Odd wireless NIC issue

[hat]

A friend came to me with this... this is what he said:

So I have a CyberPower Gamer Ultra 2098 (I think) desktop PC that I use for all my shit. I bought a Rosewill 300 mbps PCI wireless card because it doesn't have on board wireless (big mistake). It's been working fine for 2 years but now I think I have a problem with the wireless card. Almost every website I go to times out 3 times and I have to reload repeatedly before it loads. I can stream video, but again I often have to reload 3x to get it to start, and often the quality is low. Often I lag on multiplayer games or get disconnected. I have FIOS so I should be getting zippy connection speeds. The router is 1 floor right above my computer so I dont think signal is the problem. The router is also recent (1-2 years old), and I seem to get much faster speeds on my ipad and laptop even in the same spot as my desktop. When I do Verizon Speedtest, I get about 2x faster on my laptop than on my desktop, in the same place. When I plug my laptop directly into the router, I get the speeds that I'm supposed to from FIOS, so I don't think network service is the problem.

This all led me to narrow it down to the wireless card on the desktop. So I tried to replace it. I bought a USB wireless card, installed it, but for some strange reason it couldn't find any wireless networks, despite having the right driver. I bought a PCI wireless card and installed it with the proper driver, and again I got the same problem--it couldn't find any wireless networks. I found this all very strange. So I've gone back to using the Rosewill card.

Question one. Do I need to uninstall the Rosewill wireless card before I install a new one? Does Windows 7 have trouble handling multiple wireless cards?

This sounds like some sort of issue within Windows somehow to me. It can't be the router since his laptop and iPad work fine wirelessly... and for some reason it only accepts this Rosewill card that is giving him the above issues. I doubt it's the motherboard because not only did he try a different PCI card but also a USB adapter as well... what the hell?

 

[hat]

I told him to try running an Ubuntu live session thinking it could be a problem in windows, and then he said he'd try it but he also said he forgot to tell me that some time after the problem started he did a fresh install of windows... so now I'm doubting it's windows. What's going on here?

 

[brandonwh64]

I would point at the wireless router/AP cause something could be interfering with the channel. Tell him to change channel to 11

 

[remixedcat]

change channels and also completely remove the rosewill card and then try the others.

Also please give us the exact model of the adapter and I can locate a alternate driver based on the actual chipset rather then the OEM's driver and it might work better.

 

[eidairaman1]

Tell him to stop being cheap and get a Netgear WIFI N Nic

 

[Spoker]

Howdy mates, I'm the friend with the problem.
I'll try changing the channel (though I didn't know routers had channels!).
I'm away from home this week and will get the NIC model number as soon as I get back.
Remixed, by removing the Rosewill NIC, do you mean uninstalling the driver too? I did remove the card before because I only have 1 free PCI slot, but I didn't uninstall the driver. I'll try that if you think I should.
The replacement PCI card was a reputable brand though I dont recall which.
Thanks for your help.

 

[remixedcat]

uninstall the driver and physically remove the card

 

[Spoker]

Remixed, the NIC that I'm having trouble with is a Rosewill RNX-N360PC.
I'm about to try to uninstall the current driver, remove the card, and replace with another as you said. Could you point me towards a possibly better driver for the Rosewill first in case I need to reinstall it? Thanks for your help.

 

[remixedcat]

According to the following site: https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Rosewill_RNX-N360PC

You may want to dry the alternate drivers listed there. If reinstalling does not prove good.

Try the TP-Link product drivers mentioned.

 

[Spoker]

Bad news. I uninstalled the driver on the Rosewill NIC and removed the card. I inserted another card in its place (a TP-Link), installed the driver from the cd, and it couldn't find any wireless networks available. So, I removed the TP-Link card, inserted the Rosewill NIC, and tried to install the driver I downloaded from www.atheros.cz (linked from that website you pointed me to). Windows wouldn't let me install it, wouldn't recognize it as an appropriate driver apparently. So I reinstalled the driver provided by Rosewill. Now this card also can't find any wireless networks available.

I really don't understand why my computer won't let me properly install any NICs. I shut down firewall and antivirus, and I'm running a fresh install of Windows. I'm going to try my last remaining option: a powerline network adapter. If it doesn't work (and I gather they often don't), I'll be looking at buying a new computer. Seems ridiculous that I should have to do this over a small problem, but a computer that can't go on the internet isn't much good to me.

 

[remixedcat]

feck. That sucks.. You did completely remove drivers in-between right??

 

[Spoker]

Yeah. Actually im moving soon to a place where I can be hard wired, so this is really just an issue for a little while. I wish I had gotten a mobo with on-board wireless networking.

 

[remixedcat]

Did you install the drivers for the TP link mentioned on wikidevi while having the rosewill connected?

 

[OneMoar]

honestly buying a new computer is not a solution .. odds are the problem is some external factor they are both Atheros chips witch leads me to belive you have some sort of conflict with them frankly I have never had any luck with anything Atheros or ralink for that matter broadcome or realtek have been fine for me
the drivers you need to use are here
http://www.rosewill.com/products/1820/ProductDetail_Download.htm

secondly nobody has discussed the possibly that your router is at fault here just because other devices don't have a issue doesn't mean the router isn't partially to blame
I would at the very least do a 30/30/30 reset on the router and start over
at anyrate you need to get back to square one and start over
it sounds like something either in the driver load order or the registry got fubard from all the mucking about double check all connections and then run a system restore

 

[remixedcat]

I was just about to suggest that OneMoar... Some chipsets conflict with certain routers. I know broadcom had issues big time

 

[eidairaman1]

Format time. Unless if the wifi gateway is shot unless if the ONT is bad outside unless if something damaged the homerun going from the ont to the gateway or you have other devices in home or neighbors do causing wifi congestion.

Bad news. I uninstalled the driver on the Rosewill NIC and removed the card. I inserted another card in its place (a TP-Link), installed the driver from the cd, and it couldn't find any wireless networks available. So, I removed the TP-Link card, inserted the Rosewill NIC, and tried to install the driver I downloaded from www.atheros.cz (linked from that website you pointed me to). Windows wouldn't let me install it, wouldn't recognize it as an appropriate driver apparently. So I reinstalled the driver provided by Rosewill. Now this card also can't find any wireless networks available.

I really don't understand why my computer won't let me properly install any NICs. I shut down firewall and antivirus, and I'm running a fresh install of Windows. I'm going to try my last remaining option: a powerline network adapter. If it doesn't work (and I gather they often don't), I'll be looking at buying a new computer. Seems ridiculous that I should have to do this over a small problem, but a computer that can't go on the internet isn't much good to me.

 

[Mussels]

i'd have been testing pings and throughput with the original adaptor while working, to find out where the issue was

 

[hat]

How could it be the router when the other devices work fine and every wifi card he's tried with this computer has failed? He's also reinstalled Windows since this issue has been going on so I doubt a reformat can fix this one...

Spook, I believe you took the USB adapter back, right? Try getting the same one again (not the same exact one, just the same model). Try it in the desktop, just to make sure it doesn't work. Then try it in the laptop... see what happens. If that adapter works in the laptop and not the desktop that would lead me to believe, at least, that the router is unquestionably not at fault, and it would lead me to suspect some other non windows related issue in the desktop... maybe something on the motherboard is messed up...

 

[OneMoar]

How could it be the router when the other devices work fine and every wifi card he's tried with this computer has failed? He's also reinstalled Windows since this issue has been going on so I doubt a reformat can fix this one...

Spook, I believe you took the USB adapter back, right? Try getting the same one again (not the same exact one, just the same model). Try it in the desktop, just to make sure it doesn't work. Then try it in the laptop... see what happens. If that adapter works in the laptop and not the desktop that would lead me to believe, at least, that the router is unquestionably not at fault, and it would lead me to suspect some other non windows related issue in the desktop... maybe something on the motherboard is messed up...

personally I have had problems echoing the Op's with these cheap Ahteros/Ralink based adaptors finally I flashed DDWRT and the issue went away some odd firmware/driver quirk combination
it could also be some local interference

 

[Spoker]

The powerline networking setup is working like a charm, and I'm getting much faster speeds and lower latency than before. It appears the mystery of my wireless networking card will go unsolved. Thanks for the help people, I appreciate it!

 

[Aquinus]

My friend had a similar problem and the problem was crazy. His room where the computer was at the time was above the router and towards the center of the house where the router was in the room below but towards the outside of the house. He too had a Rosewill wi-fi adapter, except it was a USB (so easily movable) adapter. Come to find out, the wi-fi adapter being placed in a USB port in back of the tower cause the wi-fi single to need to travel through the computer case before it got to the router, causing packet loss and poor internet performance. I solved the problem by putting the adapter in a USB port on the front of the case and BAM! it worked.

The morale of the story is make sure there is nothing that contains a lot of iron (like steel in some computer cases and in big buildings) between the antenna and the router in a straight line.

For example, I have the wi-fi adapter plugged into my computer on my keyboard, which is slightly below the center monitor. The wall behind it has no cabling at that point and the router is on the opposite side of the room of where I am. As a result, I am almost always getting 300Mbps on 5Ghz 802.11n.

With this said, it's useful to find out if any other wireless networks are nearby as well. There have been cases in the past where I lived in places where there were a lot of 2.4Ghz wi-fi APs, but not a single 5Ghz one.

 

[Mussels]

My friend had a similar problem and the problem was crazy. His room where the computer was at the time was above the router and towards the center of the house where the router was in the room below but towards the outside of the house. He too had a Rosewill wi-fi adapter, except it was a USB (so easily movable) adapter. Come to find out, the wi-fi adapter being placed in a USB port in back of the tower cause the wi-fi single to need to travel through the computer case before it got to the router, causing packet loss and poor internet performance. I solved the problem by putting the adapter in a USB port on the front of the case and BAM! it worked.

The morale of the story is make sure there is nothing that contains a lot of iron (like steel in some computer cases and in big buildings) between the antenna and the router in a straight line.

For example, I have the wi-fi adapter plugged into my computer on my keyboard, which is slightly below the center monitor. The wall behind it has no cabling at that point and the router is on the opposite side of the room of where I am. As a result, I am almost always getting 300Mbps on 5Ghz 802.11n.

With this said, it's useful to find out if any other wireless networks are nearby as well. There have been cases in the past where I lived in places where there were a lot of 2.4Ghz wi-fi APs, but not a single 5Ghz one.

5Ghz is worse with obstructions, this is why my wifi is always USB, and always on an extension lead.

 

[Aquinus]

5Ghz is worse with obstructions, this is why my wifi is always USB, and always on an extension lead.

Well, it's not just that but higher frequency RF waves attenuate faster even without obstruction. It's the hit you take when you increase frequency on any RF application.

With that said, my friend didn't have 5Ghz. I do because I can get away with it but at my in-law's house, I can't use 802.11ac because the 5Ghz has so much trouble with all the walls where 2.4Ghz doesn't (as you eluded to.)

 

[Mussels]

i run a USB extension lead and have my wifi adapter in a cantenna in the hallway

19MB/s over wifi is worth the silliness, if you dont have kids tearing it down at least.

 

[hat]

You may also be able to try getting a wireless access point and using it as a wireless card of sorts...