[ros-users] Wireless router/card recommendations

[Antons Rebguns]

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Oh, forgot to mention that there was no performance difference when using unencrypted network vs using WPA2. We were
getting around 75mbit/s with either setup.

Anton

On 06/11/2010 08:23 PM, Eric Perko wrote:
> Anton,
> 
> I was able to do some tests with the N router I have at home (WRT300n
> running DD-WRT) and WPA2 Personal encryption, and it sadly didn't look
> so good. Using iperf, measured speeds from a Thinkpad client with the
> Intel 4965agn to one of those Asus cards in my desktop, iperf only
> reported speeds around 1.5 Mbits/s (yup... those are the right units).
> I was able to get full 95ish Mbit/s out of a 100Mbit Ethernet link, so
> iperf should be functioning fine. I did notice that iwconfig only
> reported a bitrate of 54Mbits/s for the 4965, and I was able to bump
> it to some sort of auto mode and get speeds of around 50Mbit/s to a
> wired iperf server where I had previously gotten 3-5 Mbit/s. All of
> the systems involved are running Ubuntu 9.10 x64. My current
> hypothesis for the less than spectacular speeds reported by iperf is a
> combination of a few things:
> 
> * Poor autoconfiguration of the wireless N cards by Linux
> * Running my home router in a mixed mode because we have a few G-only
> clients, so maybe we cannot do full N speeds anyways
> * Tons of wireless interference in my apartment building... there
> really aren't any wide open channels between 1-11, so interference may
> be an important factor
> 
> I plan on trying to test the latter two once the lab N router
> reappears (it seems to have been loaned out and hasn't come back yet).
> I would also like to try it on an unencrypted network and see if that
> increases the speeds. The first is trickier and will require finding
> the right iwconfig commands... the ones I tried quickly with the Intel
> card didn't seem to put it into an N mode.
> 
> Though I did successfully change my rate on the Intel card to some
> sort of auto rate, I was unable to set it to a wireless N speed. Does
> anyone else have a wireless N setup (preferably N-only) that they
> could report the output of `iwconfig` for the bitrate value?
> 
> I guess the moral of the story from these tests is that just because
> there is some N equipment doesn't mean we are getting anything close
> to N speeds...
> 
> - Eric
> 
> On Wed, Jun 9, 2010 at 11:48 PM, Antons Rebguns <arebgun at gmail.com> wrote:
> Eric,
> 
>>>> We've been using one of these
>>>> http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?Item=N82E16833320048 in our
>>>> system and it has been working quite well with Ubuntu 9.10. I can't
>>>> really comment on it's full speed potential doing 802.11n, as we only
>>>> have a WRT54G router, but it hasn't dropped out or had any problems
>>>> being recognized by Ubuntu like some of the other cards/USB adapters
>>>> we tried. Also, it goes on sale at MWave every so often for about $12,
>>>> which is helpful if you don't have a huge budget for Wifi cards.
> 
> Actually we do have a pretty good wireless G setup, I was thinking about something faster like wireless N. We do have an
> Intel 4965agn card that should support N speeds, but I was unable to get it to run any faster than G speeds (steady 60
> mbit/s though).
> 
>>>>
>>>> I could run some bandwidth tests or something with our WRT54G if you
>>>> give me some commands to run on each computer. I might also be able to
>>>> try it on a WRT610n, if I can find it in the lab.
>>>>
> 
> That would be great if you could test wireless N setup if you have one available. We have been using iperf to do
> bandwidth tests. It's in Ubuntu repos, just do "sudo apt-get install iperf". Then on one computer run "iperf -s" and on
> another run "iperf -c IP_ADDRESS_OF_ANOTHER_COMPUTER".
> 
> Thanks!
> Anton
> 
>>>> - Eric
>>>>
>>>> On Wed, Jun 9, 2010 at 8:36 PM, Antons Rebguns <anton at email.arizona.edu> wrote:
>>>>> Hello ROS users,
>>>>> We are updating our networking setup and I was wondering what other
>>>>> people/labs use on their robots? Something that is well supported in Linux
>>>>> and is fast, since network traffic is pretty significant with all the
>>>>> sensors/cameras running on the robot.
>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>> Anton
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> ros-users mailing list
>>>>> ros-users at code.ros.org
>>>>> https://code.ros.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-users
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> ros-users mailing list
>>>> ros-users at code.ros.org
>>>> https://code.ros.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-users
> 
>>

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