When can we expect Wireless N network adapters compatibility?

[lburage]

I have searched for an answer to this question, so please forgive me if I am starting a thread that has already been answered...

The Wireless-N technology has been out there for some time now. I just finally upgraded to a N router myself.

The upgraded adapter sure would GREATLY help the transfer speed, especially of HD recordings between my Series 3 and my HD TiVo.

Anyone heard anything on this?

[rainwater]

Wireless-N would NOT help the speed of transfers with current hardware. The current restriction on transfer speeds is the CPU and not the throughput max of the current wireless adapters. It would be nice for TiVo to upgrade the adapter just so it would allow people to set their routers to N only mode which can improve speeds of the network in general for some routers.

[DrewTivo]

Why not? Wired is faster than wireless right now, so doesn't that suggest that the wireless is part of the bottleneck?

[rainwater]

Why not? Wired is faster than wireless right now, so doesn't that suggest that the wireless is part of the bottleneck?

No. The TiVo branded adapter's biggest feature is it offloads many of the CPU tasks to the adapter itself. This is a feature that none of the other wireless usb adapters TiVo use to support had. With that adapter, you can get very close to wired speeds. Still, you are not getting anywhere near the theoretical maximum throughput that wireless-G provides.

[Dan203]

If you want maximum speed then just hook a wireless N bridge to the Ethernet port on the TiVo itself. (provided you have a modern TiVo with built in Ethernet) That will give you the maximum speed a TiVo is capable of outputting.

Dan

[asooley]

As I remember it took Tivo awhile just to come out with wireless G capability. But in the meantime you can certainly use a wireless N bridge as mentioned...I am in fact using 3 Linksys Wireless N (dual band) Gaming adapters w/ethernet ports with an Apple Airport Extreme (Wireless N - Dual Band) Gigabit router and can transfer/watch HD shows faster than real-time (an hour HD show downloads in ~40 minutes)...I'm very happy with this setup and the gaming adapters are rock solid along with the router.

[rainwater]

As I remember it took Tivo awhile just to come out with wireless G capability. But in the meantime you can certainly use a wireless N bridge as mentioned...I am in fact using 3 Linksys Wireless N (dual band) Gaming adapters w/ethernet ports with an Apple Airport Extreme (Wireless N - Dual Band) Gigabit router and can transfer/watch HD shows faster than real-time (an hour HD show downloads in ~40 minutes)...I'm very happy with this setup and the gaming adapters are rock solid along with the router.

The last I checked, I could transfer a hour HD program in about 42 minutes with TiVo branded adapters and a Airport Extreme N router.

[socrplyr]

I bet you won't see "Wireless N" at least until it is a standard. As it has been noted you will most likely see no increase in performance when it is. While the G adapter is slower than the ethernet port, there is still overhead associated with wireless packets and USB use, so there is unlikely to be much if any performance increase when going to N.

So really your best bet is to do like other mentioned and get a bridge.

[asooley]

That's actually excellent but dependent on network/signal conditions. Best I could do with the Tivo branded G adapter was well over an hour (~1 hour & 20 mins) for an HD hour program, since I have to switch from 5Ghz to the lower N band to support G which slows me down as well even with the N gaming adapter...but still better than the Tivo G.

[rainwater]

That's actually excellent but dependent on network/signal conditions. Best I could do with the Tivo branded G adapter was well over an hour (~1 hour & 20 mins) for an HD hour program, since I have to switch from 5Ghz to the lower N band to support G which slows me down as well even with the N gaming adapter...but still better than the Tivo G.

Many of the newer N routers no longer see the significant throughput dropoff when switching to "G" compatibility mode. But for users with those issues a N adapter would help improve their overall network performance.

[jtown]

Regardless of whether the Tivo "offloads" any processing to their branded adapter, wireless G is significantly slower than wired. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. At least wired is faster on my S3 and I suspect it's the same for an S2 with built in ethernet. USB ethernet adapters may be slower. The best I can sustain between any of my wireless adapters (bridge, notebooks, game consoles, etc.) is about 7-8mbps and I see a definite improvement in speed if I move files from my S3 to notebook using wired instead of wireless.

As suggested, the best bet is to get a wireless-N ethernet bridge and connect it to the ethernet port. You won't need to wait for drivers or support.

[acvthree]

If you are looking for more speed you might want to consider powerline Ethernet back to your router. You don't have to run Ethernet cable the entire way, just simple plug in the two adapters to the power and you have Ethernet speeds over your home powerline.

http://www.netgear.com/Products/PowerlineNetworking/PowerlineEthernetAdapters/HDXB111.aspx

[rainwater]

Regardless of whether the Tivo "offloads" any processing to their branded adapter, wireless G is significantly slower than wired. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. .

I beg to differ. The branded adapter has been shown to be almost as good as wired especially when you are talking about wired over long distances. There's no question that the adapter offloads processing power. This has been a known fact since it was released. I'm not saying you can't get better performance with wired, but if you set your network up correctly, the branded wireless adapter is going to give you comparable results.