Should I turn on "Frame Bursting" and does Airport Extreme support it?

December 4, 2004 11:58 AM

Is "Frame Bursting" worth turning on in my 11g wireless network? If so (and perhaps more importantly), does Apple's Airport Extreme card support it?
posted by deliquescent to computers & internet (7 comments total)

I have a Buffalo WBR-54g Router, and I've been looking at the (poorly documented) options, trying to see if there's anything i can do to make it more secure or faster. It has an option for Frame Bursting, which appears to maybe be a way of changing packet handling for 11g networks to make them faster. However, I cannot find any information on "frame burst" and the airport extreme on apple's support site, their forums, or google. If they do support it, i suspect they have their own name for it.
posted by deliquescent at 11:58 AM on December 4, 2004

It seems that Frame Burst isn't an official 802.11g spec. My Belkin g router also has that option. It seems to be proprietary to wireless equipment with Broadcom chipsets. Apple's Airport Express uses Broadcom chips, so you may get some increased performance with it enabled. I doubt it'll hurt anything if you turn it on.
posted by zsazsa at 3:08 PM on December 4, 2004

i tried it, and if CNET's broadband speed tester is to be trusted (who knows) my connection speed slowed down. Of course, this is WiFi - so that could just reflect that the guy next door talking on his phone. I'm wondering if there's some option for the AE I need to put a check next to.
posted by deliquescent at 3:29 PM on December 4, 2004

802.11G operates at a maximum of 54MB. Unless you have ridiculous bandwidth to your location (I'm really guessing you don't), then the CNET bandwidth test will not be predicated on your wifi connection, but rather than the upstream connection on the other side of your wifi router (DSL, Cable, T1, etc. ) Think of it like having a fire hose plugged into a garden hose. You're limited by how much the garden hose (your Cable/DSL, etc.) can shoot out, not the fire hose (54MB Wifi).

Frame Burst is a preliminary implementation of 802.11e, which hasn't been solidified yet. This is a QOS implementation for wireless networks. Read this article for more information. Most likely, you will only see a performance increase when in a mixed 802.11b/802.11g network. I don't know if the AE supports it, but I don't think it does.

As an aside, the CNET speed tester (and other sites like that) are not a terribly reliable indicator of your speed. You can get a general idea, but there are too many factors involved. The site's congestion, hops between you and the site, latency, and many other factors mean that you can get an idea of how fast your connection is, but variances of 30% wouldn't be abnormal.
posted by stovenator at 4:55 PM on December 4, 2004

I highly recommend the Sveasoft replacement firmware for the Linksys WRT54G and Buffalo WBR-54G. Since these boxes are basically tiny Linux machines, the Sveasoft team takes the (freely available) source code and enhances/improves it.

I've been running the Sveasoft firmware since the day my WRT54G got here three months ago, and have been very happy with it.

Their Buffalo WBR54G forum is here, but I don't know if you can access it without being a "subscription" customer. You can still download the public releases of the firmware, but pre-releases are only available to "subscription" customers ($20/year, but very worth it).
posted by mrbill at 2:03 AM on December 5, 2004

I'm reasonably sure Apple cards won't use Frame Burst even if it's turned on. I don't think it's enabled in the drivers.
posted by majick at 8:10 AM on December 5, 2004

hey cool - thanks everyone. I'll definitely have to check out that Sveasoft firmware.
posted by deliquescent at 8:43 AM on December 5, 2004