5Ghz -- Channels 36, 40, 44, 48

[sfx2000]

Which Mac model (for example MacBook Air 2013) and iPhone?

FWIW - iPads tend to be much better at 5GHz than iPhones in my experience - better antenna placement for all of the iPad variants.

 

[peaks]

Macbook Pro 13 inch, early 2011, maxed out. iPhone 5S. So both 11n devices. My wife has the latest Retina/AC Macbook Pro and the iPhone 6, so i can repeat the test with newer devices if necessary, but i am pretty satisfied with the results.

The overall boost in 5G signals across my APs due to the above tweaking has allowed me to stop using 2.4Ghz for macs/phones (2.4 is now a different SSID now just for security cams and audio streaming gear), which is really great as there is zero interference now, and i am always connecting at a faster rate than 2.4 can support. Ideal really.

 

[sfx2000]

Well, every environment is different, and going into the lower channels is not a bad idea - might be surprised there - if one is in the same room, lower power really isn't an issue - it's punching thru walls, and there, 5GHz has challenges in any event...

@ peaks - you might be surprised with the wife's MBP, the Mac's with 802.11ac, they're remarkable in their WiFi performance in general compared to older Macs...

 

[peaks]

agreed--the 3x3 explicit beam forming in AC as implemented by Apple is impressive--you can watch it happening as your link speed rises up from something "normal" like 300mbit to the still-mind-blowing 1300mbit rate. Way better RF design at all levels. But it's almost like cheating--and testing with 11n devices gives me more of a "true" picture, as long as I still have 11n devices. But the all-AC future is a bright one. As Tim has noted, AC beam forming is so good it greatly improves signal for n devices too, but AC/AC is just amazing.

 

[sfx2000]

agreed--the 3x3 explicit beam forming in AC as implemented by Apple is impressive--you can watch it happening as your link speed rises up from something "normal" like 300mbit to the still-mind-blowing 1300mbit rate. Way better RF design at all levels. But it's almost like cheating--and testing with 11n devices gives me more of a "true" picture, as long as I still have 11n devices. But the all-AC future is a bright one. As Tim has noted, AC beam forming is so good it greatly improves signal for n devices too, but AC/AC is just amazing.

Airport AC's support SU-MIMO amd beamforming explicitly - hence Apple's claim of beamforming with that device... and even that is pretty much specific to 802.11ac - should note however, that 11n clients do better as well, similar to Mr. Higgin's experiments on 11ac AP to 11n clients (Airport wasn't included in his tests, but my observations on consistent with Tim's observations)

Remember, at the end of the day - it takes two - not just the AP, but also the client, and Apple has done a very good job on the client side in their recent laptops (say 2011 and later...).. iPads are equally good...

iPhones - well... "handsets" if that says enough...

sfx

 

[bodean]

Old topic but just want to input my stuff.
If I set my Airport Extreme to Auto for 2.4/5.0, and use 1 SSID, then my 5.0 goes to 136 channel (DFS). My iMac connects to the 2.4GHZ band, not the 5.0 band. However if I change to channel 48, or 149, or any other NON DFS channel, the mac will connect to the 5.0ghz band. Strange

 

[ColinTaylor]

@bodean Are you taking into account that using DFS means that the 5GHz channel won't become available until 60 seconds after the 2.4GHz channel has? By which time the client has already connected to the 2.4GHz channel.

 

[bodean]

@bodean Are you taking into account that using DFS means that the 5GHz channel won't become available until 60 seconds after the 2.4GHz channel has? By which time the client has already connected to the 2.4GHz channel.

Did not know that. Is there a way around that, so I can use the DFS channel and have my iMac connect to it?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[ColinTaylor]

Did not know that. Is there a way around that, so I can use the DFS channel and have my iMac connect to it?

I don't know the specifics of the Airport Extreme because I don't have one. But when an access point starts up it has to wait 60 seconds to check that the DFS channel is free to use (if it's using DFS). If it isn't free it picks another channel and waits another 60 seconds.

That said, once the access point is up and running both bands (2.4 & 5 GHz) are available to client devices. So powering on the client at this time will let it choose which band it wants. Again, I don't know how iMac's work, but in Windows you can set a "preferred" band and whether it should switch from one band to another. But it's the client that decides not the access point.

Also note that all things being equal, the 2.4GHz signal will probably be stronger than the 5GHz one.

In Windows it is much easier to control client behaviour if the SSID's are different for the two bands.

 

[pete y testing]

opps , missed pages 2 and 3 lol

 

[ColinTaylor]

@pete y testing You do realise that you're replying to a post one and a half years old? @peaks hasn't logged into this site for over a year.

 

[sfx2000]

I don't know the specifics of the Airport Extreme because I don't have one. But when an access point starts up it has to wait 60 seconds to check that the DFS channel is free to use (if it's using DFS). If it isn't free it picks another channel and waits another 60 seconds.

In auto channel selection - they'll initialize on CH149, scan down to the UNII-1 band if the UNII-3 band is busy, and then they opportunistically scan into the DFS band.. and there they'll usually do a high-low spiral eval - if DFS passes, they'll jump...

This behavior is actually consistent with the dual-band 802.11n AP Extremes thru to the 11ac Extremes - same goes with the Express 2012 (the one that looks like AppleTV).

Across those models - QC-Atheros, Marvell, and Broadcom chips in use depending on model.

As far as I've been able to tell - all 802.11n/11ac clients capable of 5GHz operation will work in DFS land - I've got an old iMac 2006 which is 802.11 b/g/a, I'll have to check that one some day...