5 Ghz Channels, Lower vs Higher

[Deleted member 22229]

Quick question. I know the lower 5G channels have less output then the higher 5G channels from the router. That said do wireless adapters and NIC cards also have a lower output on the lower 5G channels compared to the higher ?

 

[sfx2000]

Depends on the routers and clients - the newer power limits are, should we say, fresh at the moment, and vendors will either need to recertify older devices, or produce new devices...

 

[azazel1024]

Since the old limits were 50mw, generally, no. Clients have the same output on both the higher and lower channels. Most phones are 25mw and most laptop adapters are 32mw MAXIMUM, regardless of the channel selection. There are obviously some exceptions to this and there may be some desktop NICs that utilize something like 50-100mw, just as there may be some laptop adapters that utilize 50mw or higher.

Anything over the 25/32 is rare however.

I do not know of any vendor who is recertifying older products for the new power limits. Most/all new products do seem to have the new power limits.

PS I've done some testing with both pre and post FCC change clients and routers. With 11ac, in general I do see slightly greater range (very slightly increased) AND wireless speed (maybe about 5% faster) on the higher channels on pre-lower UNI-I channel power limit changes. RSSI also tends to show 3-4dB higher power on the upper channels for the pre power limit change routers.

CLIENT performance however is unchanged (by client performance, I mean transmit from client to router). Channel selection makes no real difference there, it is only performance from router to client.

Post FCC change, I see no real performance or range difference between the lower and upper channels and RSSI is generally within 1dB between the upper and lower channels. All differences are easily within the margin of error of a test.

Keep in mind, even though the power limits are now 1 watt, most clients are still in the 25-32mw range max, which will be the ultimate limit in range, not the increased router power limits. You'll also run in to the fact that most routers only transmit at 100-150mw, so you are only looking at about 3-4.5dB increase in transmit power from the old 50wm power limits. I'll take anything I can get certainly, it just isn't a huge change.

 

[TonyH]

I have a laptop as a HTPC in our family room. Using higher channels always give better signal. I use 149/153 always. I guessed it was due to antenna being tuned to higher channels. I may be wrong.

 

[azazel1024]

I have a laptop as a HTPC in our family room. Using higher channels always give better signal. I use 149/153 always. I guessed it was due to antenna being tuned to higher channels. I may be wrong.

That can be part of it too. The antenna gain is not necessarily going to be the same in the upper and lower part of the band. One is 5.2GHz and one is 5.9GHz. However, more likely you are seeing the fact that the radio power on the router is likely about 4dB higher on the upper channels than the lower. Apple devices (at least slightly older ones) were actually tuned to have slightly better gain in the 5.2GHz range to compensate for the lower power in that range. I don't know if that is still the case or if it applied to all Apple devices.

 

[L&LD]

For at least the last year I have been using the lower 5GHz channels as they give me the best throughput with the least latency. Signal strength isn't a good indicator of performance, nor is output power.

I simply test every channel in at least the main locations of the area covered by an AP and settle on the best overall channel. This is usually channel 44 to 48 here.

Higher channels show better in utilities like inssider (which I do not use or recommend), but perform worse.

 

[sfx2000]

For at least the last year I have been using the lower 5GHz channels as they give me the best throughput with the least latency. Signal strength isn't a good indicator of performance, nor is output power.

I simply test every channel in at least the main locations of the area covered by an AP and settle on the best overall channel. This is usually channel 44 to 48 here.

Higher channels show better in utilities like inssider (which I do not use or recommend), but perform worse.

Completely agree here - since a majority of gear defaults to the higher channels, and higher power limits, there's a bit more noise up there...

I've had decent luck down in the lower channels, knowing in advance, that Tx levels are also lower on both the clients and AP's, but like L&LD mentions above, RSSI doesn't show the whole picture...