July 16 WiFi Firmware Update

[Seneleron]

Just curious, is hyper-v enabled on your machine?

No, but if you think it'll help, I'll try anything at this point. Now my 2.5 Ghz band is only getting 72Mbps max.

I'm not sure if it's related, but my Netflix app is now running like complete garbage. It loads semi slow, gets a picture, immediately tries to buffer, and stalls out. If I go through IE, this doesn't occur.

I've also noticed that now my Razer Adaro wireless headphones do not keep disconnecting/reconnecting.

Now they simply keep CONNECTING >< [like, every 30 seconds] I get a nice voice prompt that says "your device is connected"

 

[aer0]

Suddenly faster

I had the SP3 on all night updated software and such.
Wake up this morning, bring the Surface on Campus for work/school, and are pleasantly surprised
to find the speeds registering on the adapter is upto 270Mbps from being limited at 75Mbps a day before.

Nicely done MS. Only occasional stuttering now when streaming HD content instead of all the time and
or requiring an hour pre-load/pre-buffering time.

 

[aer0]

Spoke too soon.
Started disconnecting again

 

[jimp]

wifi status shows 300mbps, while I was getting around 75-80mbps before, so I think it has definitely improved for me!

asus rt-n66

I got very encouraged by your experience, but sadly the update appears to be a step backwards for me.

With the July 8 update, my wifi on battery and plugged in became fixated on 72 Mbps. That was much improved from 19.5 Mbps consistently on battery and 26 Mbps plugged in. With the July 16 update, I'm now seeing 19.5 Mbps for both battery and plugged in. What's worse is I made a Restore Point before installing, but even after rolling back (confirmed previous driver) I'm still seeing 19.5 Mbps (all the way down to 1 Mbps). I've tried all the tricks like restarting into UEFI to do a full restart of the hardware, but it's just not working right anymore. (As if 72 Mbps was "right" seeing my phone hold 144-300 Mbps consistently.)

I guess 72 Mbps was really good compared to this. I seriously do not understand how these updates vary so wildly: improvements for some, regressions for others. But even downgrading via System Restore doesn't seem to help?? These driver updates must be writing microcode to the Wifi chip itself.

I guess if I'm stuck with slow speeds, I should at least upgrade back to the latest version and hope I am getting the other advertised benefits of standby stability improvements.

EDIT: Asus RT-N16 Router

 

[jimp]

I guess if I'm stuck with slow speeds, I should at least upgrade back to the latest version and hope I am getting the other advertised benefits of standby stability improvements.

EDIT: Asus RT-N16 Router

And now after upgrading back to the 7/16 update, I'm back to 72 Mbps on battery and plugged in. This is so frustrating. The behavior of this Wifi adapter is unlike any I've ever used.

 

[bluegrass]

I've been debating with myself what kind of hypertopshelfherb you guys have been smoking. Maybe some of that high mountain herb out of Colorado. Anyway, you must be talking about wireless speeds between your SP3 and router and not your Internet speeds. It would be cool if we all got on the same page and used the same app to test our Internet speed. Here is one that I've been using and I've seen it referred to in various articles about testing Internet speed. http://www.att.com/speedtest/. I can get to about 3.5 mb at home on my AT&T DSL connection. Wouldn't mind getting the 6mbs that I'm paying for but I'm pretty happy with what I have. I can stream movies through Hulu & Amazon Prime just fine with my 3.5 mb speed.

 

[jimp]

...Anyway, you must be talking about wireless speeds between your SP3 and router and not your Internet speeds...

Correct. We are talking about local network speeds. Local network file transfers are significantly slower than they should be if it negotiates a speed of 19.5 Mbps vs the full 300 Mbps for wireless-N and 900+ Mbps for wireless-AC. You are right that it won't really matter if you are connected at a limited Wifi rate, but your Internet speed cap is below that.

 

[cjsacksteder]

I've had no more "limited" problems, but was getting a paltry 30-60Mbps in the office. Wandered around and got up to 72. Have seen 200 with other devices, but they change a lot of things on those access points, so I'm not sure about today.

At home now, I am consistently getting 270 to 300 on my 5Ghz ap, the best possible (N). Ironically, this is where my Internet bandwidth is the typical home cable modem, so that speed is only useful for local data connections. Work bandwidth is huge, and better speeds negotiated with those access points is noticeable.

 

[kontrol1]

I had in fact saved 7/8/14 update pack and so now downgraded to 7/8 wifi driver. Now connection seems solid. Testing. If anybody need it I can upload somewhere.

 

[Seneleron]

This is somewhat frustrating. Ok, I had slow speeds on battery before, and even plugged in it was hit and miss. . but now I can only get 72Mbps and every time I wake the thing up...limited conn

 

[jnjroach]

Question to those who are having issues still, did you use one of the hacks to enable additional power schemes and/or enabled Hyper-V or Visual Studio?

What happens if you reset the machine to factory default? Same behavior? Working on a theory for escalation.

 

[yonghong]

This is somewhat frustrating. Ok, I had slow speeds on battery before, and even plugged in it was hit and miss. . but now I can only get 72Mbps and every time I wake the thing up...limited conn

Man you should invest in your router.