Possible router bottlenecking?

[FizzLyfe]

Hello guys!

 

I am about to switch my ISP to a new one, my new theoretical internet speed will be 1Gbps, however - the wifi router I am using is rated for 300Mbps, my question is:
Will this affect the internet speed that's going back into my PC (via ethernet)?
The router is a: TP-Link WR841N

I know that the Wi-Fi speed itself is going to be maxed at 300. I was trying to find answers on google, but most people just talk about the wifi speed itself, that's not what I am interested in, I would like to know if entering the router itself causes any bottlenecks, in which case - I will hook up the ethernet to my PC directly, for the time being.

 

Thanks in advance!

[Chen G]

No

[Windows7ge]

You're going to need a new Router. Looking up the TP-Link WR841N all the LAN ports + WAN port are 10/100. You need 10/100/1000.

[Princess Luna]

It depends on what is your Ethernet adapter, does it support gigabit?

[FizzLyfe]

3 minutes ago, Princess Luna said:

It depends on what is your Ethernet adapter, does it support gigabit?

My PC does, the router does not, as the person above just said - I looked it up, it is 10/100 on all ports

I totally forgot that the specs sheet shows that

[FizzLyfe]

5 minutes ago, Windows7ge said:

You're going to need a new Router. Looking up the TP-Link WR841N all the LAN ports + WAN port are 10/100. You need 10/100/1000.

Yup, I don't know how I could forget the specs sheet, now I feel dumb

But then how/or why are they advertising it as a 300mbps? Am I missing something here?

[Norwegiantweaker]

23 minutes ago, FizzLyfe said:

in which case - I will hook up the ethernet to my PC directly, for the time being.

 

Thanks in advance!

how do you plan on achieving this if i may ask ? 

[FizzLyfe]

Just now, Norwegiantweaker said:

how do you plan on achieving this if i may ask ? 

The modem that the ISP supplies supports Gigabit, so I can simply use it as is - going straight into my PC, no router inbetween - it just means I won't have wifi until I get a new router, I'd rather not bottleneck my speeds that much, until then.

(Hope that makes sense)

[Windows7ge]

22 minutes ago, FizzLyfe said:

Yup, I don't know how I could forget the specs sheet, now I feel dumb

But then how/or why are they advertising it as a 300mbps? Am I missing something here?

In theory you could connect two wireless clients and transfer files directly between the two at up to 300Mbit. Most people don't need to do that though so I'd leave it up to BS advertising just like the Powerline adapters that boast up to 500Mbit but use a 10/100 Ethernet Controller.

[FizzLyfe]

Just now, Windows7ge said:

In theory you could connect two wireless clients and transfer files directly between the two at up to 300Mbit. Most people don't need to do that though so I'd leave it up to BS advertising just like the Powerline adapters that boast up to 500Mbit but use a 10/100 Ethernet Controller.

Oh, I see

Well, I learned something new today

 

Thank you

[Alex Atkin UK]

To further confuse things, routers are rarely advertised for what NAT routing speed they can do.

 

That TP-Link for example can only handle around 90Mbit and that's probably only doing plain ethernet to ethernet, it would be even lower if you connect over PPP.  To make matters worse, its unlikely to hit 300Mbit over WiFi to WiFi either, as its maximum speed will likely be similar to its NAT speed as you're limited by how quickly the CPU can shuffle traffic.

 

For example a router that can do 400Mbit NAT speed, if you actually pull 400Mbit down over an ethernet port, it will have zero CPU left for the WiFi.  So if one of your WiFi clients tried to then download from a wired client on your network, your broadband speed would actually be reduced.

 

Router advertising is notoriously bad.

[Donut417]

On 2/10/2020 at 9:46 AM, FizzLyfe said:

Hello guys!

 

I am about to switch my ISP to a new one, my new theoretical internet speed will be 1Gbps, however - the wifi router I am using is rated for 300Mbps, my question is:
Will this affect the internet speed that's going back into my PC (via ethernet)?
The router is a: TP-Link WR841N

I know that the Wi-Fi speed itself is going to be maxed at 300. I was trying to find answers on google, but most people just talk about the wifi speed itself, that's not what I am interested in, I would like to know if entering the router itself causes any bottlenecks, in which case - I will hook up the ethernet to my PC directly, for the time being.

 

Thanks in advance!

Check out specs and reviews over at Smallnetbuilder.com because your going to need to the LAN to WAN throughput and the WAN to LAN Throughput. That will tell you if the routers in question can do 1 Gbps NAT. 

[Alex Atkin UK]

11 hours ago, Donut417 said:

Check out specs and reviews over at Smallnetbuilder.com because your going to need to the LAN to WAN throughput and the WAN to LAN Throughput. That will tell you if the routers in question can do 1 Gbps NAT. 

Its unfortunate they test so few routers and AFAIK only test plain ethernet which doesn't account for any extra load from PPP often used on FTTP.

[FizzLyfe]

On 2/11/2020 at 4:12 PM, Alex Atkin UK said:

To further confuse things, routers are rarely advertised for what NAT routing speed they can do.

 

That TP-Link for example can only handle around 90Mbit and that's probably only doing plain ethernet to ethernet, it would be even lower if you connect over PPP.  To make matters worse, its unlikely to hit 300Mbit over WiFi to WiFi either, as its maximum speed will likely be similar to its NAT speed as you're limited by how quickly the CPU can shuffle traffic.

 

For example a router that can do 400Mbit NAT speed, if you actually pull 400Mbit down over an ethernet port, it will have zero CPU left for the WiFi.  So if one of your WiFi clients tried to then download from a wired client on your network, your broadband speed would actually be reduced.

 

Router advertising is notoriously bad.

I see, thanks for the detailed explanation

It's unlikely that I will ever need the max output of the Wi-Fi, but still this is good to know, again this is news for me 

 

I'll definitely do some research about this topic - I do have one question though, although I may have misunderstood something - you said that CPU processing is limited (obviously) but does this mean that if I were to disable the Wi-Fi part of the router via a physical or software button/option, I get some "extra" processing that will be free-to use for the 'wired' part?

That would also explain why such an option exists in the first place

 

[Alex Atkin UK]

6 hours ago, FizzLyfe said:

I see, thanks for the detailed explanation

It's unlikely that I will ever need the max output of the Wi-Fi, but still this is good to know, again this is news for me 

 

I'll definitely do some research about this topic - I do have one question though, although I may have misunderstood something - you said that CPU processing is limited (obviously) but does this mean that if I were to disable the Wi-Fi part of the router via a physical or software button/option, I get some "extra" processing that will be free-to use for the 'wired' part?

That would also explain why such an option exists in the first place

 

Having WiFi turned on but not doing anything wont have any noticeable impact on the CPU, only during active data transfer and obviously relative to how fast you are pushing it.