New Poster
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7 Messages
Wi Fi is half the speed of the wired network
Had been having the same issue with internet connection going out for a minute or two in the evening on a regular basis. Took the modem in and got a new one of the famed Model 37, the xFi Gateway. Also replaced the coaxel cable. My computer is connected by a CAT cable and I get 900+ speeds, however with my iPhone 15 Pro Max the best speed using Wi Fi is 550-580. Shouldn't it be faster? Was thinking of getting a separate high speed Wi Fi
zandor60657
Contributor
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204 Messages
2 years ago
That doesn't sound unusual, especially for a phone.
Did swapping the modem fix the minute or two in the evening outage problem? What plan speed do you have? How fast is the ethernet connection between your computer and the gateway?
I'm not sure what a "Model 37" is. Is that an XB8?
900+ is the most you can possibly get with 1Gb ethernet. It maxes out at about 950. So that's fine unless you're on a 1Gb or faster plan and have a 2.5Gb port on the computer connected to the 2.5Gb port on an XB7 or XB8 Gateway (possibly through a switch).
WiFi is notorious for performance issues. Distance, interference, walls in the way, etc. can all degrade performance. A general rule of thumb is you're doing well if you get 2/3 of the max theoretical speed and 3/4s is about max. I don't know what model gateway you have. If it's an XB6 550-580 is about right for a good laptop. 577 is 2/3s of 866. The XB6 is WiFi 5, which would top at at 866Mbps on a typical 80Mhz wide channel with 2 streams.
You're also using a phone. I've never gotten a phone to go as fast as a decent laptop with the same WiFi spec. Actually I have a 2019 model laptop with WiFi 5 that invariably beats an iPhone 13 (work) and Pixel 7 (personal). The iPhone 13 has WiFi 6 and the Pixel 7 has WiFi 6e. My access points are WiFi 6 so that won't help the Pixel 7 and it is limited to the 5GHz band, but both of them still beat by my WiFi 5 laptop.
Then there's also the question of "how much do you care?" Do you really care about having full speed on a phone? Enough to spend $ on it? I sure don't. My wired machines get full speed (1400/40 on a 1200/35 plan) and my WiFi is "good enough." It's about as fast as yours. That said buying your own gear can save you some cash unless you want or need more than 1.2TB/mo. The cheapest way to get "unlimited" is xFi Complete. $25/mo covers the modem rental and "unlimited." If you run your own gear it's $30/mo for "unlimited." Of course if you want features Comcast doesn't offer you have to buy your own gear. I run all customer owned equipment for that reason.
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flatlander3
Problem Solver
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1.5K Messages
2 years ago
"Speed" is also kinda funny as Xfinity defines it. What is that exactly? It's actually bandwidth. It's a theoretical calculation of possible data transfer based on the number of DOCSIS channels aggregated, if they're all working, your neighborhood infrastructure can support it (and do it when your neighbors are using data), your household wiring doesn't interfere, and you subscribe to a "speed tier" -- meaning they didn't cripple performance of your hardware.
Does a 1.2Gbps plan load a web page faster than a 400Mbps plan? No, because that's not where the bottleneck is. It depends on Your OS, processing speed, memory, OS load, everything between you and the web server, their throttling/handling of web clients, but largely depends on the content and how they wrote the site. Scripts, templates, tracking cookies they slam to you that all check back home, 3rd party data pulled from other locations, ad/multi-media content loading, and all the DNS lookups that have to take place to do it (look at the locations flash by in the bottom of your browser).
What "bandwidth" do you really use? You have to measure it with something between your end device and your modem/gateway. On a 1 second average, you'd be lucky to pull 80Mbps in burst traffic when viewing web pages. More likely, you'll see something in the 16-20Mbps range. For streaming 8K content, you may pull an average up to 50Mbps from the end point.
When does bandwidth matter? If you can get an unthrottled connection to a server for a large download, or you have multiple clients locally actually using all of the available bandwidth at the same time. Then that will pull the data down in less time. Otherwise, it really doesn't matter.
If you are benchmarking WiFi, there's a lot more too it as well. Devices and radio hardware are not equal. Encryption loss is a big one (OS, memory, processing speed, etc). Your radio chipset and the firmware stack it's using is also important. The hardware bus your WiFi devices is on, and other hardware in contention on that hardware bus makes a huge difference (PCIe, USB and which version, etc). Your gateway and it's firmware stack is also important. Can it handle 802.11ax and adjust channel width to bond additional channels to get a possible theoretical lab benchmark of 1200Mbps of your phone at extremely close range? A technicolor 3rd party cost reduced rental gateway probably cannot adjust channel width on the fly.
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XfinitySheila
Official Employee
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1.1K Messages
2 years ago
@LRaraiza
If you are still running into the problem please send our team a direct message with your full name, the name listed on the account (if different), and the service address associated with your account, I'd be more than happy to look into this for you. To send a Direct Message, please click on the chat icon in the top-right corner of the screen, next to the bell icon, and then type or select "Xfinity Support" to initiate a direct message.
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igotnewz4u
Visitor
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1 Message
2 years ago
For the past few months, I’ve been clocking speeds to my iPhone 13 Pro Max, sitting in front of my gateway, of 0.5 Mbps or less! Occasionally it will rise to about 150 Mbps, which I can work with, but I’m paying for 1200 Mbps. And 0.5 is not a typo….literally 1/2 off Mb! It’s getting super frustrating!
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LRAraiza
New Poster
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7 Messages
2 years ago
And the rest of the story. Comcast/Xfinity did some things on their end. I forgot the wi fi on my phone. Remoted into the xFi unit and turned off the wi fi and set to bridge. Then remoted back into the XFI unit and changed back to normal operation. Activated ONLY the 5 gh Wi Fi. On phone turned off and then back on and connected to Wi Fi and now get 625-650 on Wi Fi on phone and iPad
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