Question Slow wifi speeds with my new Asus R565EA-51RT laptop ?

[zbs60]

HI All

I purchased this new Asus from microcenter about 15 days ago. Im getting extremely slow speeds when connected to my home network using spectrum/charter cable. I get 4mgbts downloads. My original asus router broke and went to Charter and got their Wi-Fi 6 router. If i uninstall and re einstall my wifi drivers i can get over 200mgbt but the next day when i connect im back down to 4 to 10 mgbt. I called Asus Tech support and they updated my bios but that didnt do any good. I found out the router is made by Sagecom and doesnt get many good reviews online. I was kinda hopin to delay buying one till Black Friday when i can get a good one on sale. But any suggestions on settings i can change to quicken things up? I also checked with Charters tech help and everything is correct on their end. This laptop uses the realtek 8821ce adaptor.

zbs

 

[bill001g]

Hard to say where the problem is. Do you have another device you can test the router with.

So I would first check the router to see if the 2.4 and 5 radio are set to different SSID. Sometime because people are lazy the router manufacture sets it to the same SSID so people do not have to even think to pick which is better. This sometimes causes the pc/nic to select the 2.4g radio band. The signal might be stronger but it tends to be slower. You are much smarter than the automated software and can choose to use 2.4 or 5 when it is most appropriate. It general 5ghz band is going to be faster if you get enough signal.

That nic card is very basic. It only supports a 1x1 mimo. This means it is the same as router that has a 600 number on it.

I would be careful about buying wifi6 equipment...especially cheap wifi6 equipment. Wifi6 is pretty much a waste of money and is now outdated. Because of the government limitations on the usage of the 5g radio band most people saw very limited advantage over wifi5(802.11ac).
Also because of the government limitation related to weather radar avoidance a lot of devices chose to not even support the wider data channels that give wifi6 is faster speeds. So you must buy rather expensive router and nic cards that support the 160mhz channels and then you must not live someplace you get a lot of interference from your neighbors as well as the radar.

The better option is going to be to buy wifi6e that uses the new 6ghz radio band. The routers have finally started to drop in price. Wifi6e nic cards cost about the same as wifi6 cards.

In your case it is made much harder by the laptop you use. The largest issue is the card it currently has only uses 1 antenna. It is much more common to have 2. This will limit the choice of nic cards you can use. Adding a antenna to a laptop is not a simple project.
In addition I have not found much information in general about your laptop and the wifi. If the wifi chip is soldered to the motherboard then you are stuck. Most laptops you can remove and replace/upgrade the wifi card. In this case I can find nothing that talks about replacing it so I have no idea if it is a simple thing or if it is difficult to take the laptop apart.

It is not likely the router is the cause of the problem. You need only a very simple router because your laptop can not use anything fancy...ie wifi6 does nothing at all for you. Checking with another device is your best option.

If it is fairly easy to get to the wifi nic card and you think it might be defective replacing it should be cheap. Likely under $15. Even the very newest wifi6e nic cards are only $30 but be careful most need 2 antenna and do not use the same physical connector as the older devices. Again I can find nothing about your laptop and what type of interface it uses. I didn't even find the chipset information that you provided.

 

[zbs60]

Hello Bill

Thanks for the info. I had a friend come over with his TP Link ax3000 wi fi 6 router. According to reviews this was faster than similarly priced routers from Asus and Netgear. I think all of these sell for around 100 bucks.

The cheapo Spectrum router gave me 330mgbt connection speed with my desktop. The TPlink connected me to the desktop at 340mgbt. However, the cheapo Spectrum connected to my amazon speed stick at 330 but the TPlink for some reason only connected at 250. But, with my laptop im currently connected at 250mgbts!! Hopefully this speed will hold. I really dont wont to return the laptop. Its a pretty good deal for a lapton with touch screen and backlit keyboard for 300 bucks. I can knock it around and not worry to much.

U say it might be best to put off buying a wifi 6 router. I dont have much experience with laptops. What do you think the average laptop speed on a home network be with a 5.1 router? We're talking about a middle of the road router too, around 100 bucks? Ive also did some research and the wifi card in this card is indeed upgradeable. However, the people over at Microcenter said that switching the card out before the warranty expires voids the warranty.

Again tx for the info

zbs

 

[bill001g]

With the card you have you generally will not see over 100mbps. The maximum encoding rate is only 433 but that is not really a speed number unless you look at unrealistic lab setups. In general you get only a small fraction.....the more complex encodings you get even a smaller percentage.

You need to be very sure you are connecting on the 5g radio. The 2.4 radio has a 150 number and most people get only about 20-30mbps......that is still much higher than 4mbit.

Now do you see 4mbit on speedtest or do you see 4MBYTE from a download site. 4MBYTE is about 32mbit which would be what I would expect if you were using the 2.4g radio.

 

[zbs60]

HI Bill

Those speeds im getting using the speakeasy.net tester. By the way, you're right. When i first log on the wifi adapter attaches to the 5ghz band. But, later on it connects to the 2.4ghz. Would u happen know why its doing that?

zbs

 

[bill001g]

It is hard to say, would be nice if wifi gave some kind or error messages when it changes.

I would make sure the 2.4 and 5 radio have different SSID. That way you can tell it to attach to the 5 network and it will not try the 2.4. The nics are pretty stupid. 2.4g generally have a stronger signal in most houses because it goes through walls easier than 5. Problem is stronger signal does not mean faster since the data encoding on the 5 radio band is much more dense. So a weaker signal on 5 can be faster that a strong signal on 2.4.

If still connects to the 2.4 I would try turning the radio off in the router and see if you stay connected to the 5 or if it drops. All kinds of strange stuff affects wifi signal. Could be as simple as some closing a door to some room in your house.