Wi-Fi speed

[kyrcy]

I have an 8 Mbps internet speed connection (maximum around 1000 KB/sec transfer speed) and the modem I am using supports a maximum Wi-Fi speed of 54 Mbps. Will I gain anything by changing the modem to one that supports 150 or 300 Mbps?

[october262]

does your internet service provider use some sort a speed cap
or throttles you after a high speed data usage ??

[hech54]

I have an 8 Mbps internet speed connection (maximum around 1000 KB/sec transfer speed) and the modem I am using supports a maximum Wi-Fi speed of 54 Mbps. Will I gain anything by changing the modem to one that supports 150 or 300 Mbps?

You are not even getting close to 54 now.....you are getting/paying for 8....all you'll get is 8 on a 150 or 300.

[redwudz]

You just need to check your ISP to see what plans they have available VS their cost.
A faster modem won't help unless you upgrade your ISP speed.

I had no problems watching Netflix HD with a 8Mbs internet connection. And connection speed may also be a product of who you are connecting to. Some sites are slow. Check your speed with a site like Speakeasy or similar and see what your speed really is:

https://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/

Also if you have several computers on the internet at the same time, the connection will slow.
Then you need a higher speed.

[pandy]

I have an 8 Mbps internet speed connection (maximum around 1000 KB/sec transfer speed) and the modem I am using supports a maximum Wi-Fi speed of 54 Mbps. Will I gain anything by changing the modem to one that supports 150 or 300 Mbps?

Usually yes, 54 Mbps is highly theoretical value in one direction - practical speed will be related more to environment conditions and nature of traffic - moving to 150 or 300Mbps will improve link quality and provide higher link stability (lower latency).

[usually_quiet]

I have an 8 Mbps internet speed connection (maximum around 1000 KB/sec transfer speed) and the modem I am using supports a maximum Wi-Fi speed of 54 Mbps. Will I gain anything by changing the modem to one that supports 150 or 300 Mbps?

I have a 3 Mbps Internet connection and 300 Mbps Wi-Fi on my router. Upgrading your modem won't improve the Internet connection. It might improve wireless communication between the devices on your home network, depending on the maximum speed supported by their wireless adapters.

[pandy]

This is quite simple - there is something like MCS http://mcsindex.com/ - WLAN connection can be only in few modes, depends on external conditions and those conditions are frequently beyond our control (neighborhood with devices that radiate energy in 2.4GHz etc).
Based on those conditions AP trying to set optimal MCS index (depend on SNR) - highest MCS are possible only theoretically in real environment.
For 54Mbps equipment there are only few MCS available (from 0 to 5, and only in 20MHz and only single stream) - this bandwidth is shared by all devices connected to AP and unidirectional i.e. at one available only for Tx (transmission) or only for Rx (reception) . From practical perspective all bandwidth with particular MCS shall be divided by at least 3 or better 4 - this will be real, physically available bandwidth - in difficult environment it may be a lot of collisions and retries and this will reduce available bandwidth even more...

All above lead directly to simple rule: more spatial streams, 40MHz instead 20MHz etc will improve overall link quality and as such improve available bandwidth and at the same time latency (as in channel with higher bandwidth, transmitting same amount of information require lower amount of time and as such reduce risk for corrupting data - corrupted data need to be retransmitted i.e. create more noise in spectrum and increase overall latency).

Even slower connection to internet may show lower latency i.e. improve perceived speed of link.

Nowadays 150 - 300Mbps equipment is cheap and replacing older equipment will improve overall electromagnetic spectrum usage - i highly recommend to replace older 802.11g equipment to at least 802.11n 150Mbps.
EM spectrum is precious thing as it can't be replaced and it can be easily polluted.