XBOX 360 wireless

[geekhelp4u]

Anyone use the 360 in a wireless environment? I have no problem when the adapter is near the router, but it seems it only gets a few bars when it is away from the router. The laptop next to it gets 4 bars while the xbox wireless adapter gets 2 and sometimes 3 bars. In my opinion it is just a rubbish piece of equipment that MS gets extra money on! Anyone have better luck with after market xbox 360 wireless adapters?

[Jory]

As far as I know there is no standard for displaying wireless signal via "bars". It's possible the laptop with 4 bars and the xbox with 3 are getting an identical signal strength.

I wouldn't worry about it either way. With lower connectivity you're just going to get some packet loss, and with the total bandwidth the wireless card is capable of you're not going to even notice it when connecting over the internet.

[14049752]

you're not going to even notice it when connecting over the internet.

You'd be suprised how much difference it makes, I think. Gaming's pretty dependant on ping time, which means that dropped packets can really screw up the game.

Anyway, yeah, Jory's right...you can't really trust the bars entirely. If I recall, though, the xbox does have a wireless signal percentage readout in the system blade somewhere...it's been a while since I've set one up.
The last one I set up, though, I replaced the (relatively) old router with a new 7-antenna MIMO router..that annoying Netgear one with the blue LED lights in the middle of it...the model number escapes me. But the signal increased drastically with that router over the older, single antenna netgear.