Help with Wifi at home
By nicregi
@nicregi (1934)
Malaysia
December 21, 2010 11:23am CST
Hi my fellow mylotters.
I am having a problem now and I wonder how to solve it. My girl and I uses two laptops at home and we have WiFi at home. There is no problem at all sharing the wifi and the speed is great. However, when her brother gets home and start buffering movie online, we tend to get sudden lag and the speed of our laptops (for the net) drops so rapidly! It is so terrible and slow that it took me 5 minutes to load this page at mylot.
How this be happening? I thought the speed of wifi is divided equally with all computers accessing to it. We thought that was the modem problem and we just changed it less than one week ago and still, the problem persist.
What do you think and how we can solve it?
Much help needed and appreciated!
2 people like this
12 responses
@Sanitary (3968)
• Singapore
28 Dec 10
Wifi is supposed to be shared equally, that's right. However, speed is reduced when there are too many stations at work at the same time. Let's say both of u are used to the same speed with just the 2 of u using, so when there's a 3rd party coming in, u might think it's getting really slow, when it's not really so. U can test it out by going to a cafe, using their WIFI, u would notice the difference in speed too.
@RamRes (1723)
• Argentina
23 Dec 10
Guess it is because the movie download is dragging all available bandwidth from the ISP. The router don't distribute it equality, but it balances the workload needs, so the one that is demanding more data receives more attention. Either you need to limit the download speed at the movie player by putting some software or buyinh a superior plan for higher speed with your ISP.
Maybe some setting on your router helps. Have you tried the exactly same scenario, but with a wired network? The wifi is mainly slow network, and wired have always more capability.
@youless (112481)
• Guangzhou, China
22 Dec 10
This is because your girlfriend's brother uses the computer to watch movie online. As it will take up lots of the internet connection. I am not sure how is your connection speed. But it does to have an effect on it when you download or watch movie online. Perhaps you have to upgrade your connection speed and this problem shall be solved.
I love China
@sachii315 (488)
• Japan
22 Dec 10
Hi nicregi! I think you need a wireless router with a Quality of Service (QoS) function. It's the one who determines which packets are to prioritize. If you set a high priority on websurfing and a low priority on media streaming and downloading, you'll experience a better performance on those set on high. Your girlfriend's brother may still be able to view movies but not of fast speed while you can enjoy websurfing. You can also balance both settings. I am using ASUS RT-N16, it has a QoS function. To have a better understanding of what QoS does. There is a better explanation in Cisco's website. Happy Mylotting! 
@Money007 (48)
• India
22 Dec 10
First u have to check this device std
like it comes in 802.11a or 802.11g
The functionality of the device is working as
a switch means suppose if u are using higher bandwidth
like streaming movies your successors got little
bandwidth because the consumption of the bandwidth is high
on your lap-top
thats why you suffer from low speed
ok
@intifadha (127)
• Indonesia
22 Dec 10
for streaming video requires a large bandwitch,you can use software to manage bandwitch net limiter
@kingparker (9673)
• United States
22 Dec 10
No, even though you change that modem, the speed will be slow too. So, there is no really solution to your question here. The best thing you can, sign up two DSL, and don't share it with anyone within your home. You can get the full speed of it just by yourself.
@Suggar (3606)
• Bulgaria
21 Dec 10
Hello friend, i think that when it's wireless modem, the speed is not divided.
At home we got that kind of modem, but only i use it and we got key for the network, so no one else to be able to use what we pay for.
Why don't you suggest the brother of your girlfriend just to download the movies? If the speed is really good, he can save the movies on his computer, which will happen really fast and it will effect your speed only in the minutes, when the guy is downloading movies, not after that.
@yoniarnon (1079)
• Israel
21 Dec 10
Hello my friend, i can advise you with 2 options that my help, first if he can download ask he to download at nights, that he will not disturb and on the morning he will have the movie..
Second if he still want to download at the middle if the day try telling he to limit his download speed cause it interrupt??? you to enter even for a small sites, so if now your internet is like 400 speed tell him to download until 200 speed...
Wish you good luck and hope that i helped
@braimer23 (108)
• Philippines
22 Dec 10
i would like to add..,
one of the thing that you should do, is to minimize the download, watching movie and watching videos of one of the computer so that the other computer will not be affected.
@braimer23 (108)
• Philippines
22 Dec 10
hi nicregi?
actually, it is true that the speed will be divided equally with all computers accessing to it., but since one of the computer is buffering a movie online, it will really gets some speed of the other computers,for example, 2 computers are sharing with one wifi connection, if one of the computer is going to open a certain video in youtube, then the speed of the connection of the other computer will be affected, because watching video buffers more than surfing..,
