Tenda A301 Wireless N300 Universal Range Extender Review

Performance

PassMark PerformanceTest Suite

Passmark has a great network performance testing tool that allows me to set the test conditions and control both the server and client side of operations. I’ll be testing the network connection for a continuous period of 5 minutes, first with a fixed packet size of 16384 bytes and then with a variable packet size ranging from 32 to 16384 bytes. The charts below will show the maximum, average, and minimum speed recorded between two systems where one is cabled to the router and the other using the WiFi that we are trying to test.

Fixed Block Size

To test the maximum throughput speed that a connection can handle, a fixed block size of 16384 Bytes is sent from the client to the server over a period of five minutes. The higher block size will allow the transfer rate to stay as high as possible – in the same way that large files transfer from one drive to another quicker than lots of small files of the same total size.

Variable Packet Size

In a real world situation, the blocks of data that pass through a network adaptor are not of the same size each time, so to give a more realistic impression of how an adaptor performs, the adaptor is once again tested for a period of five minutes. This time, the block size will vary from 32 Bytes up to 16384 Bytes in increasing steps of 148.7 Bytes each time.

Baseline

Closer to router

Midway between router and system

Closer to system