NotebookForums.com › Forums › Notebook Manufacturers › Dell Forums › Dell Home (Inspiron, XPS, Studio) › Studio XPS 1640 - How do I set it to prefer 802.11a over 802.11g?
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

Studio XPS 1640 - How do I set it to prefer 802.11a over 802.11g?

post #1 of 6
4/14/10 at 2:21am
Thread Starter 
I'm trying to figure out how to set it to prefer 802.11a over 802.11g when both are offered in an area. I am usually in areas where 802.11g is completely clogged and 802.11a is totally free.

I have it set for 802.11a/g only, but it keeps defaulting to 802.11g and never goes to a unless a is the only thing offered. The only way I can get it to go to 802.11a is if I set it to 802.11a only. I do a lot of roaming, and 802.11a is not offered everywhere so it is annoying to have to constantly go into the device manager and change it from 802.11a only to 802.11a/g. My card is an Intel Wifi Link 5100 AGN. Does anyone know how to get it to prefer 802.11a over g when they are both offered? There seems to be no option to do it like most cards do. I recently updated the drivers to the latest version, too.



The only thing I can get it to prefer 802.11a over is in ad-hoc mode.
Reply
Reply
post #2 of 6
4/14/10 at 3:56am
Did you try letting windows manage the wireless connection? I found that doing this would allow the switching to be smoother.

cheers ...
Reply
Reply
post #3 of 6
4/14/10 at 5:02pm
It doesn't matter, its not being clogged, a/b/g/n refer to the data rate protocol, ie g gives you 54Mbps, b is around 10Mbps... Also, g will give you a better connection over a distance than a or b... If your network gets clogged, try a channel change, but that is dependent on the gateway/access point...
Reply
Reply
post #4 of 6
4/16/10 at 10:30pm
Thread Starter 
No, 802.11a is a completely separate spectrum. That is why when I switch to 802.11a in clogged areas my speed becomes exponentially faster than 802.11g in the same place.

802.11a is on the 5.0GHz spectrum while 802.11b/g/n is on 2.4GHz. 802.11n also supports 5.0GHz, too. 802.11a has 19 completely non-overlapping channels while 802.11b/g has only 3 non-overlapping channels: 1, 6, and 11.

I have been unable to find a way in Windows to make it prefer 802.11a...can anyone show me how?
Reply
Reply
post #5 of 6
4/17/10 at 4:07pm
Have you tried looking through the User Guide for the 5100? There might be some info in the user guide. Here's a link to the guide for you:

Intel 5100 WiFi user guide Linky
Reply
Reply
post #6 of 6
4/17/10 at 5:06pm
I stand corrected after reading the wiki .... However protocol a is still limited by distance and most new access points don't support it (b/g/n is supported, but I think you'll see b go)...
Reply
Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
NotebookForums.com › Forums › Notebook Manufacturers › Dell Forums › Dell Home (Inspiron, XPS, Studio) › Studio XPS 1640 - How do I set it to prefer 802.11a over 802.11g?