Is Connectivity Related To Distance From Wireless Router?

[Latindancer]

I live in a share house and we have a wireless router. There is a person whose room is right next to the wall the router sits next to, and when he gets on the net downloading stuff (especially movies) I cannot connect.....or I get connected, it says signal strength is good, but the web pages won't load because of poor connectivity. Other members of the house are also affected.

The person sucking up the bandwidth has a computer with twice the RAM as mine and a faster CPU ( I just happen to mention this....I'm not sure if it matters).

Currently when connectivity disappears, I sit in the kitchen (as I am now) connected to the router with a cable.

Is there any way around this ?

I can't run a cable up to my room as it's too far. How is it that this person gets to suck up the bandwidth ? Proximity to the router ?

[AyG]

It's not proximity to the router. The wifi signal is either there or it's not. The signal strength indicator is actually pretty meaningless.

What's happening is that his program for downloading torrents (I presume) is making dozens if not hundreds of individual connections. A web browser typically only makes a handful of connections (usually no more than two to an individual website by convention). Since the router handles the individual connections with equal priority the other person is getting almost all the available bandwidth.

All torrent programs allow the user to specify how many connections to make and how much bandwidth to use. Your best bet, therefore, is to ask this person to configure the program to limit the number of connections and bandwidth used.

[Gone]

Sounds like you have a problem with another renter not with you router.

Man up and tell the guy to stop downloading movies or using torrents when other people want to use the internet as well. Maybe he isn't aware of what he is doing?

[gosompoi]

If it is N router set it to "G" only mode or N130 mode. Also, some routers have traffic limit controls. If I knew the model I could help more.

[beano2274]

As someone has already correctly said, the torrents do not have one single connection but many, this is where you problem lies. Who does the router belong to, as you can change a few things to make it harder for him to download, you can even block torrents by using it as a rule in the modem/routers firewall.

[Phil Conners]

It's not proximity to the router. The wifi signal is either there or it's not. The signal strength indicator is actually pretty meaningless

That is actually not true. As the wifi signal deteriorates the connection speed goes down.

[rakman]

It's not proximity to the router. The wifi signal is either there or it's not. The signal strength indicator is actually pretty meaningless

That is actually not true. As the wifi signal deteriorates the connection speed goes down.

+1

[sfokevin]

Tell whoever controls the router to block port 6881 thru 6999...

Edited February 14, 2012 by sfokevin

[Phil Conners]

Why? What should that accomplish?

[beano2274]

The ports can be changed for torrents, just block torrents all together from the router.

[IanTheGeek]

Check to see if your router has QoS and if it does lookfor more informataion via google.

If it does then that may solve your issues.

Sorry I could not post a LINK but for some crazy reason the forum does not allow it.

Edited February 14, 2012 by IanTheGeek

[Phil Conners]

Hello IanTheGeek and welcome on board. The forum software enforce a cooling-off period of a couple of days before you are allowed to post links. It reduces the number of spam we have to remove. Thanks for understanding

[astral]

The thickness of the intervening walls and the amount of reinforcing steel in them also make a difference

[Latindancer]

If it is N router set it to "G" only mode or N130 mode. Also, some routers have traffic limit controls. If I knew the model I could help more.

It's a Netgear RangeMax ADSL rotuer DG834PN

Thanks to all for your replies. I'll mull over it, and also chat with another tenant here who knows how to alter the router settings. It's beyond my capability, but he knows a lot.

I don't want to completely block the torrent downloads, just limit them (preferably without the downloader's knowing I'm doing it....he's potentially a bit irritable).

Just looked up the router...there is no QOS prioritisation (whatever that is !)

Edited February 14, 2012 by Latindancer

[Pib]

It's not proximity to the router. The wifi signal is either there or it's not. The signal strength indicator is actually pretty meaningless

That is actually not true. As the wifi signal deteriorates the connection speed goes down.

Big 10-4 on that. As signal strength decreases due to distances/obstructions the data throughput will decrease...and it's not a linear relationship like if you double the distance throughput will be cut in half (i.e., it may be more or less, vary quite a bit)...lots of variables involved. In any good review of a Wifi router testing will be done to see how well it maintains data throughput speed as distance increases/signal strength decreases. All Wifi routers are definitely not created equal when it comes to their data throughput at various distances.

[sfokevin]

I don't want to completely block the torrent downloads, just limit them (preferably without the downloader's knowing I'm doing it....he's potentially a bit irritable).

Most Torrentor's are irritable...

[Pib]

I don't want to completely block the torrent downloads, just limit them (preferably without the downloader's knowing I'm doing it....he's potentially a bit irritable).

Most Torrentor's are irritable...

A Torrentor can indeed get irritable when he can't get his daily 10 gigabyte download high.