Vista Wireless Performance Questionnaire

I think my head is about to pop. I have made every possible combination (well, seems like it...) suggested in this and other posts, and finally went back to my original settings on the NAS, no kidding, and now it works like I'd expect it to. So, after several days of reading posts and such, I find my original setting work fine. So, what is it, NetGear folks, that makes your software and firmware so freaking unreliable, please? You owe me three days of life and an explanation.

Ed

I was about to post my own thread about this, but then I found this one.

Setting MTU on the laptop to 1430 solved the issue for me. 8) Never tried 1460 or 1492 though.

This was my first Vista laptop. I tell you I panicked there for a while. :slap:

I also had a lot of trouble with wireless on both Vista and Windows 7. I tried every combination of MTU on the laptop and ReadyNAS NV as well as different version of wireless drivers and nothing worked, transfers were running abou 20-30kb/s. Laptop is a Dell XPS 1340 with Dell Wireless 1515 Wireless-N Adapter, based on Atheros chipset. The router is Verizon FIOS Actiontec MI424WR.

I added a new D-Link MIR-655 router after the Actiontec router and connect to the D-Link instead. Now wireless transfer speeds are around 4MB/s read and 8MB/s write from 3 rooms away.

Having watched this post grow and all the comments change about MTU value i feel it is now time for me to speak up.

I must first say that i am quite dissapointed with the wireless performance and since this was a Vista issue that has also not gone away with Windows 7 i can continue to assume the issues is not (specifically) windows related.

Here i will post my observations - needless to say i still have no desire to spend more money on powerlines (network points that use earth lines in your electricity supply) or run ethernet cables round the house - thats the whole point of wireless and the reason i bought a wireless router!

My setup (all devices listed, PC Specs are not relevant as i have tested many many devices).

Router - Netgear WNDR3700 (only 2.4GHz used, with WPA2-PSK (AES))
NAS - Netgear ReadyNas NV+ (4x2TB ST32000542AS) Enable fast CIF is on everything else - off.
PC1 - hardwired Windows 7
Laptop 1 - wireless Windows Vista
Tablet - wireless windows 7
PC2 - wireless (currently XP)
Cowan Q5 - Wireless WindowsCE
Netbook - wireless - Windows XP
2 x Nintendo Wii wireless
Nokia N86 Symbian 9.1 wireless
Epson PX800FW hardwired

As well as other wireless devices from time to time.

Ok so, a lot of the above are not relevant but will give an insight in to the fact that wireless is becoming very much used not just by laptops but by many other devices now. (Even my Nokia can map a drive to the NAS fine)

I setup a PC - new build with Windows 7 on, let it do its own thing for drivers so they are all certified, i then later on tried netgears own latest drivers - with the same results (wireless dongle WN111V2 was used).

All tests performed without any MTU changes - all out of the box defaults.

Test 1 - router configured for 54Mb only
Internet speeds (downloads) of 2Mb/s (around about 20mbit)
copy from the nas - less than 15 bytes per second

Test 2 - router configured for 130Mb only
Internet speeds (downloads) of 1Mb/s (around 10mbit)
copy from the nas - about 300-400kb/s

Test 3 - router configured for 300Mb only
Internet speeds (downloads) of 60Kb/s (around 512Mb)
Copy from the nas - about 2Mb/s


What i dont understand is why when i increase the wireless speed does my internet speed reduce but my Nas transfers actually work, but when i lower the wireless speed my nas transfers are rediculous and my internet speed returns.
Both the ReadyNas, router and the wireless dongle are Netgear devices - ok one was an aquired vendors kit but now labelled Netgear.

Can anyone explain?

As we know most wireless devices will conenct at 54Mb - and herein lies the problem for NAS speeds as above.

I have changed the MTU and got better speeds, but i shouldn't have to change these, it is in a way the same as me buying a fast car but the mechanic telling me, oh it wont go that fast on the road, you have to tweak it for it to actually move and even then dont hold your breath.

I am willing to test but please, someone, anyone - there must be an answer, i see other vendors do not have this issue, so what is so unique about the ReadyNAS for this to still remain an issue?

Does this thread end here???

Newbie to NAS but seeing all of these speed issues now.

Help.

daviswe wrote:

I think my head is about to pop. I have made every possible combination (well, seems like it...) suggested in this and other posts, and finally went back to my original settings on the NAS, no kidding, and now it works like I'd expect it to. So, after several days of reading posts and such, I find my original setting work fine. So, what is it, NetGear folks, that makes your software and firmware so freaking unreliable, please? You owe me three days of life and an explanation. Ed

What was you original setting?

sderuiter wrote:

dbott67 wrote: Have a look at this tutorial for Vista wireless issues: http://home.bott.ca/webserver/?p=226 -Dave I was about to throw my 6m old Vista laptop out of the window. No usable connection to my ReadyNAS NV, while an old XP laptop could connect perfectly with very acceptable speeds. I thought I'd tried everyting, including changing the MTU to 1492 and 1460, but to no avail. Using MTU of 1430, as suggested in above article, fixed ALL, again ALL, issues with Vista and ReadyNAS. Thank you again for this, but man, why should using your computer be such a pain in the butt....

All issues including speed over the wire?

I contacted tech support with another issue. Delay write failure.

They said the fix was to change duo nas mtu to 1400.

Is that seriously turning the speed down? I have wired and wireless access running.

Pidsly wrote:
Is that seriously turning the speed down? I have wired and wireless access running.

Not necessarily. Generally speaking, larger MTUs are more efficient, however, larger packets can choke slower links, resulting in the old "trying to suck a basketball through a garden hose syndrome."

The top section of this article provides a good explanation:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximum_transmission_unit

Pidsly wrote:
All issues including speed over the wire?

The tutorial is primarily for wireless users, not wired. Before doing anything, can you please post your current network settings for your NAS, as well as the performance numbers you are seeing.

We need to know:

- type of connection (wired, 10, 100 or gigabit)
- MTU setting
- performance settings (journaling on or off)
- make & model of router & switch
- client PC specs (operating system, type of network card, etc.)
- what performance numbers you're getting for read and write

I am having Ethernet speeds of ~10MB/s, but Wireless speeds of ~600KB/s. I changed MTU to 1430 as per the Netgear FAQ page, restarted, and it went up to 4MB/s, not bad. However, a few days later, it's back to ~600KB/s! I've rebooted all components, and nothing. Then I tried many other suggestions-- changing MTU to 1460, 1492, 1500, then back to 1430 (reboots after each change), but I still can't get good performance. Then I tried changing MTU on the ReadyNAS NV+ to 1400, 1430, 1460, and 1492 (with reboots), still no luck.

Running ReadyNAS NV+ 4.1.4 [1.00a042], Belkin N1 Vision Wireless Router (F5D8232-4) router (confirmed MTU of 1500 on the router), Windows 7 Ultimate Retail. I upgraded from Windows XP recently and that had worked perfectly fine on wireless.

It's so frustrating because MTU of 1430 worked temporarily and I don't believe anything changed.

I'm going to try Wireshark and see what I find.

Very frustrating!