two wrt160n routers can i use one of them as an access point. In order to better explain my thoughts please see the picture below.





This setup if possible will ensure that i will get 11n speeds in my xbox. Plus it would lead to incredible cost saving as well.
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[hussain]

anyone pleasse help

help anyone
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[pender]

You are trying to use the second 160n as a wireless ethernet bridge using either client bridge or WDS technology.

Some routers supports WDS in their stock firmware (I don't know if the 160n does). If it does then it will work. If the router does not support WDS, you can not do this.

Certain versions of the 160n support DD-WRT firmware. Before you buy, confirm what version you are buying. Version 1.0 and 1.1 work with DD-WRT. Version 2.0 and 3.0 do not. If you get a 1.0/1.1 flash both with DD-WRT (at your own risk). Then use one as an access point and the other as a Client Bridge or Repeater Bridge.
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Wireless_Bridge

Any device that then plugs into the bridge should get an IP address from the DHCP server on the primary 160n (in your diagram).

If you are unsure of what version you will be getting, don't buy. BTW, both routers must supports WDS for the WDS method to work, but if you get a 11n router that supports DD-WRT, your primary gateway can be any 11n router for the client bridge mode to work.

You can also just buy a wireless ethernet bridge (and a cheap ethernet bridge) pre made. It will save you a headache trying to find compatible routers.
WGA600N
WET610N
DAP-1522

 

[thiggins]

Hussain: Pender is giving you good advice.

1) Use Ethernet, not wireless if you want trouble-free HD streaming.

2) To implement the setup shown in the diagram you posted, the best way to go is to buy a wireless bridge, not a WDS link. WDS will cut your throughput at least in half. A wireless bridge basically acts like a wireless client, so will have the same throughput as a normal wireless adapter.

 

[hussain]

All you htpc, Gaming, Media Center Extender Fanatics after intensive research into my issue stated above I have finally come up with fantastic and dirt cheap solution to all my problems and the name of the solution is Netgear WNHDE 1111.

Just Read the following review and you will know what i am talking about.

http://www.cnet.com.au/netgear-wnhdeb111-hd-gaming-5ghz-wireless-n-networking-kit-339291827.htm

Here is finally networking diagram that i am going to implement. Just beware that Netgear WNHDE 1111 only works in 5 ghz frequency.


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[pender]

At that point, you should consider a MoCa or Belkin's 1Gbit powerline network solutions
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=30821&Itemid=51
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/30743/51/
http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=495008

If the devices you want are unavailable where you are, you can use this website to buy items from the US and they will ship them to you. If you need a US address to make an account, you can use their personal shopper service.
http://www.myus.com/index.shtml
It does cost money to sign up ($10) and more money to ship it to you, but it works and I have bought stuff on Amazon and Newegg.com that was not available where I live. It is a small price to pay for quality items, especially computer components and peripherals.

I am sure a cheaper DIR 628, WRT320n or WRT400n paired with a WGA600n/WET610n (plus a cheap 5port switch) will work well enough and can be used as a gateway should you choose to change your setup. The price may work out the same (350 $AU) with inflated shipping and currency conversion, but it is an option.