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Has anybody else experienced very slow 5 GHz speed ? Mine times out most of the time and the router is 5 m distant. 2.4 GHz works better but it is saturated where I live and I cannot use it for streaming as it constantly buffers. At the moment I have to use EoP devices so I can get Ethernet speeds. Wondering if it is the integrated 5 GHz that’s not good and I’m better off buying an external dongle?

This is the iperf3 result between RPi and Mac on 5 GHz:

[  5]   0.00-1.00   sec  12.6 MBytes   106 Mbits/sec                  
[  5]   1.00-2.00   sec  16.2 MBytes   136 Mbits/sec                   
[  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  17.0 MBytes   143 Mbits/sec                               [  5]   8.00-9.00   sec  17.2 MBytes   144 Mbits/sec                   
[  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  17.5 MBytes   147 Mbits/sec                   
[  5]  10.00-10.03  sec   813 KBytes   197 Mbits/sec                   - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [  5]   0.00-10.03  sec   169 MBytes   141 Mbits/sec

Not sure if it looks ok but I think so. How can I run iperf3 to my router?

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  • 1
    is that 5m clear line of sight? or are there some walls, furniture or Faraday cages in the way? Jul 24, 2022 at 0:17
  • 1
    @JaromandaX just a wall with the door. I have two computers in that room, tv and Playstation all connected to 5ghz no issues, RPi is the only one that times out or uses ridiculous speed like a 56k dial up modem.
    – Kerberos
    Jul 24, 2022 at 2:30
  • 1
    What OS? How is networking configured? How did you test? What speed do you get?
    – Milliways
    Jul 24, 2022 at 7:18
  • 1
    @Milliways raspbian OS. Speedtest.net for the tests. It gives me 0.2mbps in download and 0.1 in upload. On Ethernet it give me 49.3 Mbps speed. How is it configured? Turned on wifi, selected 5ghz from the list and put my password in, that’s how it’s done on all my computers, phone, tablet, ps4
    – Kerberos
    Jul 24, 2022 at 7:22
  • 1
    Raspbian is MEANINGLESS - it could be any of 5 families of OS spanning 10 years. Even Raspberry Pi OS is ambiguous - at last count there are 8 and there are significant differences between Buster & Bullseye.
    – Milliways
    Jul 24, 2022 at 7:40

1 Answer 1

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Internet speed tests are not a reliable indicator as there are too many links in the chain.

I use iperf3 (which is in the repository and also available for other platforms).

Testing from a Pi3+ to a Pi4 (connected via Gigabit Ethernet) I get for 5GHz and 2.4GHz

    [ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr
    [  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  58.6 MBytes  49.2 Mbits/sec    8             sender
    [  5]   0.00-10.02  sec  58.1 MBytes  48.7 Mbits/sec                  receiver

    [ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr
    [  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  27.5 MBytes  23.1 Mbits/sec   14             sender
    [  5]   0.00-10.03  sec  26.8 MBytes  22.5 Mbits/sec                  receiver

You can check performance with ip -s a which will show

    RX: bytes  packets  errors  dropped missed  mcast   
    125439060  148925   0       0       0       2394    
    TX: bytes  packets  errors  dropped carrier collsns 
    184479938  161571   0       0       0       0       

This gives an indication of problems.

The first step should be to check (and if necessary change) what mode & channel the router is set to. Select a channel other than the default often improves performance and the widest bandwidth often does not perform at highest speed, particularly if there is interference.

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  • This is the iperf3 result between RPi and Mac on 5Ghz: [ 5] 0.00-1.00 sec 12.6 MBytes 106 Mbits/sec [ 5] 1.00-2.00 sec 16.2 MBytes 136 Mbits/sec [ 5] 2.00-3.00 sec 17.0 MBytes 143 Mbits/sec [ 5] 8.00-9.00 sec 17.2 MBytes 144 Mbits/sec [ 5] 9.00-10.00 sec 17.5 MBytes 147 Mbits/sec [ 5] 10.00-10.03 sec 813 KBytes 197 Mbits/sec - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - [ 5] 0.00-10.03 sec 169 MBytes 141 Mbits/sec
    – Kerberos
    Jul 25, 2022 at 9:25
  • Do NOT post detail in Comments - edit your Question.
    – Milliways
    Jul 25, 2022 at 10:18

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