Linksys WRT54GS - which version?

On Thu, 03 Aug 2006 19:29:14 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote in :

I think both "no" and "clobbers" are a bit strong. See

The criticism of Super G is largely based on a Broadcom PR campaign against the initial (arguably premature) release of Super G, tainted by apparent envy and sour grapes, since Broadcom had nothing comparable, and since Broadcom products were the ones most affected by Super G. Tests showed that interference even from initial Super G was only a problem when (a) Super G was running at full tilt and (b) the other network was within 50 feet, conditions that won't normally be met. Current Super-G products are designed not to interfere with non-Super-G products.

While 125 High Speed Mode (125HSM, originally called Afterburner), Broadcom's belated response to Super G after the relative flop of Xpress, is probably more neighbor-friendly than _initial_ Super G, I've seen no real evidence that it's significantly more neighbor-friendly than _current_ Super G, and it's less effective than Super G. (From the last article above: "On the other hand, as Figure 7 shows, Afterburner's speed drops pretty quickly with distance and / or obstacles - enough so to question whether Afterburner provides any significant benefit under real-world conditions.")

Reply to
John Navas
Loading thread data ...

John Navas hath wroth:

I'll confess to not staying up to date on Super-G versus Afterburner. Let's see what I find:

formatting link
and DLink use Super-G (Atheros), Linksys uses Afterburner (Broadcom), and SMC uses something from TI.

At an average throughput of around 50 Mbps, the NETGEAR products using Super-G clearly beat Linksys' Afterburner-based offerings, but only when Super-G is running in its controversial channel-bonding mode. As the plot shows, Super-G drops out of channel bonding on a periodic basis to ensure that non Super-G products get a chance to communicate, which lowers its average best-case throughput to about 45Mbps.

What this means is that the improved Super-G uses channel bonding only when it has exclusive use of the channels involved. A bit of personal testing showed this to be the case only on Ch 6 (the center channel). It doesn't listen on the adjacent two channels.

The Tom's Networking URL's are from 2003 and 2004. This is slightly later and still shows a problem:

formatting link
Page 7 for where the thruput on a Belkin F5D7230-4 droped 94% when operating near a Netgear WGT624 in Super-G mode. The Belkin was setup to hunt for usable channels during the test. It didn't find any.

Change apparent to obvious. Broadcom was more than a little obnoxious with their smear campaign. However, they were initially correct about channel bonding problems.

Digging a bit deeper into Super-G at:

formatting link
Updated December 6, 2003 A Super-G WLAN running at full speed will seriously interfere with an 11g WLAN running 2Mbps streaming video even at 30 feet. The interference is essentially gone at 50 feet. I'll assume they're talking about interference on the adjacent non-overlapping channels. Yeah, I'll buy that. It's only a problem in close proximity. Add 6dB of antenna gain, and the 50ft becomes

25ft. Add 6dB of antenna gain on both ends, and the 50ft becomes 12.5ft. In other words, with the stock rubber ducky antennas, 50ft is safe. With better antennas, it's not.

No. They're designed to disable Super-G channel bonding if there's anything on the channel. The problem is that they don't seem to be listening (my guess) on the adjacent channels. Only on Ch 6. This is not exactly my idea of non-interference. Locked in channel bonding mode, they generate quite a bit of RF on the adjacent channels.

I only have some spotty experience with both Super-G and Afterburner. In both cases, I turn them off. The problem is the same as with

802.11b compatibility in an 802.11g router. The receivers can only decode the mode if it "scans" for it. If it's listening for 802.11g, it won't hear an Afterburner or Super-G (channel bonded) signal. So, it time slices the receive listening for 802.11b, 802.11g, and enhance modes respectively. I spent a few minutes trying to deduce the algorithm used and just gave up. My current policy is to disable the enhanced modes and run in 802.11g mode only (if possible). For public access systems, I'm stuck with 802.11b mode only, or possibly 802.11b/g compatibility mode. Anyway, it's for this reason that I don't have much experience with the enhanced modes. I always disable them.
Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

Here is a detailed listing of all WRT54G and GS router versions and how to identify them both inside and out. (And contrary to at least one poster, there are 7 versions of the GS ranging from 1 to 5, just like the Gs)

Reply to
Bryant Smith

On Fri, 04 Aug 2006 09:24:16 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote in :

I've got a fair amount of experience with Super-G (more than with Afterburner/125HSM), and I've just not seen the kind of problems you're suggesting in the real world. For example, not too long ago I did a SOHO setup with Super-G, was able to test the results carefully at a number of nearby Wi-Fi-equipped neighbors; and found no measurable interference with Super-G enabled, even when running at full tilt, which was quite a bit faster for my client than with it disabled.

While it's certainly possible to demonstrate problems with artificial tests, that's true of many things that work well in the real world.

Reply to
John Navas

On Fri, 04 Aug 2006 17:04:38 -0700, Bryant Smith wrote in :

Reply to
John Navas

Oops I forgot to post the link I wanted to post.

Here it is:

formatting link
And here is a listing of firmware revisions:

formatting link

Reply to
Bryant Smith

Cabling-Design.com Forums website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.