Will an external antenna improve latency

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rustic

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Maybe a silly question, but i'm desperate, really want to play bf2. Sometimes it's playable. I get good download speeds.
Any help would be great.
 
Just a suggestion ... maybe review previous posts with an IDENTICAL heading for information on how external antenna can improve signals..

but... if the connection comes and goes I'd say it's a tower issue... so antenna won't help
 
rustic, it sounds liek you have a good connection so I'd say its quite possible, but whether its enough of a change to justify the purchase of an external antenna.... I can't say, could you post more information, like your current ping situation, time of play, location and best throughput speed
 
Ok here's my take on what an external antenna will and will not do:

IMO an external antenna can improve your iBurst connection's signal quality and reduce packet loss from UTD/UTC to base-station, and therefore reduce the FER% shown in the iBurst systray app [in Windoze with UTC or USB attached UTD].

IMO an external antenna will not help improve the latency of your iBurst connection. I say this bcos measuring your iBurst's latency by pinging is still a radiowave transmission - still at the speed of light, and assuming you have a decent signal quality & low to no packet loss from your UTD/UTC to the base-station, it will not make any difference if you have an external antenna or not - the transmission will still find its way to the base-station you are connected to at the time and with no significant amount of lag unless you are bouncing your iBurst UTD/UTC signal off the ionoshpere or the moon to get to the base-station...
 
slimothy said:
but.. the lower the frame error rate the better the latency
Click to expand...
IMO no, the lower the FER%, the lower the packet loss from UTD/UTC to base-station, will not affect latency - either your packets get to the base-station or they do not - an external antenna is not going to get your packets to your base-station any quicker since they are still going to be travelling at the same speed...it is not like an external antenna is capable of making radiowaves travel faster than the speed of light ;).
 
Maybe not but the quality of the signal could be better with an antenna.
 
Gonna try anyway

I can't really tell you much because my UTD is 60m away and i have no signal at my pc, so i'm not sure if i've found my sweet spot or what my "FER%" is, i've always got 5 led's, i know that's not a good indication of signal quality but here's a ping.

Reply from 196.30.31.120: bytes=970 time=162ms TTL=126
Reply from 196.30.31.120: bytes=970 time=158ms TTL=126
Reply from 196.30.31.120: bytes=970 time=175ms TTL=126

Ping statistics for 196.30.31.120:
Packets: Sent = 92, Received = 92, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 150ms, Maximum = 939ms, Average = 269ms

Granted it is very early, but my average last night was 380ms so i can't understand why it's so laggy?

I'm connected to wonderboom tower and i'm about 8-10 km away.

thanks in advance :)

P.S i did read the earlier posts but as far as i could tell they all covered FER% and there was no definate yes or no. ;)
 
I still think trying an antenna is worth a try, maybe try to loan one from wbs to see whether it helps or not.
Even with all the lights on does not mean that the signal your UTD is sending back is "clean". Could very well be that the tower is missing weak acknowledge signals from the UTD.
 
Fantastic service ( David at tradepage)

:D Ok, i've arranged with tradepage to get hold of one tomorrow, i'll let you guys know what happens, according to the David at tradepage, it might very well improve my latency.
 
ic said:
IMO no, the lower the FER%, the lower the packet loss from UTD/UTC to base-station, will not affect latency - either your packets get to the base-station or they do not - an external antenna is not going to get your packets to your base-station any quicker since they are still going to be travelling at the same speed...it is not like an external antenna is capable of making radiowaves travel faster than the speed of light ;).
Click to expand...

IC, I'm with slim on this one ... tried to find a new wet spot over the weekend, so up with USB cable moving around with a ping in the background ... as soon as the FER% increased, so dit my ping times ... I can't make any technical comments on it, but this is what I experienced
 
Assuming 0% FER ping times would not be improved by boosting the signal as waves only travel so fast.

If there are FER errors the radio layer will re-transmit the packet ... from a TCP/IP level it would seem like a slower ping response but in actual fact it could be a retransmit.

So, there is an INDIRECT correlation of ping time to FER ...
 
Also consider the fact that the packet loss is really what you need to be stable enough to play at all times. I've found with stable pings and irratic packet loss that any FPS gaming experience (even RPG's through iburst) was a bit too much for me.

Running and jumping and shooting with my l33t skills comes to a big fat zero when I die 3 seconds later with nobody even in sight...
 
well they improved for me, now i get 50 - 70ms ping times, so take it or leave it
 
regardtv said:
So, there is an INDIRECT correlation of ping time to FER ...
Click to expand...

I would say there is a DIRECT correlation between FER% and latency (& throughput.)

As you said the iBurst technology re-requests & re-transmits corrupt frames at Layer 2 (packet radio), hiding it from Layer 3 (TCP/IP). If you monitor your FER% together with a (large packet) ping you will see as the FER% rises so does the ping latency.

So the answer to low latency & speed on iBurst is the lowest possible FER%. My experience with the ext. antenna is that it does dramatically reduce FER%, but that would depend on your location etc.

Well ... was worth the R 456 for me.
 
David oh David, Where art thou David

Well maybe i spoke to soon, Can't get hold of david or my antenna but as soon as i have one up i'll let you know if it made a dif. :(
 
rustic said:
Well maybe i spoke to soon, Can't get hold of david or my antenna but as soon as i have one up i'll let you know if it made a dif. :(
Click to expand...
I suggest you p.m. GRES, and try test one of his antennas - from what I've heard they give a much better gain than the WBS external antennas...
 
Roman & Slim ....

Those experiences may be yours.... but not mine ...

The correlation has been erratic at best and changes in FER didn't impact ping times dramatically... Granted this was all tested to Northcliff tower.

Since my switch to Linden (with external antenna) things are looking better ... need to check age FER on the new location but, who cares if it works right...

So, for Rustic's sake .. give it a go .. but make sure it's a free/returnable loan unit in case it does not work for you.
 
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