What is the Best Wireless Mode for 5ghz?

[ShawnyS4]

On my router i have multiple wireless modes on AC. By default its on 802.11 a/n/ac mixed. The other options are 802.11 a only, 802.11 n only, 802.11 a/n mixed, 802.11 ac only. I've heard that AC is the best wireless mode but I don't know if it is better alone or mixed or something completely different. I have a TP-LINK Archer T6E which has 5ghz. Someone please help 😀 Thanks

 

[kanewolf]

It depends on what kind of clients you have connecting to the WIFI source. There are very few "a" devices. Not real useful. Most devices are "N". But if you have only AC devices (unlikely) then you could use the AC only. The A/N/AC setting is probably the best choice.

 

[ShawnyS4]

It depends on what kind of clients you have connecting to the WIFI source. There are very few "a" devices. Not real useful. Most devices are "N". But if you have only AC devices (unlikely) then you could use the AC only. The A/N/AC setting is probably the best choice.

Would there be a speed difference between AC only and A/N/AC.

 

[kanewolf]

It depends on the clients. If you only want to support AC clients then you can set it to AC only. Most wireless clients will not be able to connect because there are very few AC devices. If you had an AC TV and didn't want any lower bandwidth devices connected, then you could set AC only. Your phone wouldn't be able to connect.
Unless you have a lot of 5Ghz devices you won't see any differences.

 

[broshm]

If I mix AC/N/A do I "waste" bandwidth to A?
In other words, if I mix only AC/N will each of these 2 have more bandwidth than having set AC/N/A ?

 

[kanewolf]

If I mix AC/N/A do I "waste" bandwidth to A?
In other words, if I mix only AC/N will each of these 2 have more bandwidth than having set AC/N/A ?

I will answer you, but you should know better than to necro post to a three year old solved thread.

If you have no "A" devices, then having the router set to allow them won't change the performance to your "N" or "AC" devices. The amount of bandwidth is determined by the device, the configuration of the router, the router, the distance, the interference, etc. It is not an easily predictable answer.