Why is my download latency better on wifi?

[MedicTim78]

So I've always played PC games hardwired as it is supposed to be the best, most reliable connection. I like to play call of duty and other FPS games, always have some form of lag, sometimes unplayable. So I've been doing some testing, all PC'S that can be connected to Ethernet I've gotten good idle ping (per Ookla) awful download ping and good upload ping. 22/313/11 - multiple runs averaged.

The same PC's either USB tethered or using the built in wifi, 29/67/25.

 

My network is a home built PFSense router, on a spectrum arris modem (model isn't known ATM didn't look) to a Netgear gig switch, wifi is Unifi AP LR Pro's x 2.

 

The network adapter on the MB's are two Intel's and two Realtek's, so 4 separate PC's and two different cards. All firmware, drivers, OS's are up to date. All cables are CAT 5e and have been swapped out and still no changes. 

 

So if anyone has any insight on why wifi latency is better by a bunch on my download tests, I would be apprective. 

 

Thanks. 

[Bombastinator]

39 minutes ago, MedicTim78 said:

So I've always played PC games hardwired as it is supposed to be the best, most reliable connection. I like to play call of duty and other FPS games, always have some form of lag, sometimes unplayable. So I've been doing some testing, all PC'S that can be connected to Ethernet I've gotten good idle ping (per Ookla) awful download ping and good upload ping. 22/313/11 - multiple runs averaged.

The same PC's either USB tethered or using the built in wifi, 29/67/25.

 

My network is a home built PFSense router, on a spectrum arris modem (model isn't known ATM didn't look) to a Netgear gig switch, wifi is Unifi AP LR Pro's x 2.

 

The network adapter on the MB's are two Intel's and two Realtek's, so 4 separate PC's and two different cards. All firmware, drivers, OS's are up to date. All cables are CAT 5e and have been swapped out and still no changes. 

 

So if anyone has any insight on why wifi latency is better by a bunch on my download tests, I would be apprective. 

 

Thanks. 

Netgear is frequently a low end brand,  while the other is high end.  Could be your ethernet switch.  Just guessing.

[MedicTim78]

20 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Netgear is frequently a low end brand,  while the other is high end.  Could be your ethernet switch.  Just guessing.

Everything is parked in the same switch. Even tried directly connected to the router and modem via wire and same results. Just ordered a PCIe NIC and will see if that will help. 

[Alex Atkin UK]

Download/Upload test latency is only a useful metric to measure bufferbloat, it has zero corrolation to gaming performance unless you're maxing out your download/upload at the same time.  In that case, you can mitigate it a little by enabling Traffic Shaper and setting the upload/download limits to slightly below what speedtest shows your speed to be.  This will put a much higher load on your router though, so if enabling it dramatically cuts your speed, its probably not powerful enough.

 

I'm not sure its still a thing, but some games would perform badly if your latency was too good, to try to compensate for people whose latency is bad.  That could explain why the worse latency of WiFi is somehow making the experience better.

Now why WiFi looks better on a speedtest than wired, it could be WiFi is preventing you from hitting maximum speed so you aren't getting bufferbloat.  Again, its not any relation to how gaming performs which uses very little bandwidth.