Develop Bugs

[Q] Restricting wi-fi to connect at 802.11g ONLY

Is it possible ? I have been disappointed with the browsing speed on my TP2 and thought it might be something to do with MTU settings or something like this. However, last weekend I decided to change my router mode from 801.11b/g to 801.11g only. WOW, suddenly my browsing was perfect (the same speed as browsing with my laptop)
So I wondered if it's possible to set something on the TP2 to allow it to connect at g Only - for when using in areas which have a Free Hotspot (like Cafe's or Hotels), since I cannot control the speed that they allow me to connect at.
It's very possible that my TP2 was connecting originally at g speed but that rates were in some way competing against each other.
C

WM will normally default your connection to the better of the two choices. If the option is between b or g, the connection would default to g. There are some things that could be affecting your connection, however. This is most likely a problem with your router broadcasting both signals at once. If you have no use for a b channel, then have it simply focus on sending the g channel.

This is exactly what I have done - shut down the b channel. However, I am trying to ensure that I connect with g ONLY whenever I find a Hotspot in public places.
C

Maybe the problem with browsing speed isn't your phone!
Better check if you are in an area with lots of wireless networks... Try to set your router to use a channel which is 3 channels distance from other WiFi networks.
For example if you have networks on channels 1,3,5,11 you should set your router to use channel 8.
Also try to set "802.11G Protection" to ON, if your router has it!

Any solution? (I know it's old, but I also want to restrict to 801.11g on my android tablet only and I have found nothing on the internet).

Jazzist2014 said:
Any solution? (I know it's old, but I also want to restrict to 801.11g on my android tablet only and I have found nothing on the internet).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The issue is not with the phone in this case, but the access point. When running in mixed mode, data transfer speeds on wifi access points slow down unless they have multiple dedicated radios. If you want the faster wifi speed, just don't use 802.11b. It's antiquated anyway, especially considering we now have not only g, but n and ac standards on the 802.11 rfc.

CaptJosh said:
The issue is not with the phone in this case, but the access point. When running in mixed mode, data transfer speeds on wifi access points slow down unless they have multiple dedicated radios. If you want the faster wifi speed, just don't use 802.11b. It's antiquated anyway, especially considering we now have not only g, but n and ac standards on the 802.11 rfc.
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Click to collapse
i've noticed, however, my phone's (samsumg g-s5) battery drains much quicker when connected to 802.11n network compared to 802.11g. there is no real need for more than 54 Mb/s on my phone, but on my laptop there is. therefore, a way to restrict the phone to use only 802.11g in a mixed-network environment would be beneficial.

scarlion said:
i've noticed, however, my phone's (samsumg g-s5) battery drains much quicker when connected to 802.11n network compared to 802.11g. there is no real need for more than 54 Mb/s on my phone, but on my laptop there is. therefore, a way to restrict the phone to use only 802.11g in a mixed-network environment would be beneficial.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As far as I know, you can only restrict the mode of the access point, not the phone. I have yet to see any wireless client device, in fact, that lets me restrict which radio mode it uses, save perhaps some homebrew stuff running embedded linux.
EDIT: Pardon the grave-dig. I had been off the site for a while and only just noticed the above reply to my posting from last year after having last night posted a question of my own.

[Q] Wifi Association and Reassociation Priorities and Thresholds

I've been having a few relatively minor (but hopefully solvable) problems with WiFi roaming and association with my Epic 4G Touch. My current baseband version is EL13.
At home, I have two access points to improve coverage. One of them is a relatively new 802.11n/g/b D-Link router. This is the one connected to my modem and set to router mode. The other is an older 802.11g/b Linksys router set to access point only mode connected to the other router via ethernet. In order to allow easy roaming between the two, I have both APs set to the same SSID and security settings. I have them set on channels 1 and 11 respectively to avoid interference (most of my neighbors use the intermediate channels).
With laptops, roaming works well. Not perfectly, possibly because of the lack of 802.11n on the second AP, but they automatically reassociate to the router with a stronger signal at a reasonable difference in strength. There's rarely a time when the link speed falls below 30 mbps.
With my E4GT, roaming is more hit-and-miss. For some reason, once it's connected to an AP, it doesn't like to reassociate until it loses its current signal completely. This can be a problem when I reach the outer reaches of either AP's signal zones. With the 802.11n AP in particular, the E4GT tends to stay connected even when the link speed (as stated by the router) is 1 mbps. The actual performance is, of course, even worse. Latency is at least 500 ms, and often times, data isn't transmitted at all. I might as well be on 1xRTT. This happens when I'm in the same room as the other AP.
Another annoying quirk is that the ET4G seems to prioritize the 802.11n AP over the 802.11g one when it makes its initial association. When I turn WiFi on in the room with the older router, half the time, my phone decides to connect to the very weak 802.11n signal instead of the full bar signal from the AP in the room.
So, my questions:
Has anyone else noticed this problem?
Is there a way to increase the threshold signal strength before the phone tries to reassociate? This would hopefully make roaming more functional.
Is there a way to de-prioritize 802.11n signals, or alternatively, disable 802.11n connectivity altogether? I don't want to disable it in my router because the extra bandwidth comes in handy for my PCs, but 130 mbps is unnecessary for a phone.

Wow you must have a huge house lol.... Maybe you could try adjusting the transmit power strength on one or both of the routers so that the signal will drop off completely and switch to the other access point. Hope I could help.

[Q] Wifi extender with my S3

Hey all. So heres my deal. I have a Linksys E3000 router and an Edimax Wireless Extender I just picked up. I got this since in my house, the router is on one side of the house and so naturally, on the other side, I get 1 bar of wifi strength. Was hoping to improve that. So what I wanted to do was have both units have the same SSID and have the devices automatically switch between the physical devices (same SSID) as I get near them. This didnt work. In fact, both my S3 and my Nexus 7 kept getting confused and dropped connections often.
So now Im trying it where they have different SSIDs (lets say Router1 and Router2) so no conflicts. The issue I have is this. I want both my S3 and N7 to AUTO SWITCH to the better signal SSID. Im running Cyanogenmod 10.1 on both devices and I see in the adv wifi settings something about, 'Only connect to a network where strength is GOOD'. This seemed to be the answer, however it doesnt actually work. 1 network shows great and other shows fair and it still wont switch.
Wondering if there is any other way around this? Otherwise this extender is basically useless to me as I dont feel like constantly switching my wifi networks as I walk across the house. (wow I sound spoil when I say it like that lol)
Thanks all

Is it configured for Universal Repeater Mode?

When you say "it" are you referring to my router or the extender device?
The router BTW is a Linksys e3000 with dd-wrt and the other unit is edimax 7348rpn. I believe that's the right model. Its a little plugin unit. Thanks

RoachForLife said:
When you say "it" are you referring to my router or the extender device?
The router BTW is a Linksys e3000 with dd-wrt and the other unit is edimax 7348rpn. I believe that's the right model. Its a little plugin unit. Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
From the Edimax site:
Complies with the IEEE 802.11b/g and IEEE802.11n standards.
Supports 2.400~2.4835GHz frequency band.
High data rate up to 300Mbps network speed.
Auto rate fallback in case of obstacles or interferences.
Supports point-to-point and point-to-multi point bridge function.
Supports WDS (Wireless Distributed System) repeater mode.
Supports Universal Repeater mode.
Supports AP Client mode.
Supports four sets of ESSID to group the different wireless networks.
Supports roaming link integrity.
Provides 64/128 bit key length WEP data encryption.
Supports WPA, WPA2 security enhanced function (pre-shared key, 802.1x, TKIP, AES …).
Supports WPS (Wi-Fi Protected Setup) function.
Provides MAC access control.
Provides hidden SSID function.
Supports Web-based configuration.
Firmware upgradeable via Web browser.
So it can be configured into different modes. Make sure you have it configured for Universal Repeater Mode

Nexus 7 (2013) Slow Wi-Fi Home Network WPA2 Problems

Hi everyone,
I have my Nexus 7 connected to an verizon actiontec router. I am getting terrible wifi with WPA2 security enables. Loading websites takes forever and youtube constantly gives network error. I changed the encryption to WEP and its not disconnecting as much but I would prefer to run WPA2.
Anyone have any suggestions on what is causing the lag and disconnects? 2 laptops and 2 android phones no issues.

Try switching to 802.11g. The N7 is quite flaky in 802.11n mode with a lot of routers.
If you are using WEP, you are in effect forcing 802.11g mode, since 802.11n requires WPA2.

tni.andro said:
Try switching to 802.11g. The N7 is quite flaky in 802.11n mode with a lot of routers.
If you are using WEP, you are in effect forcing 802.11g mode, since 802.11n requires WPA2.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply tni,
Is this a hardware issue or a software issue? Could hardwiring and IP number and switching back to WPA2 possibly fix the issue?

cloves said:
Is this a hardware issue or a software issue?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Driver and/or firmware. The Nexus 4, which has pretty much the same Wifi hardware, also has quite a few complaints about Wifi issues.
Could hardwiring and IP number and switching back to WPA2 possibly fix the issue?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's highly unlikely that a fixed IP will make a difference.
Not sure if that came across, but you can use WPA2 with 802.11g (you need to configure that at the router).

Well I changed the router over to WPA2 and then in the advance preferences set it to 'Legacy Mode' to support only 802.11bg and the tablet seems to not be having many hang ups even with youtube. I'll post back if anything changes. Thanks and hopefully this helps a lot of people out there.

I'm using N7 2013 with two different routers,
Both with WPA2, and 802.11n.
No problems at all.

Well, I just did a heck of a lot of work on the IEEE 802.11 protocol suite. I am in no way an expert, but I picked up a bunch of interesting factoids.
- In the 802.11n protocol implementation, all devices must have 802.11n supported NICs. This includes all the clients, not just router. If you have even a single device that is doing legacy 802.11b/g while all the other client NICs are doing 802.11n, then the router will not do 802.11n for any device. Yes, all or nothing deal and the router does not show it. I used Wireshark to confirm this situation exists by drilling down a ton of 802.11 data frames. Despite the router staying set in the drop down menu to 802.11n, under the hood, all the devices dropped to 802.11g.
- Even worse, I know I have clients and router NICs that all support 802.11n, yet I get dropped into the 802.11g protocol. To try to find out what happened, I started from scratch. I put my router into 802.11n which lists it as "performance", then added a static IP to my Nexus 7. I immediately had 58Mb/sec. since 58Mb/sec > 54Mb/sec, I figured maybe I did get 802.11n this time since 802.11g gets 54Mb/sec in optimal conditions. When I went to check which protocol my Nexus 7 is using, I moved it in front of me, a distance no more than 18 inches, and saw my signal drop to next to nothing. I pulled up the Nexus 7's WiFi advanced settings to find out that I now only have 5Mb/sec and the protocol is now 802.11g. This means while roaming, if you hit a sufficient enough degradation in the signal, the Nexus 7 drops your 802.11n status like a hot potato and no, you can't get it back unless you reset everything. I mean at least, to date, I have not found a way to keep a device configured to stay with 802.11n even if the bandwidth drops.
Since I was given a drop down menu in my router as to which protocol I wanted to use and since the 802.11n specs say it is all or nothing, I thought that the router would enforce 802.11n and not allow a legacy NIC to connect to it. This is far from the case. Why they even give us a drop down menu if they are always going to do 802.11b/g/n anyway is beyond me.
Now that I have seen Nexus's wireless protocol drop from 802.11n to 802.11g outside of my control, I want to find all devices that misbehave like this and see if there is anything I can do to force the client to stay on 802.11n. Obviously, I also have to eliminate dead and near dead zones.
Just thought I'd share the all the fun I've had getting to this abysmal point.
I will dig into our smart phones and tablets another day to see if I can force it to stay with 802.11n even its Rx signal attenuated for a few seconds.
I hope this helps others and if your experience is different then mine, I'd love to here what your findings are.

You may be fighting interference not only from the neighbor's WiFi, but appliances in your home. Possible sources for rf noise would include dimmer switches, CRT and plasma screens, microwaves, cordless phones. An rf detector can be bought or built or an am radio tuned between stations can work.
I've seen anywhere from 5mbps to 300mbps connect speed, it can change in one session if the router dynamically adjusts throughput. Also, there may be a power level setting in the router setup to get your signal farther above the noise floor.
Sent from my Le Pan TC1020 using Tapatalk
---------- Post added at 09:23 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:17 AM ----------
An easy rf detector: single coil electric guitar pickup and cheap practice amplifier sourced from a guitar shop. Ask the guitar tech for a good used p/u, they swap them out all the time.
The wider channels used for faster throughput will be more susceptible to interference than the g standard,IMO.
Sent from my Le Pan TC1020 using Tapatalk

Fire TV Stick - wifi problems due to Wifi direct remote

I wonder if anyone can advise how this problem might be fixed:
I have a fire-tv stick in my bedroom the latest version which has a voice remote and connects using WiFi direct instead of bluetooth. I'm using 2.4Ghz wifi (using a TalkTalk hg633 super router). I can't use 5Ghz because the signal to my bedroom isn't good enough on 5Ghz. On 2.4Ghz the link score from inSSIDer is 91 with the fire-tv stick unplugged, with a signal of -50dBm. With the fire-tv stick on a WiFi Direct AP appears on inSSIDer with a signal of -39dBm (ie stronger than my normal wifi signal). The link score drops to 71.
If I test download speeds and pings, then with WiFi direct off, i get decent downloads speeds (around 20Mbps) and 18ms pings in my bedroom, in the lounge its a little higher. With Wi-Fi direct on, download speeds drop below 7mbps, sometimes 1mbps, pings increase to 200ms (although I have seen 10,000ms) and the connection often disconnects so the download speed test or ping is unable to complete. (I get about 2 tests that work out of 6, the others fail due to connection issues).
The upshot of all this is that I can't get a reliable streaming service on my fire-tv stick. especially in the evening. The network often disconnects, or slows to a crawl so I get frequent buffering, inability to stream at all or a poor quality picture. In the lounge, I often find my PC disconnects when wifi direct is on though streaming is less of a problem (because there the wifi signal is about 5dBM greater than the WIfi-Direct signal
I contacted amazon, and they suggested changing the channel of my wifi so it isn't on the same channel a Wifi Direct. That doesn't work because the WiFi Direct signal follows my wifi onto the same channel.
I can't use a lan cable (no option for this on a fire-tv stick, and I shouldn't have to in any case). I don't want to add extra extenders / APs to my wifi network as that might just make things worse.
Does anyone know of any way to switch off WiFi direct and use bluetooth for the remote or the FireTV app on my phone instead? Or to decrease the power of the wifi direct signal, or any other solution?
I wonder about switching to an older fire-stick with bluetooth remote - but that I think would mean I lose the voice search facility?
If I swapped to a full Fire TV with voice remote - do they use bluetooth or Wifi Direct?

Same problem. Not as dire a situation because it's in my kid's bedroom and not mine. :silly: But it interferes with the WiFi signal in areas that are closer to her room than my home router.
Not sure why AMZ chose to use the same channel as the FireTV stick talks to your WiFi network on to do their communication to their remote. That seems like a really bad design - if it's messing the 2 of us up, it has to be doing the same for a whole lot of people.
I tried changing my home WiFi from channel 11 to 1 in troubleshooting and had the same experience as you - the FireTV stick's WiFi changed right along with it to continue to clobber my home WiFi signal. Been through the menus in FireTV stick - no way I can see to change its behavior. Google search led me here.

Hi,
Whilst I stand by everything I said, in attempting to get Amazon to replace my remote with one that used bluetooth instead of wifi-direct, they sent me exactly the same remote in replacement. It still uses wifi-direct. However, it has worked fine, despite being on the same channel. That suggests that some remotes are faulty and causing or exacerbating the problem. Exactly why that would be I don't know, but it's all working fine for me now.

Roku has been doing this for years Here is a link to there form maybe amazon will listen I just got a new one for another room but no network problems and is faster on menu loading so I can live with it.

You're always gonna have problems with a ton of stuff on 2.4ghz. If your router has 5ghz, I would recommend reorganizing if possible, or getting a stronger router. 5ghz means no headaches, no problems with other things, controllers\remote work fine, etc.