30M Superhub on Virgin??

TONYHAMILTON · 22-02-2012, 12:27

I live in a shared house and have got Virgin Media 30 MB with a Super Hub and its an old guest house(meaning its rather bigger than a normal house),the trouble is people who are using the wireless are complaning about the internet speed they get in various parts of the house so would Virgin suggest anything to help us or just tell us to upgrade the speed when in a couple of months it will be automatically upgraded

Stuart · 22-02-2012, 12:29

Is it slow on a wired connection as well?

TONYHAMILTON · 22-02-2012, 12:35

No i dont think so and ive checked the speed of the connection and last night was getting 20+MB just wondered thats all what Virgin would suggest if we rang them

General Maximus · 22-02-2012, 13:11

the speed you get through wireless and what Virgin actually give you are two completely different things. It is like me saying there are no speed limits on the motorway and you can feel free to blast along at 200mph if you want to. If you have got a tin can for a car that can only do 50mph then that is all you are going to do. Virgin can upgrade (and will do) you speed to 60mbit, and even if you upgrade right now to 100mbit, it won't make any difference to your wireless performance at all.

The problem you have got is the shub. There will be various factors which affect wireless performance in your house so the shub isn't entirely to blame, but it isnt helping either. The shub is notorious for poor wireless performance and although you can ring up tech support and dick about with the settings at the end of the day it is just rubbish. I you are going to use wireless as your primary transmission method for communication with the shub you really need to be looking at putting the hub in modem mode and buying yourself a proper router with better wireless performance. To put things in perspective for you, on a scale of 1-10, the shub is 1 and without me going on a Linksys rant (10

), there are plenty of very cheap routers out there for £20-£30 which will deliver great performance at a 7-8.

The morale of the story is don't prolong your pain, by a proper router.

Stephen · 22-02-2012, 13:24

If it is a large house then the Superhub may not be to blame for the poor wireless in parts of the house.

thenry · 22-02-2012, 13:26

a decent router investment would be worth while if everyone wants to chip in.

------------------------------------------------------

have you tried changing wireless channels?

-----------------------------------------

can you post you power level/connection stats...

put this in your web browser.. 192.168.100.1
login > defaults - username: admin - password: changeme

click on advance settings below 3 red boxes
toyour left look for connection and cvlick on it

copy and paste all the info that comes up

Milambar · 22-02-2012, 13:32

I would suggest running inSSIDer on the laptops, to see which channels are the most cluttered, and pick an uncluttered one.

Its worth noting, especially in a large house, that the more walls/floors there are between the router and the laptop, the weaker the signal is going to be. Had a friend once who put his wireless router in a metal filing cabinet, where it was "out of sight". He never could get a wireless signal and always blamed the router.

Ideally, the router/superhub should be in the most centeral location possible,

Also worth noting that the superhub has a dire-weak wireless signal to begin with.

General Maximus · 22-02-2012, 13:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stephen

If it is a large house then the Superhub may not be to blame for the poor wireless in parts of the house.

I know, that is why I said:

Quote:

Originally Posted by General Maximus

There will be various factors which affect wireless performance in your house so the shub isn't entirely to blame, but it isnt helping either

It isnt neccessarily to blame but I do think he wouldn't have made that post if he had a proper router to start off with which delivered excellent wireless performance.

thenry · 22-02-2012, 13:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Milambar

Had a friend once who put his wireless router in a metal filing cabinet, where it was "out of sight". He never could get a wireless signal and always blamed the router.

my mate stuck his in a cupboard and i thought that was bad

qasdfdsaq · 22-02-2012, 15:44

The Superhub's antennas are pointing backwards so try point that side of the Superhub towards the furthest part of the property.

If it's already in a central location, then consider getting a decent wireless AP with proper omni antennas.

---------- Post added at 15:41 ---------- Previous post was at 15:40 ----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stephen

If it is a large house then the Superhub may not be to blame for the poor wireless in parts of the house.

Or maybe it is.

---------- Post added at 15:44 ---------- Previous post was at 15:41 ----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by Milambar

Ideally, the router/superhub should be in the most centeral location possible,

Also worth noting that the superhub has a dire-weak wireless signal to begin with.

Actually, ideally, it wouldn't be in a central location as the output is lopsided. If you put it centrally you'd get too much going one way and getting wasted and not enough going the other.

That said, lopsided output by necessity results in wasted output compared to an omnidirectional, as regulations limiting wireless output are based on EIRP measurement of the part of the beam where the signal output is strongest.

Milambar · 22-02-2012, 21:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

The Superhub's antennas are pointing backwards so try point that side of the Superhub towards the furthest part of the property.

My bad. I assumed the broadcast pattern was omnidirectional. The aerials are pointing backwards then? So the strongest transmit is around the rear of the router?

General Maximus · 22-02-2012, 22:41

turn the router around so it is back to front?

qasdfdsaq · 23-02-2012, 10:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Milambar

My bad. I assumed the broadcast pattern was omnidirectional. The aerials are pointing backwards then? So the strongest transmit is around the rear of the router?

Yes, that's my conclusion based on the design of the thing.

I'm yet to actually measure it scientifically though to see exactly how lopsided it is.

Sephiroth · 23-02-2012, 20:52

The SH is rubbish on wireless and more than likely the house itself isn't helping. I've got a top class router in one part of my house but in my office, wireless is poor.

So I use a Powerline adaptor to punt ethernet over the mains from my router to the office Powerline. I connected the Powerline to a hub/switch and connected a port on the hub to a wireless extender in my office. This extender uses the same SSID as my router so I can move around the house wirelessly.

This solution is ideal in the type of house described - but involves laying out dosh.

Don't even think in terms of the wretched SH wireless decently reaching any part of the house where difficulty is currently experienced.