Wireless card or dongle

flyer

I have a speed of over 100mb coming into my house, but my PC is often quite slow at loading. A friend has suggested it could be the old wireless adapter I've got stuck in the back of the PC, it's over 3 years old.

So my question is do I get a new 5g card, or get a 5g dongle and just plug it into the USB slot?

TIA

pramsay13

I think you probably need to investigate a bit more first.
Who says you have 100mb coming in?
If it's the internet service provider chances are that is just their headline speed and your actual speed to the house will be lower.
Also any device on a wireless network will be slower than one that is wired in.
What kind of speeds do you get if you plug in an ethernet cable?
What if a friend brings a newer wireless device, do they get better speeds?

debitcardmayhem

What is your PC , make and model, what Version of Windows are you using, slow loading is not usually down to the internet give more info please

mksysb

You might want to look at PowerLine adapters. They are faster than wireless.

John_Gray

An ethernet cable connection between your router and your PC will always give the most accurate figures for data download testing.
Is this easily possible for you?

Having said that, debitcardmayhem's post is correct about 'slow loading'.

arciere

Assuming that you are referring to the internet speed on your computer, a 5Ghz dongle won't necessarily fix your problem.
Pretty much any 2.4Ghz dongle is able to get at least 54 Mbps, or even more if it uses different protocols, so your problem is definitely not the dongle unless, of course, it's faulty (the fact that it's 3 years old doesn't mean anything). If you get at least 20/30 Mbps you shouldn't notice any difference in general internet browsing (not talking about streaming).

If your problem is the coverage (not enough signal where your PC is), a 5 Ghz dongle will not improve the situation (2.4 Ghz can penetrate obstacles much better than 5 Ghz).

I would say you need to establish: A) Is the slowness referred to internet browsing or more generally to the PC performance? What is the WiFi signal like on the PC? C) Are there other devices on the network, and if so, how is the internet connection on them?

flyer

Hi all. Thanks for the replies. I'm using Windows 10 on a purpose built machine. I know I'm getting 100+ to the router as the Virgin engineer showed me. Also, we have no problems with wifi on our mobiles etc. I can't use an Ethernet cable as the PC is about 6 metres from the router and it would mean trailing a cable across the room, something I really don't want to do with young kids.

Sometimes the PC is lighting fast at loading, other times it's dead slow or even times out.

arciere

flyer wrote: »

Hi all. Thanks for the replies. I'm using Windows 10 on a purpose built machine. I know I'm getting 100+ to the router as the Virgin engineer showed me. Also, we have no problems with wifi on our mobiles etc. I can't use an Ethernet cable as the PC is about 6 metres from the router and it would mean trailing a cable across the room, something I really don't want to do with young kids.

Sometimes the PC is lighting fast at loading, other times it's dead slow or even times out.

It doesn't sound like there's anything wrong with your current dongle then.
Just to clarify, when you say your PC is 'dead slow', do you mean it's slow at opening websites or at booting up when you switch it on or when you open programs?

flyer

Sorry, opening websites. Booting up and opening programmes is fine.

flyer

As I am typing now, I am trying to open new tabs but the circle is just going round and round. Now I've got a message "This site can't be reached". It's timed out

H1a3rt

What browser are you using? It may be worth trying another one. If you are using chrome then try IE or firefox at least to rule out its not your browser.