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Re: WAX214 maximum real world throughput issue

t0mb0
Aspirant

WAX214 maximum real world throughput issue

Hi,

 

I've just installed a WAX214 access point.  The maximum throughput I can achieve using 5Ghz Wifi 6 with 80Mhz channels is about 540Mbps.  I realise that real life speeds are less than the theoretical ones, but this a long way short of the advertised speeds and somewhat less than I was expecting.  Has anyone else obtained faster speeds?

 

The AP is connected by gigabit ethernet to a switch which I've tested running at the full gigabit so there's no issue with the wired connection to the AP.

 

In terms of clients, I've tried an iPad, an iPhone and an M1 Macbook, all a negligible distance from the AP, which are all full Wifi 6 devices and they all cap out at close to 540Mbps.

 

In terms of the wifi environment, it's not very congested in general

 

Am I missing something, is there some setting in the configuration which will get better throughput?

 

Thanks very much,

 

Tom

Message 1 of 4
jeremyshaw
Tutor

Re: WAX214 maximum real world throughput issue

Not to be entirely too silly, but that sounds really close to the max theoretical 2.4GHz speed (570Mbps).

 

Also, it's not too far off of being 1/2 of the max 5GHz speed. Bandwidth tests are being done without other interfereing pre WiFi6 devices connecting to the 5GHz channel? They are being run from the WiFi device to a wired device, and not between wifi devices?

 

All that being said, the peak I saw on my WAX214 was ~550Mbps as well (~6GB file move from laptop with AX200 to NAS - NAS is capable of ~2000Mbps when transferring from my 10GbE desktop to the 2.5GbE NAS with HDDs).

 

I am in an extremely noisey RF environment, though.

Message 2 of 4
schumaku
Guru

Re: WAX214 maximum real world throughput issue


@t0mb0 wrote:

I've just installed a WAX214 access point.  The maximum throughput I can achieve using 5Ghz Wifi 6 with 80Mhz channels is about 540Mbps.  ... I've tried an iPad, an iPhone and an M1 Macbook, all a negligible distance from the AP, which are all full Wifi 6 devices and they all cap out at close to 540Mbps.


Ok, instead of digging in the dark - what does the Macbook WiFi diagnostics show for the M1 connection?

Message 3 of 4
t0mb0
Aspirant

Re: WAX214 maximum real world throughput issue


@schumaku wrote:

@t0mb0 wrote:

I've just installed a WAX214 access point.  The maximum throughput I can achieve using 5Ghz Wifi 6 with 80Mhz channels is about 540Mbps.  ... I've tried an iPad, an iPhone and an M1 Macbook, all a negligible distance from the AP, which are all full Wifi 6 devices and they all cap out at close to 540Mbps.


Ok, instead of digging in the dark - what does the Macbook WiFi diagnostics show for the M1 connection?


Thanks for the reply.  The relevant settings are:

 

Channel: 40 (5 GHz, 80 MHz)

Country code: GB

RSSI: -40 dBm

Noise: -90 dBm

Tx Rate: 1,200 Mbps

PHY Mode: 802.11ax

MCS Index: 11

NSS: 2

 

I have done more tests however, and the situation is now rather stranger.  I've run some iperf3 tests, and I can achieve 850ish Mbps, which is more what I'd expect, so the raw throughput of the WAX214 appears ok.  

 

However, when running a variety of internet speed tests, these cap out at 540 Mbps through the WAX214.  The normal conclusion would be that the bottleneck is therefore my internet connection, rather than the wireless throughput.  However, the computer which is wired in to the same switch as the WAX214, can reliably achieve a full 1000Mbps on the same internet speed tests.  This is the very same computer which I used as an endpoint to the iperf3 throughput tests. 

 

Is there any reason that the max throughput of the WAX214 should be significantly lower for an internet speedtest than for an iperf3 (default settings) test if (as I believe we have proved) internet speed itself is not to be the bottleneck?  Alternatively, could there be some subtle interaction between the WAX214 and the internet router/modem, for example, which would limit the throughput?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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