Increase the Wi-Fi signal strength significantly.
Increase the Wi-Fi signal strength significantly.
The router is very close, only a few centimeters away. On Wi-Fi, the ping varies between 250 and 400, while connecting via Ethernet gives a stable 105. Could there be something affecting the connection distance or speed?
The results show no variation between Ethernet and Wi-Fi on Speedtest.net, except for gaming performance.
Try their pingtester tool—it performs better for pure ping than just measuring download/upload speeds. The way ping is measured combines signal times going to you and returning. Older Wi-Fi standards like G standard can hinder online gaming. A newer standard is much preferable, but both your router and laptop need to support it. If your router works with 5GHz, use that for less interference.
I understand what ping means—it’s why I’m puzzled. The router is just a few meters away, using a TP-LINK Wireless N model, which follows the N standard. How can I tell if my laptop works with it?
This would be the simplest option. You could search online for the product number or look up a compatible Wi-Fi adapter. If it's a newer model, it might be labeled as N (approximately three years old). I've experienced this with a G standard laptop before. Using a 5GHz router would improve performance significantly, but I should check the ping stability. My current download speeds are similar. If you can obtain a 5GHz router, that's ideal. Interference might also affect the consistency of pings.
Signal quality might not improve much by adjusting settings. The router’s admin panel lists 5GHz as a network option, and your laptop supports both 2.4GHz and 5GHz, which is fine.
On my home network (100/100) and with PingTest I see 36ms (Turku, FI to Frankfurt, DE) on desktop. In the game it's usually similar. On my new Lenovo U41-70 with AC (slightly higher than N) and 5GHz same server I get 51ms, while 2.4GHz is 54ms. So higher frequency doesn't make much difference here. But Wi-Fi remains worse than Ethernet. Sorry, that's the extent of my knowledge in this area.