Need help choosing powerline/wireless adapter speed

[farseerat]

I'm building a new computer and was looking at a TP-Link TL-WDN4800 Wi-Fi Adapter which can go up to 450mbps. I don't know if I need 450, or if 300 or 150 would suffice. I tried figuring this out myself but I got confused as I don't know much about computers. Here's some information that will hopefully help;

I have 100mbps cable internet, a Netgear CG3000-2STAUS router which is located downstairs whilst my computer will be located upstairs, usually around 7 or 8 devices will be connected to the router at a time (5 computers, 2 phones and 1 console).

I'm also considering a powerline adapter but again, I don't know which speed I'd need to get, and they cost a bit more. Thanks for your help.

 

[bill001g]

Having lots of issues finding good info on your router. The wireless speed you get will is the lower of the router speed or the nic speed. So if your router only supports 150m then even if you were to buy a 450m nic it would slow down to 150m.

Wireless does not get even close to those magic numbers especially when you go from floor to floor in a house. You would have to get very lucky to get even the newest 802.11ac devices to actually be able to get 100m going though a floor.

Powerline tends to work much better in situations like yours. Just like wireless the powerline guys have magic speed numbers you can never get. The big clue should be that the devices they pretend can do 500m have only normal ethernet ports on them..... they know very well these devices will not even come close to 100m.

The newest version of powerline that claim 600/1.2g can exceed 100meg in many houses. 1.2g though is just a funny joke.

There are no guarantees since it depends on the power wiring in your house but in general powerline tends to be faster than wireless when you are going from floor to floor.

 

[RealBeast]

For adapters, I would recommend the latest AV2 MIMO, the best and least expensive is the TP-LINK TL-PA8010P KIT AV1200 at $75 a pair from Amazon. HERE is a great tool to compare real world speeds of adapters.

I would not try to use wireless, it will work poorly or not at all from such a distance. The powerline adapters have much lower latency and do not suffer nearly as much from the interference that makes wireless problematic for gaming, streaming and other low latency or high bandwidth usage.

 

[farseerat]

Having lots of issues finding good info on your router. The wireless speed you get will is the lower of the router speed or the nic speed. So if your router only supports 150m then even if you were to buy a 450m nic it would slow down to 150m.

Wireless does not get even close to those magic numbers especially when you go from floor to floor in a house. You would have to get very lucky to get even the newest 802.11ac devices to actually be able to get 100m going though a floor.

Powerline tends to work much better in situations like yours. Just like wireless the powerline guys have magic speed numbers you can never get. The big clue should be that the devices they pretend can do 500m have only normal ethernet ports on them..... they know very well these devices will not even come close to 100m.

The newest version of powerline that claim 600/1.2g can exceed 100meg in many houses. 1.2g though is just a funny joke.

There are no guarantees since it depends on the power wiring in your house but in general powerline tends to be faster than wireless when you are going from floor to floor.

Thanks for your response. I guess I'll be getting a powerline adapter. I'm probably going with a TP-Link TL​-PA211KIT which is the same price as the wireless adapter I was originally looking at, hoping that AV200 will be enough.

 

[farseerat]

For adapters, I would recommend the latest AV2 MIMO, the best and least expensive is the TP-LINK TL-PA8010P KIT AV1200 at $75 a pair from Amazon. HERE is a great tool to compare real world speeds of adapters.

I would not try to use wireless, it will work poorly or not at all from such a distance. The powerline adapters have much lower latency and do not suffer nearly as much from the interference that makes wireless problematic for gaming, streaming and other low latency or high bandwidth usage.

Thanks for your response. I looked up the kit you suggested but I don't want to spend that much at this point. Hopefully the AV200 one will be enough, but if it's not, I'll keep the one you suggested in mind for the future.

 

[bill001g]

I hope you looked at the link realbeast has in his post that shows the expect rates of those devices. You will likely get only around 50mbit with av200 devices. Realistically that is fast enough for most people but if you really wanted it to run at 100m you will have to go with the newer devices.

 

[RealBeast]

^ +1 Bill is correct as always. I will repeat what he said -- no not believe the marketing specification, they perform far slower than that in the real world.

Any of the current AV2 MIMO 1200Mbps models will exceed 100Mbps reliably with low latency.

Some of the 1000Mbps models will, but nothing below that will and the price for the 1200Mbps models is only a little more, for example the TP-LINK TL-PA8010P KIT AV1200 is only $75 and always exceeds 100Mbps in any pair of outlets in my house, which is large.

The set you mentioned (TP-Link TL​-PA211KIT) will get around 35-50 Mbps.

 

[RealBeast]

The TP-LINK TL-PA8010P KIT is on sale at Newegg starting today for $49.00 if you quickly subscribe to their email ads and use promo code EMCKKNA38 -- that is a great price.

 

[farseerat]

I don't think I can get that deal in Australia, it's currently out of stock on the Australian site anyway. It's okay though, you've convinced me to get a better kit, I'll find it somewhere else. Thanks RealBeast and bill001g for your help!

 

[RealBeast]

Sorry to hear that you can't get those prices, and I know that you have a 10% VAT (the goods and sales tax) so it will be more even on a good sale -- but it will be worth the additional cost for an AV2 MIMO 1200Mbps model.

There are a couple of other units that are quite close in speed like the Netgear PL1200 set or the Trendnet TPL-421E2K kit.