11/8/2019 Double your WiFi speed on Windows laptops and tablets with Intel network cards | Digital Citizen

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Double your WiFi speed on Windows laptops and

tablets with Intel network cards
MISC by Ciprian Adrian Rusen
[https://www.digitalcitizen.life/users/ciprian-adrian-rusen]
published on 01/17/2018

WiFi is everywhere. We use it daily, but it does not always work well.
Sometimes we are in places with a weak signal, and we get frustrated by low
speeds and instability. If that is the case for you, and you have a Windows
laptop, tablet or hybrid device with an Intel processor, then you can improve
your speed quite a lot, by fiddling with just two settings, if that device also has
an Intel wireless network card. Here's how to enjoy faster WiFi, on Windows
devices with Intel wireless network adapters:

Two wireless network card driver settings that can

seriously enhance your speed on WiFi
Laptops, tablets and hybrid devices with wireless network cards made by Intel
have two driver settings that, when enabled and configured correctly, can
enhance the speed you get in areas where your WiFi tends to be slow. The two
are Throughput Booster and Transmit Power.

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Throughput Booster enhances the wireless transmission throughput by enabling

packet bursting. The default setting is Disabled. When activated, your wireless
network card does not allow for other clients to have equal access to the
available wireless bandwidth. Therefore, you get more bandwidth while others
get less. Streaming video, uploading large files, and sharing content, are
examples of applications that would benefit from enabling Throughput Booster.
If you need the maximum throughput, you should enable this setting, especially
if you are in an area with a small number of wireless clients. It should be
disabled in an environment where equal access by all clients is a priority or in
wireless networks that use older networking standards like 802.11b or 802.11g.

Transmit Power sets the transmission power for the wireless signal from your
network card. Intel sets the transmission power at the lowest possible level still
compatible with wireless communication quality. The setting allows the
maximum number of wireless devices to operate in dense areas. It reduces
interference with other devices that share the wireless radio spectrum. If you
decrease the transmit power, you reduce the radio coverage of your network
card. If you increase the transmit power, you get better radio coverage from
your network card. You can choose between five levels of transmission power:

Lowest: Sets your WiFi network card to the lowest transmission power.
You should use this level in high traffic areas to improve overall
transmission quality and avoid congestion or interference with other
devices. This will work well if you are relatively close to the router or the
access point emitting the wireless signal that you are connected to.
Medium-low, Medium, or Medium-high: this achieves the best balance
between transmission power and network congestion. These levels are
usually set based on the legal requirements in each country where
devices are sold.
Highest: sets the transmission level of your wireless network adapter to
its maximum. This way you achieve the maximum possible performance
and range from your network card. Intel advises users to use this setting
in environments with a limited number of wireless devices.

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11/8/2019 Double your WiFi speed on Windows laptops and tablets with Intel network cards | Digital Citizen

If you would like to learn more about Intel wireless adapter settings, go to this
page: Advanced Intel® Wireless Adapter Settings
[https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000005585/network-
and-i-o/wireless-networking.html].

Real-life test: You can double the speed of WiFi by

enabling and configuring these settings!
We wanted to see the real-life impact of fiddling with these settings, so we took
two different laptops with Intel network cards and Windows 10 installed:
Lenovo Legion Y520 [https://www.digitalcitizen.life/lenovo-
legion-y520-laptop-review] with an Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 8265
network card and an HP Spectre 13t with an Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 8260
network card.

We first tested the wireless network speed with Throughput Booster disabled
and Transmit Power set to Lowest. We used both laptops in different
apartments, with different wireless routers, in the rooms were we had the
lowest speed on WiFi, in each of the two apartments. The speed measurements
were made with SpeedTest [http://www.speedtest.net/]. The Lenovo
Legion Y520 had a speed of 43.81 Mbps for the download and 10.01 Mbps for
the upload.

We then enabled Throughput Booster and set Transmit Power set to Highest.
The same laptop, in the same room, enjoyed a considerable increase in speed,
up to 101.77 Mbps for the download and 56.38 Mbps for the upload. Also, the
ping reply decreased considerably from 30 ms to 4 ms. It is a big improvement!

We then took the HP Spectre 13t, and we used it in a different apartment, with
Throughput Booster disabled and Transmit Power set to Lowest.

We went to the room where we tend to have the lowest speed, and the laptop
had a good result but lower than what our WiFi can deliver in other rooms:
98.02 Mbps for the download and 43.44 Mbps for the upload.

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We then enabled Throughput Booster and set Transmit Power to Highest. The
same laptop, in the same room, went to 185.79 Mbps for the download and
130.46 Mbps for the upload. Again, a massive increase in speed.

We made the same measurements in other rooms that are closer to the router
and noticed a crucial trend: these settings improve your WiFi speed only in
areas where the wireless signal is weaker. When we went to the rooms where
the two routers were placed, both laptops did not enjoy an increase in speed. In
those rooms, there was no noticeable difference when we fiddled with these
settings.

How to enable Throughput Booster and set Transmit

Power set to Highest
To find these two settings and fiddle with them, you need to edit the properties
of your wireless network card. The quickest method (but not the only one) is to
open the Device Manager [https://www.digitalcitizen.life/ways-
open-device-manager-windows]. To do that, go to "Control Panel ->
Hardware and Sound -> Device Manager." Please note that you have to be
logged in with an administrator user account, for this to work.

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In the Device Manager window, scroll down to Network adapters and double
click on it. Then, find your wireless network card and double-click (or double-
tap) on it.

NOTE: At this step you see the name of your wireless network card. It may be
Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC followed by a number, like it is for us, or
something else like Realtek Wireless LAN Adapter or Broadcom Wireless
LAN adapter.

The properties window opens for your wireless network card. Its name might
be different than what you see in our screenshots. There, go to the Advanced
tab. You then see a list of settings for your network card. The list of settings
may vary on your Windows laptop or device. Scroll down until you find
Throughput Booster and Transmit Power, highlighted below.

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Use the drop-down list of values for Throughput Booster and choose Enabled.

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11/8/2019 Double your WiFi speed on Windows laptops and tablets with Intel network cards | Digital Citizen

Use the drop-down list of values for Transmit Power and choose Highest.

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11/8/2019 Double your WiFi speed on Windows laptops and tablets with Intel network cards | Digital Citizen

When you are done setting things the way you want to, click or tap OK to apply
your changes. Your wireless network card will reset and stop working for a
couple of seconds. After it resets, it connects automatically to the same WiFi as
before, and you can enjoy the benefits of changing these settings. Test your
speed on WiFi and see if it works better.

What if I do not have an Intel wireless network card?

Other manufacturers of wireless network cards may or may not have similar
settings in their Windows drivers. You should use our tutorial to access all the
available properties for your network card and see if there are similar settings
for you to change. If there are, test your changes as we did: before and after. If
you see an improvement leave your changes enabled. If you do not, revert to
the default settings. If your wireless network card starts misbehaving, you can
reset it back to its defaults, using this tutorial: How to reset all your Windows
10 network adapters with just 6 clicks
[https://www.digitalcitizen.life/how-reset-all-your-windows-10-
network-adapters-just-6-clicks].

Did you enjoy an increase of speed on WiFi?

We recommend that you follow our tutorial and make tests before and after
making these changes. Did you notice an increase in speed? Again, the trend
we identified is that these changes provide meaningful improvements only in
areas were your WiFi signal tends to be weaker. Do not hesitate to leave a
comment and share your experience with other readers and us.

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