Hi all,
I'm just wondering if i've missed anything out trying to fix my network problems, any suggestions welcome
What i'm trying to do is play HD movies from my buffalo file server plugged into my airport extreme on my new mac mini downstairs (plugged into an onkio home theater system)
The first problems that were evident on the mac mini was that it's network connection was painfully slow. I also noted that the download speed was nearly non existent at 30kb/s.
Naturally i suspected the Network range (which is pretty weak in my living room)
So i got out my macbook aluminium (running the same intel 2.4ghz processor but has 4gb of ram instead of the macmini's 2gb)
downloading the same file from the same website at the same time with the computers next to each other, my macbook got around 400kb/s and my mac mini peaked out at around 70kb/s
at which point i started getting suspicious
so i downloaded istumbler on both and noticed that my macbook was getting around 35% of the signal (from the airport extreme) Vs the mac mini's 23%
to help this a little i moved the mac mini out from any dvd players/tv's/tuners/satboxes etc because i suspected their shielding might be causing interference. This got the Signal strength upto around 30%
which i figured was close enough to the macbook to point at something else being the problem.
so i moved the mac mini upstairs, next to the airport extreme (79% signal) and tried moving some files from the (aforementioned) file server to the mac mini. I then got a much more respectable 2.4mb/s transfer rate.
however, when playing movies i noticed that instead of a steady rate of around 1.3mb/s (which is what my imac and macbook get when playing the same movie from the same server) the mac mini was showing massive spikes and lows i its transfer rate.
The next logical step for me seemed to be to buy an airport express and set up a relay to boost signal strength downstairs.
So i did, set up the WDS network, signal for the mac mini downstairs is now at around 60~70% (which should be more than good enough)
however i still got the same problems and crappy transfer rate
i later discovered that the mac mini was still trying to connect to my Base station(extreme(30%signal)) So i denied the mac mini access to the Base station and only granted it access to the relay. This helped get transfer rates up to around 700kb/s but it still spiking and isn't nearly steady enough to play a movie without stuttering.
I have also tried connecting the mac mini to the relay via ethernet, this hasn't made any significant difference.
All connectivity data was gathered using Istumbler, Noise on the channels is between 9% and 14% throughout the house
information about transfer rates etc were gathered using Activity Monitor, all update frequencies etc are identical across the computers.
My file server is connected to the airport extreme via Ethernet. It has worked flawlessly with the network and all connected computers (Imac/macbook pro/macbook) for a year.
Does anybody have any suggestions on how i can get the transfer rate more steady to the mac mini?
And no running a giant ethernet cable from my living room through the house to the airport extreme is not a viable solution for me. Neither is plugging the File server directly into the mac mini, as i then the network problems would stop me from being able to access it comfortably over the network
Thankyou and sorry for the rambling
hope i didn't miss anything out
I'm just wondering if i've missed anything out trying to fix my network problems, any suggestions welcome
What i'm trying to do is play HD movies from my buffalo file server plugged into my airport extreme on my new mac mini downstairs (plugged into an onkio home theater system)
The first problems that were evident on the mac mini was that it's network connection was painfully slow. I also noted that the download speed was nearly non existent at 30kb/s.
Naturally i suspected the Network range (which is pretty weak in my living room)
So i got out my macbook aluminium (running the same intel 2.4ghz processor but has 4gb of ram instead of the macmini's 2gb)
downloading the same file from the same website at the same time with the computers next to each other, my macbook got around 400kb/s and my mac mini peaked out at around 70kb/s
at which point i started getting suspicious
so i downloaded istumbler on both and noticed that my macbook was getting around 35% of the signal (from the airport extreme) Vs the mac mini's 23%
to help this a little i moved the mac mini out from any dvd players/tv's/tuners/satboxes etc because i suspected their shielding might be causing interference. This got the Signal strength upto around 30%
which i figured was close enough to the macbook to point at something else being the problem.
so i moved the mac mini upstairs, next to the airport extreme (79% signal) and tried moving some files from the (aforementioned) file server to the mac mini. I then got a much more respectable 2.4mb/s transfer rate.
however, when playing movies i noticed that instead of a steady rate of around 1.3mb/s (which is what my imac and macbook get when playing the same movie from the same server) the mac mini was showing massive spikes and lows i its transfer rate.
The next logical step for me seemed to be to buy an airport express and set up a relay to boost signal strength downstairs.
So i did, set up the WDS network, signal for the mac mini downstairs is now at around 60~70% (which should be more than good enough)
however i still got the same problems and crappy transfer rate
i later discovered that the mac mini was still trying to connect to my Base station(extreme(30%signal)) So i denied the mac mini access to the Base station and only granted it access to the relay. This helped get transfer rates up to around 700kb/s but it still spiking and isn't nearly steady enough to play a movie without stuttering.
I have also tried connecting the mac mini to the relay via ethernet, this hasn't made any significant difference.
All connectivity data was gathered using Istumbler, Noise on the channels is between 9% and 14% throughout the house
information about transfer rates etc were gathered using Activity Monitor, all update frequencies etc are identical across the computers.
My file server is connected to the airport extreme via Ethernet. It has worked flawlessly with the network and all connected computers (Imac/macbook pro/macbook) for a year.
Does anybody have any suggestions on how i can get the transfer rate more steady to the mac mini?
And no running a giant ethernet cable from my living room through the house to the airport extreme is not a viable solution for me. Neither is plugging the File server directly into the mac mini, as i then the network problems would stop me from being able to access it comfortably over the network
Thankyou and sorry for the rambling
hope i didn't miss anything out