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Hello,
I currently have some tp-link powerline adapters that link my PC to the Router (Think this is them). They're about 2-4years old. I think they're limited to 100mbps due to their age, I manage to get the full 50mbps internet through them. I've recently got a SteamLink(similar to an nVidia Shield) and tried play a few games via the powerline adapter and I'm getting lag spikes every couple of minutes. Occasionally I also find they just lose eachother completely and I have to crawl under my desk and behind the TV cabinet to reset and re-pair them. So my question is would a more modern set of Powerline adapters be better? Obviously you can get faster connections with gigabit ethernet, but do they have clever tech to help them maintain connection. I've found similarly specc'd kits from different manufactures at vastly different price points.
Could anyone help me pick, or explain why the tp link stuff is much more expensive? Is there anything I could do to my current powerline adapters?
Caveats; It's in a rented house so I have no idea on the age of the wiring, cant go drilling holes etc.
Many Thanks,
Jack
My experience with two sets of powerline adaptors is that they halved the speed on my FTTC connection through interference. I'm pretty sure my neighbour used a set too and the whole lot interfered with each other. I would try to download something big and you'd watch the internet connection drop about 30 seconds in.
Might be better off with fast WiFi? You can easily get 100mbps across a wide area with the new mesh stuff, or a decent router put in a good position.
I had no end of problems with powerline adaptors and ended up running cables and using WiFi.
One potential cause is "noisy" mains and these adaptors seem to get good reviews although I have never tried them and cannot vouch for them.
https://www.solwise.co.uk/net-powerline-pl-hl129ep.html
I havent got a wifi card in my desktop pc hence the powerline adapters, plus they seem to give me better ping etc when playing online games than wifi every managed.
Thanks for the input.
I use some TP-link adapters that must be 8 years old. The last time I touched them was 5 years ago when we moved house. in practice, they're invisible. No issues streaming, transferring files or gaming.
Hmm could be the old wiring in the flat then... maybe I'll buy a super long ethernet cable and run it to the router.
I have some of those Solwise AV2 ones. Generally, they're pretty good. I have crappy electrics in the house and I can get 75Mbps in my office from a 100Mbps connection. The wifi one isn't very good from a wifi perspective, but it's OK when it's wired.
Where they plug into my router, there's an electrical noise problem, so I have an ethernet cable across the living room to put the homeplug in a different corner of the room and it's fine (kind of defeats the object, but I'm not moving the TV and AV kit)
I don't do gaming, so can't comment on latency.
tried downloading the software, updating the bios and turning off power save mode? the latter was the cause of some of my issues with adapters
Didn't know there was software... I'll have a look tonight when I get home.
So I updated the firmware and they're actually even older models than I thought, TL-PA251. Since the upgrade they get ~180mbps according to the powerline utility and I didn't experience the lagging I was getting whilst playing via steam link. Google internet speed test shows 55mbps download.
Thanks for the help.