Airport express file transfer speeds

A

awmt102

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Here is my setup:

Airport express attached to a broadband modem/router.
Mac Mini attached to the router via ethernet
Powerbook attached to the netwoirk wirelessly
PC running Windows XP also attached wirelessly

Until recently transferring files was fine - all speeds were OK. But for some reason (im guessing a recent update of OSX to 10.4.5 on both macs) my mac wireless speeds have plummeted. The PC can happily copy to and from the macs at normal speed but the macs cannot copy to and from each other or to and from the PC at anything near normal speed (approx 30 mins for a 700MB file).

I dont quite know whats going on - i had this problem once before but i installed a program called Broadband Optimizer and it fixed it all. I havnt removed this program since but all of a sudden i get very slow speeds. I tried reinstalling it but nothing has helped.

I read various posts that say setting the MTU value solves the problem ( I think this is what Braodand Optimizer does). But I cannot find out what valu it should be set to??

Can anyone help with this - please dont state the obvious sucha s upadte the firmware etc, I am pretty computer savvy and have tried all of the obvious (as well as some less obvious) answers.

Thanks

Andy
 
To change the MTU value following the direction in the Help Support Articles titles"Mac OS X 10.4: How to change the MTU for troubleshooting purposes."

Also, you should try disabling support for IPv6.
Click the "Configure IPv6" button under the TCP/IP tab in Network Preferences.
Change from "Automatic" to "Off" this can speed at transfer speeds and you likely don't use/need IPv6 anyway.
 
Disabling IPv6 has not helped. Im still getting speeds of about 8Mbps.

The article you suggested I have already read - its the value that i dont know what to set. DO you have any idea what type of value would be optimal? I would have thought that as long as both machines are using the same mtu value everything would be fine.?
 
I believe a normal value for MTU is 1492 or you could round off to 1500.

Check your Airport Express settings and make sure it is setup to accept 802.11g/b wireless and not just 802.11b.
The "b" band being slower. I also believe that even if "g" is selected once you reach a certain distance it drops to "b" speeds.
 
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