Testing Setup:

• Belkin N1 Wireless N Router

Testing:

Before I begin testing this card, a few explanations as to how it will be done. First of all, wireless cards boast their top speeds and ranges. This is due to the fact that each installation is unique in its location and environment. Therefore performance will vary from situation to situation. However, whatever the performance, you can assume that a card with a higher top speed will still beat one with a lower top speed. This will not change. Secondly, though I will mention the speed that my wireless network runs at, I will comment more on the improvement or lack thereof from the previous wireless network. This will give you a more accurate sense of performance than will my own personal bandwidth numbers, seeing as how you may experience a totally different set of numbers yourself.

For the test I decided to see how fast I could transfer files from one computer to the other using the wireless network. The PC of origin was hardwired directly to the network, whereas the receiving PC would use only the Wireless N card. The file sizes consist of 10MB, 100MB, and 500MB. Here are the results.

The average that my Wireless N network runs at is 4 bars reception, 270 Mbps. The signal is shot from one location to another, over a distance of roughly 80 feet. I found this to be a significant improvement upon my previous Wireless G network. I performed the same test on my previous network with much different results. Here they are.

I found that the extended range of the Wireless N and its higher bandwidth allowed for quicker transfers of larger amounts of data. While I certainly notice an improvement while surfing the web, multimedia applications are where the higher performance of the Trendnet 300Mbps card really shines through. I also ran some latency tests on both networks. The results were what you would expect, with the Wireless N completing more packets and doing so in a much quicker time. Let’s see what the final word is on this product.