Modem/Router and 5G

[Amaury]

Just to note, I'm not creating this to troubleshoot, I'm just curious, as 2.4G still works just fine.

To begin with a little backstory, back in March 2020, we got an all-in-one modem and router combo, as we were no longer really using Ethernet and were getting with the times of Wi-Fi and changed to full-on Wi-Fi. My computer has built-in Wi-Fi, while my mom's needs an external USB Wi-Fi adapter. Before that, we had the Spectrum modem and our own separate router that my mom purchased for Wi-Fi.

The problem is that Spectrum modems don't have Wi-Fi, and Spectrum also doesn't have modem and router combos. They have separate routers, but it would have increased our monthly payment. So, my mom just decided it would be better to purchase a modem and router combo with a one-time payment. We just had to call Spectrum so they could activate it on their end since they still need it on record and for it work so we can get online, even if it's not their equipment.

Anyway, it got dropped on the floor a few times a few years ago while cleaning, and while it still worked, you could hear things shaking inside. Eventually my mom ordered another one that was exactly the same—brand, model, and everything—back in April of this year. We finally got it up and running today.

So, on the previous one, everything was connected to our 5G network (PCs, PS4, Roku, etc.). And we still have everything connected to the 5G network, except my mom's PC. For some reason, it's not showing up on the list of available networks, so we could only connect to the 2.4G one, which is fine. It's still connected to the Internet, and that's all that really matters. My mom doesn't do anything heavy on her PC, and neither do I, really. I know that 5G is considered better, but 2.4G seems to work all the same.

It can't be a compatibility issue on my mom's PC end if 5G was showing up before. Google searching suggests a configuration issue on the router, but then 5G wouldn't show up on any of our devices.

So, I don't know, but again, I'm not posting here to troubleshoot, just more for a general discussion. I don't need things to try or anything. My mom did note she was having some occasional issues with her Wi-Fi adapter before, so perhaps just need a new external adapter.

[kphoger]

I know that 5G is considered better, but 2.4G seems to work all the same.

meh.  The 5 GHz does reach farther under ideal conditions but, because of its higher frequency, it is more easily impeded by obstacles.  Walls yes, but especially appliances.  For normal household use, you probably won't notice much difference in signal strength between the two.

The main reason to use the 5 GHz band is that the 2.4 GHz can get really crowded with other traffic.  If you have a lot of neighbors nearby, such as in an apartment complex, then the demand from all that Wi-Fi usage on the same frequency band can bog down your speeds.  But if you don't have heavy Wi-Fi traffic in your immediate area, then that also shouldn't be much of an issue.  Now, if you have a bunch of smart appliances and stuff, then chances are they'll be tied to the 2.4 GHz band, so that might matter.

Here in the Cox market, the latest modem/router combos (Panoramic gateway) don't even allow you to specify a certain frequency band for specific devices:  it analyzes the Wi-Fi traffic and chooses whatever frequency band it thinks is optimal at that particular time, and there's no way to override that.  I miss having that kind of control, but the new way has presented zero user-end problems for me at home.

And we still have everything connected to the 5G network, except my mom's PC. For some reason, it's not showing up on the list of available networks, so we could only connect to the 2.4G one, which is fine. It's still connected to the Internet, and that's all that really matters. My mom doesn't do anything heavy on her PC, and neither do I, really.

Sounds like it should work out great for you, then.  The 'heavy' work will get done on the less-crowded 5 GHz band, leaving the 2.4 GHz band for just her computer—and the traffic issue mentioned before shouldn't even matter now that everything else is on a different band.  If anything, you might even consider sliding one or two other things onto the 2.4 GHz band as well.

[Scott5114]

The main reason to use the 5 GHz band is that the 2.4 GHz can get really crowded with other traffic.  If you have a lot of neighbors nearby, such as in an apartment complex, then the demand from all that Wi-Fi usage on the same frequency band can bog down your speeds. 

I've found this can usually be mitigated fairly well by changing the channel in the router settings. Usually with a little trial and error you can find a channel that nobody else nearby is using. (But as you said, that's not an option on some routers. I use a MikroTik router, though, which is decidedly non-standard in the United States. It has so many options you can tweak I don't even know what most of them do.)

[Amaury]

The 5 GHz does reach farther under ideal conditions but, because of its higher frequency, it is more easily impeded by obstacles.  Walls yes, but especially appliances.  For normal household use, you probably won't notice much difference in signal strength between the two.

Hm. A friend of mine who's tech-savvy mentioned that the higher the frequency, the shorter the range, so 5G would have a shorter range, but I wonder if he's remembering wrong.

The main reason to use the 5 GHz band is that the 2.4 GHz can get really crowded with other traffic.  If you have a lot of neighbors nearby, such as in an apartment complex, then the demand from all that Wi-Fi usage on the same frequency band can bog down your speeds.  But if you don't have heavy Wi-Fi traffic in your immediate area, then that also shouldn't be much of an issue.  Now, if you have a bunch of smart appliances and stuff, then chances are they'll be tied to the 2.4 GHz band, so that might matter.

We live in a single house, but obviously we have neighbors. So, do you mean that even if they're not connected to your 2.4G network directly, which nobody would unless they know your password, that you can still get bogged down because of the general 2.4G network?

Although we've never really had issues with speed, unless, of course, there were Internet problems going on, but that's a separate issue that wouldn't just be us. Here's our speed for anyone curious: https://www.speedtest.net/result/17906920040.png

We don't have any smart appliances.

Sounds like it should work out great for you, then.  The 'heavy' work will get done on the less-crowded 5 GHz band, leaving the 2.4 GHz band for just her computer—and the traffic issue mentioned before shouldn't even matter now that everything else is on a different band.  If anything, you might even consider sliding one or two other things onto the 2.4 GHz band as well.

Here is a list of everything we have connected to our Wi-Fi, if you or anyone else is curious:

• Both of our computers—my mom's in the living room and mine in my bedroom
• The shared single printer
• Both of our cell phones
• My Amazon Fire HD 10 (9th Generation) tablet
• My mom's Roku on the living room television
• My mom's Roku in her bedroom television
• My PlayStation 4
• My television in my bedroom for Samsung TV Plus

Everything, with the exception of my mom's computer, for the aforementioned reasons, is connected to the 5G.

I've found this can usually be mitigated fairly well by changing the channel in the router settings. Usually with a little trial and error you can find a channel that nobody else nearby is using. (But as you said, that's not an option on some routers. I use a MikroTik router, though, which is decidedly non-standard in the United States. It has so many options you can tweak I don't even know what most of them do.)

This is the one we have: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07H42QXF1

[JREwing78]

We live in a single house, but obviously we have neighbors. So, do you mean that even if they're not connected to your 2.4G network directly, which nobody would unless they know your password, that you can still get bogged down because of the general 2.4G network?

You can get bogged down because if there's too many nearby 2.4GHz wi-fi access points in use, their wi-fi signal may be stuck on the same channel as yours is, and then it's a fight over whose signal is stronger. 

On 2.4GHz, despite having 11 channels to choose from, there's only 3 that don't have some amount of conflict with each other - 1, 6 and 11. Channel 3 interferes with channels 1 and 6, for example. Channel 9 interferes with channels 6 and 11. The channels are also narrow width - a max of 40MHz - which limits throughput. The main benefit of 2.4GHz is that the signal penetrates walls and other obstacles much easier than 5GHz does. 

5 GHz (and newer devices in the 6GHz band) have way more channels to choose from, the channels themselves are much wider (up to 320MHz of width) and are much harder to interfere with by competing signals. This allows those bands to have much faster internet bandwidth - often fast enough to max out the internet connection speed you get from your internet provider.

[kphoger]

Hm. A friend of mine who's tech-savvy mentioned that the higher the frequency, the shorter the range, so 5G would have a shorter range, but I wonder if he's remembering wrong.

In the real world, he's right.  If you were to test it in a huge empty warehouse with nothing inside, then the 5 GHz signal should reach slightly farther.  But, because nobody's house is like that hypothetical warehouse, the 5 GHz range ends up being shorter.  Drywall and chairs and stuff don't present too much of a problem, but a refrigerator is another story.

We live in a single house, but obviously we have neighbors. So, do you mean that even if they're not connected to your 2.4G network directly, which nobody would unless they know your password, that you can still get bogged down because of the general 2.4G network?

JREwing78 explained it way better than I could have.  But the short answer is yes.  If, however, your neighbors aren't super close to you, if the property sizes aren't tiny, then it probably doesn't matter a whole lot.  It's mainly an issue when there are a lot of people in a small-ish area all trying to use the same frequency band at the same time.

Here is a list of everything we have connected to our Wi-Fi, if you or anyone else is curious:

• Both of our computers—my mom's in the living room and mine in my bedroom
• The shared single printer
• Both of our cell phones
• My mom's Roku on the living room television
• My mom's Roku in her bedroom television
• My PlayStation 4
• My television in my bedroom for Samsung TV Plus

Everything, with the exception of my mom's computer, for the aforementioned reasons, is connected to the 5G.

At our house, we're subscribed to a grandfathered-in iteration of the second-slowest internet speed that Cox offers (offered).  We have the Roku, Xbox, four cell phones, laptop, two desktop PCs, Echo dots and portals, a couple of Kindles, and probably some stuff I'm forgetting.  Of course, not all of those devices are connected to Wi-Fi at the same time, but I'd say four of them is pretty common.  We've had dual-band Wi-Fi for several years, but I never had any problems back during our single-band days either.  And we live in a 50s-era house in the middle of town, so not huge lots.

At work, I recently switched to a laptop, using a second laptop as a second monitor.  That's impossible hard-wired, but it's possible over Wi-Fi, with the second laptop acting as a discoverable monitor on the same Wi-Fi network (same as casting to a TV, just choosing the laptop instead and choosing to extend instead of duplicate).  I've been frustrated with the lag between them, but I've noticed the lag gets way worse when the managers are in the conference room and each of them is using Wi-Fi on his laptop.  Part of it is probably that business internet plans aren't as good as residential plans, but I'm also not sure how good our router is.

[Amaury]

We have the Roku, Xbox, four cell phones, laptop, two desktop PCs, Echo dots and portals, a couple of Kindles, and probably some stuff I'm forgetting.

Speaking of forgetting, I've edited my post, because I forgot to add my Amazon Fire HD 10 (9th Generation) tablet to that list, which is also connected to our Wi-Fi.

But in any case. thank you to you and JRE78. I appreciate all that information. Well worth the read.

[MikeTheActuary]

Hm. A friend of mine who's tech-savvy mentioned that the higher the frequency, the shorter the range, so 5G would have a shorter range, but I wonder if he's remembering wrong.

In the real world, he's right.  If you were to test it in a huge empty warehouse with nothing inside, then the 5 GHz signal should reach slightly farther.

In free space, with no interference, and all other things being equal (including signal width, and antenna "equality" being relative to the frequencies involved), a 5 GHz signal weakens "faster"/closer to the transmission point than a 2.4 GHz.  It's a function of wavelength, and the bigger the frequency, the shorter the wavelength.

However, all other things are rarely equal.  Because of the shorter wavelengths, it's easier to build higher gain antennas for 5GHz than 2.4GHz.  And, because of the shorter range, poorer penetration power, and additional channels in the authorized band, generally there's less interference to 5GHz transmissions, further reducing that band's disadvantages vs 2.4GHz.

There's a reason when hams do long-distance WiFi (100-mile mountaintop-to-mountaintop hops), they prefer 2.4GHz over 5.8GHz

[Amaury]

I just thought of something regarding the 2.4G can become bottlenecked issue. I wonder if that's why I've never had luck the couple of times I've had wireless keyboards and mice a long time ago. I had the ones that are battery-powered and also had the very small USB receiver that plugs into the computer. The mice worked okay, but I would semi-frequently have issues where the keyboard would either lag when typing—I would type "A," and it wouldn't appear until after a couple seconds—or it wouldn't work at all, but I know it wasn't the batteries. I haven't gone back since and have been using wired keyboards and mice. While the wireless mice worked okay, as mentioned, I like consistency.

A quick Google search shows that wireless keyboards work on 2.4G, so... I'm guessing wireless mice also work on 2.4G, but I personally never had any issues with the wireless mice, as mentioned, only the wireless keyboards.

Why do wireless keyboards sometimes stop working intermittently?

Interference: Wireless keyboards operate on radio frequencies (often 2.4GHz) or Bluetooth, which can be disrupted by other devices operating on similar frequencies like Wi-Fi routers, cordless phones, microwaves, or even other wireless peripherals. This interference can lead to missed keystrokes or delays.

Low Battery: Weak batteries can cause signal strength to decrease, resulting in delayed responses or loss of connection.

Signal Obstructions: Physical barriers such as walls, furniture, or metal objects can weaken the signal between the keyboard and its receiver.

Driver Issues: Outdated or incompatible drivers can affect the keyboard's communication with the computer.

Range Limitations: If the keyboard is too far from the receiver, the signal may become too weak.

Connection Problems: Issues with the connection between the receiver and the computer's USB port can cause problems.

I think the first one is the only one that likely was the issue, especially since my wireless mice had no issues. My computer tower and everything is together on the same desk, so there were absolutely no issues of obstruction with the signal. I wonder if a wireless keyboard and mouse with Bluetooth would generally work better than a standard wireless keyboard and mouse. Or even Wi-Fi ones.

The last time I ordered a wireless keyboard and mouse was in January 209, and it was this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B079JLY5M5 Logitech is generally considered to be an awesome brand, I guess just not with wireless keyboards. Due to the aforementioned issues, I later went back to wired again in July 2019 and, while I've purchased different wired ones just for something new, I have not gone back to wireless since. It's possible wireless technology for mice and especially keyboards has improved since 2019, though.

EDIT: And just to clarify, when I had wireless keyboards and mice, that was back before we were even using Wi-FI to connect things to our Internet. Our computers were connected via Ethernet, and that's all that was connected to our Internet at the time, unlike all the things mentioned now. And we also didn't have unlimited data plans on our phones like we do now that we have with the Spectrum bundle, which includes Spectrum Mobile, so couldn't use our phones to browse the web, which wasn't a problem since our computers were right there, but still. For things like our printer, it was connected to my mom's computer like it is now, but since there was no Wi-Fi set up, whenever I wanted to print, I would have to forward the document to her email and print it that way. So, for the whole 2.4G bottleneck issue that can happen, I don't think that issue could have happened back then?