Wireless Woes

From reading the forums, I am beginning to understand that using a wireless connection (specifically Airport Extreme -> cable modem), could be causing a lot of the problems I have in Second Life in regards to lag, packet loss, awful FPS, etc. The only advice I have seen to fix the problems is "don't be on wireless."

Ok, so what do I do if I have no choice but to be on wireless?

I use airport and ethernet, it makes no difference, lag seems exactly the same on both.
I think it's a myth that's been spread around. I used to switch over to ethernet whenever I got too laggy on airport, after a while I realised it made no difference.

I've watched wireless connections totally lose all connection to SL with wireless, while the wireless computer next to them was perfectly fine. It just randomly started working again about a minute later.

Wireless can be prone to interference and lower transfer speeds from time to time, depending on the surroundings. If you use wireless, I recommend at least 802.11g; the 802.11b equipment's been the most troublesome from what I've seen and heard. (Note that if you're using any equipment that only does b, you'll be stuck on b).

Imp, here's a good tip, but you've probably already tried it...

If you're using a powerbook with it's metal case and tiny arial windows, try changing the orientation of the airport base station. I got a significant increase in signal strength from mine by simply moving the base station a couple of feet and turning it around a little.

Also there's an article in Apple's Knowledge Base section on their site about re-seating the airport card in some powerbooks. Sometimes they come loose apparently. Sorry I've lost the link but a search should reveal it.

Anecdotally...

I actually found (to my surprise) the same SL performance using either hardwired Ethernet or wireless Airport 802.11b, *as long as* I have decent wireless signal strength between my Mac and my Netgear DG834 router. I do get some packet loss with both types of connectivity, but then that may just be geography, living in the UK. My ping times in the debug menu usually hover around 180ms if that has any relevance.

I have had problems since upgrading from (PowerMac) G4 to G5 and consequently to 'Airport Extreme' 802.11g, as for some reason on the G5 the signal strength is much the poorer, even with a Dr Bott external antenna, the best case is 60% compared to 90% on the G4. When my signal strength drops below 40%, then I start to see problems occurring with dropouts and packet loss, but that affects everything, not just SL. I've actually got the system running on the older 802.11b in preference to 802.11g, as although slower (though still much faster than the DSL connection), the signal strength does seems to be a little more robust, simply by experiment and observation. I understand the older Airport protocol has greater range, which is probably the factor there.

Antenna orientation has a huge effect though and I'm also sure my neighbour switches something on at about 6pm which breaks my signal, so just lately I've been snaking a long loose ethernet cable down the stairs !