Home Networking: The Basics

[Steve Downer]

Hey guys.
I'm kind of a troglodyte when it comes to networking. I was wondering if anybody would be willing to give me info on what kind of network setup would work best for my needs.

Right now, I've got broadband cable Internet access via Ethernet to my Intel iMac running 10.5.5.
I've got an Airport Express I bought in 2005 to use for wireless printing at my old house, but I never really used it for Internet connectivity.

I've also got an AppleTV running Boxee that I'd like to use to watch Hulu, CNN, CBS, etc.

Now, this is where it all becomes witchcraft to me.

I can do that just fine on my iMac with the Ethernet cable, but when I try to stream to my iMac or Apple TV via the Airport Express, it chokes. Speed tests from a number of sites confirm that Wi-Fi is slower than Ethernet, and that Internet upload/download in general is slower than my provider claims. (But that's another thread entirely, I suppose.)

Is the problem the proximity of the Airport Express to the AppleTV and/or iMac? (About 12 feet, with an interior wall and a couch on the way to the TV. But about four feet with my chair on the way to the iMac.)
Is the problem that I'm using an Airport Express as a router instead of an Airport Extreme?
Could I use an Airport Express for this if it were a new one with the 802.11n? What is that anyway, and how does it compare to what I was using before?

Why the heck is an Airport located an arm's reach from my computer slower than a cable going to my computer?

Sorry to sound like a dope. I'm usually pretty Mac-savvy but networking and Internet issues are a whole new ball of wax for me.

Thanks,
Steve

[gsahli]

Wireless has always been slower than wired. There's an extra layer of hardware to go through.

[Mad101daN]

Have a look at this for the difference in speeds between g and n wireless networking.

http://www.barefeats.com/net80211n.html

[nixgeek]

To add, wifi is also affected by various other elements such as phones that work in the same frequency as the wireless signal (2.4 GHz), microwave ovens (wifi is basically a microwave signal), walls, and any other environmental factors. Also, since wifi works similarly to a hub, the more nodes that are accessing a wireless signal from one access point, the slower things will get (the bandwidth is shared amongst the number of nodes connected to the access point). Even worse, the signal is only as fast as your slowest device, so if one node is far away from the access point, it will automatically go down to a slower speed, causing everyone else to drop to a slower speed. Of course, this all depends on how you have things configured on the access point.