Ubuntu

WAN max speed of 1 MB/s in Ubuntu 8.04

Asked by Yosek

I get a maximum speed of 1 MB/s over my WAN network with Ubuntu 8.04. I've researched countless help forums, and have not come up with a solution.

'sudo iwconfig wlan0 rate 36M' has only upped the WAN rate to 1 MB/s. Many other people have experienced the same issue. Most replies to the slow network speed issue has come up as, 'it's a known issue with Ubuntu 8.04, and nothing has been done with it'.

My issue is the slow network connectivity. I have a D-link DIR-655 router. The DIR-655 router is one of the best routers available, and is capable of N-draft speeds. My computer is a DELL - Inspiron 6400 with a Broadcom B43 Wireless card. When I used windows with the same computer, and same router, I got very fast speeds over my WAN. Using a Cat5 connection allows me to achieve rates of up to 100 MB/s. That is still slow.

This issue with Ubuntu 8.04 is very frustrating. Transfer rates over my network are painfully slow. I know I can achieve faster network speeds than the max 1MB/s I am getting. Please help.

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Thomas Kluyver (takluyver) said : 		#1

Do you know what driver you're using? There are issues with the b43 driver, so if you're using that, you might want to try using NDISwrapper and the Windows drivers instead.

If you're not sure, do the following and post the output:
lsmod | grep b43
lsmod | grep ndis

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Yosek (kjosok) said : 		#2

Hi Thomas,

Thanks for your reply. Here are the outputs:

lsmod | grep b43

b43 144420 0
rfkill 8592 3 rfkill_input,b43
mac80211 165652 1 b43
led_class 6020 1 b43
input_polldev 5896 1 b43
ssb 34308 2 b43,b44

lsmod | grep ndis

ndiswrapper 192920 0
usbcore 146028 6 usb_storage,libusual,ndiswrapper,ehci_hcd,uhci_hcd

So it appears that I am using the b43 driver. Is there a straight forward method to changing the driver over? Thanks again :)

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Thomas Kluyver (takluyver) said : 		#3

I'm afraid it's not straightforward. This seems to be a decent guide:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=766560

Or this is more detailed (and linked to by the first one):
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/Driver/bcm43xx/Feisty_No-Fluff

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Yosek (kjosok) said : 		#4

Well, the 1st URL you gave did it. It worked! There's one hic-up though. I am now connected to the network at 54mb/s, I can only transfer over the network at 2.4 mb/s. Any ideas?

Thanks very much! You're a life saver!

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Thomas Kluyver (takluyver) said : 		#5

54Mb/s is the maximum speed of your connection, you won't necessarily get that. Possible reasons:
- Are you transferring things from the internet? If so, the speed of your internet connection will limit it, rather than the speed of the wireless.
- The signal may not be that great--try going closer to the router
- The programs may just be transferring inefficiently. Not much you can do, except perhaps use different programs
- You may be confusing bits and bytes--if it's reporting 2.4 megabytes per second (the symbols vary, but generally, Mb is megabit and MB or MiB is megabyte), then it's actually getting 2.4 x 8 = 19.2 Mb/s. Still not perfect, but much better.

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Jim Hutchinson (jphutch) said : 		#6

Fwiw, there is now a native Linux driver for broadcom cards. I don't all the cards it works with but if it works with yours it may help. I have installed it on one computer and it seems to be working fine. There is info in this thread:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=914697

It does involve opening up the "proposed" repository which could introduce instability so you might want to wait a month for Intrepid to be released. It should be in that version by default.

HTH

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