Slow Internet Connection (need expert help .. please read)

Question

Last month I received my XPS Gen 2 and spent the first couple days in awe of how powerful the system was. I had a few minor issues with it but I didn't pay much attention to the problems the till after the first few days. When the excitement lifted, I noticed tons of issues with the laptop including some wireless. The main problem being that I get very poor/slow download speeds even though my signal strength is awesome! I was doing two things to test my speed. First was downloading the Intel 2915 drivers(Started doing this test by downloading the Dell TrueMobile 1450 drivers later after I had recieved that card) from the Dell site, once on wireless and once on wired. The result was around 100KBs for wireless and 400KBs-600KBs for wired. The second test was from http://www.dslreports.com and the wireless was rated from 500Kbs-700Kbs with the average being more around 545Kbs and there was only ONE time it even came close to 700Kbs but I think that was cause I hit back and refresh or something. The wired connection was rated around 2.8Mbs-3.4Mbs with the average being around 3.1Mbs. So basically, I was getting around 1/6th the speed on wireless vs wired. Meanwhile, I talked to a bunch of other people from both forums and in town who had either the same setup or something close and all reported having awesome speed. Everyone seemed to be getting the max speed from their wireless that their broadband would allow. Some even having 6Mbs Cable and getting that full speed through wireless. After speaking with wireless and xps gen 2 techs I decided to get the Intel 2915 card replaced with the same card. When the new card arrived I had no problem installing it myself yet when I loaded windows up the problem still existed. I ended up calling back up that same day and speaking with both wireless and xps support. After talking with xps support they offered to send me a replacement system out within the week due to some unrelated, as far as I know, issues with the video card. I received the replacement xps gen 2 about a week after the order was placed and my first impression was that while the video card issues had been resolved the wireless issues had not. This would make my 3rd Intel 2915 wireless card. The same day I called Dell back up and spoke with wireless support then customer support, at this point I was starting to get a little frustrated. I ended up talking to a very nice customer service manager who helped me out by sending me the Dell TrueMobile 1450 at no cost due to the issues I was having. A couple days later I receive the TrueMobile 1450 and install it knowing the problem will be solved... at least that's what I though :( I loaded Windows up and to my shock it still had the EXACT same slow speed. At this point I though it had to be the router. I called up Linksys and after a couple hours on the phone with the Techs they just told me to return the router because they couldn't resolve my issue. I went to the store where I purchased it, got a refund, and purchased the D-Link DI-524. When I got home and set it up I was shocked yet again to see that my speed was still EXACTLY! the same. Right then I called D-Link hoping maybe their techs would have a little more knowledge on my situation and maybe know of something that could be hurting my connection speed. Well, they ended up to actually be less help than Linksys and so I called Dell again. After talking with Dell wireless support for almost an hour all they told me is that it had to be my environment or location. I took what they said and tried everything over at my friends house. He lives in the country so there is not much around. I just took the stuff outside, hooked it all up, and saw that yet again my speed was EXACTLY!!! the same. So here I am in the middle of nowhere, with a poor connection, and agrivated as heck! I called Dell back up when I got home and was told that even out there, in the middle of no where, I was still prolly getting something blocking my signal. I couldn't believe a tech was actually telling me this. That had to be the most stupid thing I have heard from a tech given what I just tried. HOWEVER, I decided to humor this guy and I went out to replace the router YET AGAIN! This time I purchased myself a $129.99 Netgear WGU624 that does A/B/G and 108Mbs AND!!! the matching linksys notebook card. I figured that even if the higher freq. of wireless A didn't help that maybe the higher transfer rate would. Now I am left with three options, either call Dell back up and speak with software support(which all the xps and wireless techs have suggested I do countless times), I can format yet again and install nothing but windows and the Dell TrueMobile 1450 drivers and see if that helps, or just try the notebook card. I decided to call software support because I just dont wanna have to resort to using the notebook card which I just bought and having to actually keep it and the new router just to solve the issue with slow internet. However, I am told that I cant get software support and they want to charge me to get it. I purchased a 3 year warranty to cover this computer if its not working .. and it isn't. I dont care if the problem is hardware or software, if Dell sends me something bad they need to make it right.. end of story. The rep told me they have no supervisors and since customer service isn't open I will have to wait till tomorrow to try and get em to give me some free software support which I dont think will even help. Next I try and format like I said before and load only the dell drivers. This doesn't help at all but has proven at least that no other software is blocking or hurting my connection speeds. Now I get to hook the matching Netgear notebook card and BOOM my speed flew like nothing I had seen on the system yet. All this leaves me with one huge problem however. I am now out $129 for the router and $99 for the wireless card PLUS left with having to use up my only notebook card slot. All I wanted was to get the same speeds others have said they got from the router I had in the first place. I cant talk to customer service till tomorrow as they aren't open but what do you all think I should do??? I am now out of my 21 days trying to figure out this problem so I doubt I would be allowed another replacement sent to me like the last and even so I dont know if that would help as this would be my 2nd replacement. I dont want to return the system as it is a beast and love what it can do aside from wireless but I dont want to keep a flawed system. I am thinking about asking for some kinda store credit to cover the cost of the stuffI had to buy to get my speeds to be what it should have been in the first place.   What do you all think? Any tech advice on how to correct the problem without having to use the notebook card and router?     Btw, sorry for any poor spelling or stuff like that. :)   Edit : Btw, dunno if anyone saw that above I said the matching LINKSYS notebook adapter. I purchased the netgear router and a notebook adapter from linksys that matched the specs of the netgear. The reason I did this is because I wanted to see if one of the issues could have been compatibility between the router and the intel or dell cards. So I figured if I purchased another notebook card but one that wasnt the same as the router it would so any problems with the router being picky or something. Message Edited by pyro2005 on 07-17-2005 06:37 PM

NemesisDB · Answer

internet speed tests are often poor indicators for wireless, as more latency may be interpretted as lower throughput.  if you have more than one computer on your LAN try a free utility like QCheck to get a better indicator of your actual wireless speeds.  also, get the latest drivers 9.x.x.25 from www.intel.com

pyro2005 · Answer

Sadly, I had already tried those drivers you are refering to :( I think in all I have tried about 5 versions of Intel drivers not including the two I downloaded from Dell directly. As far as the speed tests I am also using Dell.com as another test with downloading the Intel and Dell drivers. What I do is turn on the desktop that is wired and d/l either the Intel or TrueMobile drivers and watch for how long it takes as well as an average d/l rate. Then I turn off the desktop and try the laptop via wired and recieve the same speed almost on the dot. I then disable the wired connect on the laptop and try the same download via wireless and get roughly 1/6th the speed as the others. So in actual internet use I can clearly see the difference by both time taken and download rate.

Networking, Internet, & Bluetooth

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