Why it's so important to know your WiFi environment and how to be a good WiFi neighbor

[wwillson]

This is a write up I did on the RV site. It pertains WiFi in the home as well, so I thought I would link to it here.

Why it's so important to know your WiFi environment and how to be a good WiFi neighbor

We are in a campground near Fort Collins, we have been here before. I've learned that their WiFi is ok, but not business quality, so we brought our Starlink and I use our own Ubiquiti access point. Why bring our own access point instead of just using the one built into the Starlink? Thanks...

rvthe.us

 

[bbhero]

Really very well written and very well explained. It is a whole lot to read and comprehend… It definitely makes sense to utilize a different frequency that is available and hardly ever used by anyone else. Especially if you are doing what you use the connection for Wayne.

 

[CDX825]

My new neighbor is a bad wifi neighbor. At least 6 SSIDs coming from their house on multiple channels. Talk about self interference.

 

[zzyzzx]

Can't they just use a wired connection to their Starlink?

 

[wwillson]

Can't they just use a wired connection to their Starlink?

Yes, I have Ethernet between Starlink and my switch. However, how would I run an Ethernet cable to every device like phones, tables, laptops without an Ethernet port, streaming box, etc. WiFi is an absolute necessity these days. Plus, most people don't even think about wired Ethernet, as WiFi is ubiquitous.

 

[zzyzzx]

Yes, I have Ethernet between Starlink and my switch. However, how would I run an Ethernet cable to every device like phones, tables, laptops without an Ethernet port, streaming box, etc. WiFi is an absolute necessity these days. Plus, most people don't even think about wired Ethernet, as WiFi is ubiquitous.

Ethernet adapter for the laptop, and you should only buy streaming boxes that have ethernet ports. Those two are probably using most of your WIFI bandwith anyway, so hard wire both of those and the phone and tablet should work pretty good after that.

 

[redhat]

It is inevitable that majority of consumer devices will be on WiFi. The only exception is a savvy-customer or technical person either retrofitting a house with cabling and drops (and let’s be honest… you aren’t convincing 9/10 people to do that, lol) or you’re planning that in a new build.

I agree when the stars align… the GoTo move is drops for everything that doesn’t get moved during the day. But that just isn’t always feasible. Irregardless though of how little or many devices are competing for airtime, appropriate channel and width configuration is almost mandatory.

Years ago when I was installing UAP-LRs… old by today’s standards. I’d scan and see what channels were congested and make a best effort choice on where to place mine.

Does Starlink out your behind a CNAT? Or can you get a public IP?

 

[Brons2]

Ethernet adapter for the laptop, and you should only buy streaming boxes that have ethernet ports. Those two are probably using most of your WIFI bandwith anyway, so hard wire both of those and the phone and tablet should work pretty good after that.

I've never hardwired any of my TV streamers. Prior to this current version of the AP software, they have streamed 4Kp60 no problem, in fact, I have done it on all three TVs at once just as a test. Worked fine. I'm going to roll back the version of the AP software I am on, because it's awful.

Ironically, all of my TVs have physical Ethernet ports.

 

[PandaBear]

My new neighbor is a bad wifi neighbor. At least 6 SSIDs coming from their house on multiple channels. Talk about self interference.

It is not how many SSIDs they have but how much traffic (streaming) they are using in total. You can have 1 SSID and 4 kids streaming 4K at the same time and be worse than 6 SSIDs they just use to keep things secure.

 

[PandaBear]

Most of the future wifi improvements will come from better channel utilization and interference control. 2.4GHz should really be limited to only 3 channels and fallback for long distance these days, and future wifi would likely improve mostly on coordination (time and frequency), 6GHz (less range makes it easier to reduce interference if you are nearby), and most importantly preamble puncturing (block off partial channel when interference so you can still use part of it).

I don't think we have much room for higher QAM in real life outside of the lab, or more than 4 antennas.

 

[SC Maintenance]

My new neighbor is a bad wifi neighbor. At least 6 SSIDs coming from their house on multiple channels. Talk about self interference.

Yes, I am the same, but I think its more than 6. They even have 2 called "hidden network" that aren't hidden, I can hardly receive my own wifi in my office. But there good neighbors, so I don't want to say anything. I presume they simply don't know better. I ran a cat5 to my office for now.

 

[wwillson]

Ethernet adapter for the laptop, and you should only buy streaming boxes that have ethernet ports. Those two are probably using most of your WIFI bandwith anyway, so hard wire both of those and the phone and tablet should work pretty good after that.

Back when WiFi had little bandwidth and the radios and drivers were mostly terrible, I ran Ethernet to pretty much everything. The need to do that is over. WiFi has gotten light years better and faster, it's now ubiquitous. I only run Ethernet to the APs and a couple Linux servers that sit close to the switch. I don't even run Ethernet to my main PC, which moves over 80GB/day. My wife and I both work from home and will spend hours each day where we are both on video calls. The quality is not discernible from wired Ethernet. If you have good APs and configure them correctly for your WiFi environment, you'll have a great experience.

 

[wwillson]

The only exception is a savvy-customer or technical person either retrofitting a house with cabling and drops (and let’s be honest… you aren’t convincing 9/10 people to do that, lol) or you’re planning that in a new build.

We are doing a remodel of most of the first floor in our house. Most of it is down to the studs and I haven't run an inch of Ethernet cable. No need.

I agree when the stars align… the GoTo move is drops for everything that doesn’t get moved during the day.

I don't see any reason, as my house has four APs set up correctly. I can get > 500Mb/s download anywhere in my house.

Does Starlink out your behind a CNAT? Or can you get a public IP?

Starlink uses CGNAT. You can't get public IPs on any of the consumer plans I've seen.

Ironically, all of my TVs have physical Ethernet ports.

As do mine and they are full of dust, as I've never plugged anything into them.

It is not how many SSIDs they have but how much traffic (streaming) they are using in total.

SSIDs (ESS) frames are only 32 bytes, so announcing them takes very little bandwidth.

I don't think we have much room for higher QAM in real life outside of the lab

My PhD EE buddy said that as you increase the QAM constellation, it takes exponentially more processing power. The modulation is all done in hardware, as it's so compute intensive. Modulating with more bits gets harder and harder. It will be interesting to see how this works out in the future.

 

[redhat]

FWIW though, there is nothing wrong with having dedicated items cables. It is very clear that your (as are mine) wireless-quality experiences are the culmination of experience, quality equipment and appropriate configuration -- that of which is not available on all "dollar store wireless routers" or ISP provided equipment that of which many folks on here might be rocking.

 

[wwillson]

FWIW though, there is nothing wrong with having dedicated items cables. It is very clear that your (as are mine) wireless-quality experiences are the culmination of experience, quality equipment and appropriate configuration -- that of which is not available on all "dollar store wireless routers" or ISP provided equipment that of which many folks on here might be rocking.

Agree 100% on all points.

 

[PandaBear]

My PhD EE buddy said that as you increase the QAM constellation, it takes exponentially more processing power. The modulation is all done in hardware, as it's so compute intensive. Modulating with more bits gets harder and harder. It will be interesting to see how this works out in the future.

Yes. It is only part of it as we have better and better processing engine for it. The signal to noise ratio keeps getting worse if we keep pushing it for more data vs accuracy. 2^9=512 can store 9 bit, 2^10=1024, 2^11=2048, 2^12=4096, the much reduced signal strength would now require 8 times the precision to get 12/9 = 4/3 = 33% more data. Most of the improvement is in the error correction code engine and increase number of antennas in MIMO. There is a finite number we can use before the noise gets you. 4 antenna for home use and probably 4096 is the max. Most of the improvement recently is in the new channel using wider and wider band hoping not to get collision with other users. The only low hanging fruit is now mitigating collision and, higher frequencies that won't travel far hence less interference from neighbors.

The same is happening in flash memory. TLC (2^3=8 voltage level) is likely going to be for most SSD and QLC (2^4=16 voltage level) for USB / SD card in the future, or archiving use in large storage (servers of read only contents like videos). It is very hard to keep going to finer precision without losing data. I don't think people even bother using 5LC or whatever they want to call it, unless some special customers custom design an SSD for analog data that can tolerate data loss in photos, video, voice contents.

 

[zzyzzx]

Back when WiFi had little bandwidth and the radios and drivers were mostly terrible, I ran Ethernet to pretty much everything. The need to do that is over. WiFi has gotten light years better and faster, it's now ubiquitous. I only run Ethernet to the APs and a couple Linux servers that sit close to the switch. I don't even run Ethernet to my main PC, which moves over 80GB/day. My wife and I both work from home and will spend hours each day where we are both on video calls. The quality is not discernible from wired Ethernet. If you have good APs and configure them correctly for your WiFi environment, you'll have a great experience.

My personal experience suggests that the wired connections are working better, especially the wired ethernet to the Roku box.

 

[wwillson]

My personal experience suggests that the wired connections are working better, especially the wired ethernet to the Roku box.

WiFi will never be a "good" as wired, but when properly configured WiFi is so close to Ethernet that you can't tell the difference, what's the gain to spending $ on running Ethernet to devices? I'm a networking snob, because it's what I do for a living and I see no benefit of running Ethernet to most devices.

 

[Brons2]

FWIW though, there is nothing wrong with having dedicated items cables. It is very clear that your (as are mine) wireless-quality experiences are the culmination of experience, quality equipment and appropriate configuration -- that of which is not available on all "dollar store wireless routers" or ISP provided equipment that of which many folks on here might be rocking.

There's nothing wrong with it - other than the cost, if it's not already there.

 

[meep]

I’m old school. Ethernet as much as reasonably possible for the win. I’m also skeptical of exactly how much microwave EMF we transmit in our homes is good for us.