Windows 8 to Have Greatly Improved Wi-Fi Connection Times
Get back on the net even faster with Windows 8.
Earlier on we learned about the new steps Microsoft is taking in making Windows 8 the most wireless connection-friendly version yet with its simplified and integrated Wi-Fi and mobile broadband controls.
Buried in some of that information was a brief comparison highlighting how much better Windows 8 will be at picking up Wi-Fi networks as compared to Windows 7, particularly when resuming from standby. In fact, according to Microsoft, Windows 8 will be 11 times faster than Windows 7.
"When you resume from standby, Windows can also reconnect you faster to your preferred Wi-Fi networks by optimizing operations in the networking stack, and providing your network list, connection information, and hints to your Wi-Fi adapter," Billy Anders, a group program manager on Microsoft's devices and networking team, explained. "Now when your PC resumes from standby, your Wi-Fi adapter already has all the information it needs to connect to your preferred Wi-Fi networks. This means you can reconnect your PC to a Wi-Fi network from standby in about a second –oftentimes before your display is even ready. You do not have to do anything special for this – Windows just learns which networks you prefer and manages everything for you. This work was a major part of the architectural work we did in the networking stack and with our hardware partners."
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This is what should happen in a new Windows version. Enhance, refine, fix, allow. Don't fix a wheel that isn't broken. Oh and make there there is an easy to find "Metro OFF" button.
Is this even needed? I have win7 on my laptop. (2.xxGHz single core, 1GB ram.) When I bring it back from standby at my work where I connect wirelessly its connected to works wifi by the time its down waking up. I've never timed this but it feels like around 5-7 seconds at most. I never even see the wireless symbol down by the clock looking, its just "connected". This behavior isn't normal?
no that is normal behavior. they just improving windows 7 with better and more stable. they fix the copying pasting it works better, they fix the wifi been taking long time and add touch screen system. They just making os better.
Is this even needed? I have win7 on my laptop. (2.xxGHz single core, 1GB ram.) When I bring it back from standby at my work where I connect wirelessly its connected to works wifi by the time its down waking up. I've never timed this but it feels like around 5-7 seconds at most. I never even see the wireless symbol down by the clock looking, its just "connected". This behavior isn't normal?
Every improvement is needed. I don't know why your laptop takes 5-7 to wake from sleep, but mine is instant. Then I have to wait a small while before I can use the internet while the connection (wired or wireless) connects, which is annoying. If they can making connecting almost instantaneous that would help a lot.
Every improvement is needed. I don't know why your laptop takes 5-7 to wake from sleep, but mine is instant. Then I have to wait a small while before I can use the internet while the connection (wired or wireless) connects, which is annoying. If they can making connecting almost instantaneous that would help a lot.
Hard drive spin-up maybe?
Marketing...
A lot about a network is NOT HOST BASED. If the Win8 computer resumes from sleep/hibernation, inactive anything, and the DHCP address lease has been allocated elsewhere, then the time needed to receive another DHCP lease and populate a routing table will depend on a DHCP server, not the Win8 PC.
W8 manages everything, specifically it doesn't help to Stop MITM attacks.
Windows7 flow
1) Scan all networks for a long time
2) Is the preferred network around?
---Yes
3) Connect to preferred network
Windows8 flow
1) Is the preferred network around?
---Yes
2) Connect to the preferred network.
WOW! Really improved!
@spectrewing: to be fair, Windows 7's Wi-fi reconnect time is quite long; when I take my wife's Win7 laptop out of standby, it takes a little while to restore network access: scanning networks, then once connected, browsing, can take a few seconds. On the other hand, my Ubuntu-powered netbook happily tells me "connected" by the time the screen lights up - which is only a quarter of a second after the disk restarted spinning.
To sum up, my wife's laptop requires something like a third of a minute between opening the lid and its restored state, while the netbook is ready to go under a dozen seconds.
I should try and see if Windows XP wasn't snappier, by any chance... As such, it could have been a regression dating back to Vista.
Ah its always good to hear from the "no improvement ever" crowd who apparently believe that computers reached their zenith in 1999 or so and that every advance since than has been a waste of time... except for Windows XP of course which they inexplicably pine for.
Ah its always good to hear from the "no improvement ever" crowd who apparently believe that computers reached their zenith in 1999 or so and that every advance since than has been a waste of time... except for Windows XP of course which they inexplicably pine for.
I thought the zenith of speed was Windows 98, reliability, Windows 2000... XP was a resource hog!
I think most of the push back comes from those who remember Windows ME, XP (pre SP2), and Vista. While Vista was a HUGE step up in terms of included driver availability, it was just so darned slow... Even Slower than XP was going from Windows 2000 on a Pentium iii. You needed a 2000 dollar computer in 2006 to run Vista comfortably. Therefore, since Vista was horrible, and Windows 7 was so much more refined, we all just assume that Windows 8 will be a resource hog again...
The difference is that Windows 8 is conceptually different: They are looking at less powerful systems to dominate the near future, for mobility's sake. Therefore, speed will be key. Power saving and time saving from wasted power is extremely important.
It isn't that Windows 8 is a waste: People just fear that we will loose all of our old hardware/software again...
I wouldn't be surprised if, in their little chart there, they are comparing a below average Windows 7 result/performance to a best case scenario Windows 8 result/performance.
I wouldn't be surprised if, in their little chart there, they are comparing a below average Windows 7 result/performance to a best case scenario Windows 8 result/performance.
That may be. But even best case scenario, my netbook with a SSD takes 1 second to 'wake up', but take up to 30 seconds to connect to my network. It is obnoxious, since the whole point of my 'netbook' is to quickly be able to connect to my 'network'. Windows 8 looks like it can be a nice improvement.
I have a feeling MS could push this feature in a SP or Update for Win7 but won't. Instead, they will market this new 'improved' feature as a selling point for Windows 8.
I have a feeling MS could push this feature in a SP or Update for Win7 but won't. Instead, they will market this new 'improved' feature as a selling point for Windows 8.
I believe this might be an inherent underlying architectural thing. Supposedly, many of Vista's faults were actually addressed in various service packs. I however, never found this to be the case, as even on new builds, I will occasionally try to use my old copy of Vista, only to find it as frustratingly bloated as when I first installed in oh so many years ago. I think the underlying structure of Vista was just too bloated and assumed too much hardware resources present, to be ultimately svelte...
Hard drive spin-up maybe?
That shouldn't matter. When it's in sleep, everything is stored in ram.
yeah this was needed in Windows 7 i noticed it took a good 6 or 7 seconds after resuming from sleep at times on my laptop, funny thing was XP was faster at reconnecting on my laptop then Windows 7 is.
Go go gadget network adapter.
I've been using Windows 8 Developer Preview since October/November 2011. It's really better than Windows 7, much more lighter and better user interface.
Of course I also don't like the current Metro UI but you can easily turn it off in the registry and voila, you have the new cooler aero theme, better features, better performance and etc, etc and it looks like Windows 7.
What better?
I didn't have any problems with any games, any! Even 10 years old games made compatible for Windows 7 with patches works fine with Windows 8. The only problem I've found is that Kaspersky are lazy weirdos and their Anti-virus/Internet Security and Pure products don't work but whatever, the other anti-viruses work.
Conclusion: install windows 8, there are no problems at all ^^
My 7 Pro connects ultra fast!
Now they need to improve the Disk Defragmenter. It's sucked since Vista.
Now they need to improve the Disk Defragmenter. It's sucked since Vista.
A complex proposition with SSDs in the mix.
this is supposed to be good
One question, I thought PC's were hard to hack into but routers/modems were relatively easy. I hope this does not cause any vulnerabilities.
i dont use wireless for my main computers. my wireless experiance comes from my parrents tech, the ipod touch, the ipad, the laptop, and a kindle, my little brothers 360 (wifi bridge thing) and my ps3, connection time on the laptop with win 7 64bit is kind of annoying, but its a one time thing its up its up till i close the laptop, the rest is... well... i dont know, i barely use them for online.
*a bit ranty from here on*
and to the people brining up xp... i wish win 7 used less than what... how much space does it take up? and i only use it for the same crap that xp did... you know what i would like... an inturnal sd card reader built into the mother board, you hook up a 32gb or 64gb card, its slow as hell but it stores all of the non you need it data... when you actually need it, it pulls it from the card and adds it to your ssd/hdd... but my space issue with win 7 comes more from haveing an ssd than me complaining for no reason.
and for the record, i prefer xp to windows 7 and i still miss key features that were in xp that are missing in 7, like native gif support. yea i can use external programs, but i dont like doing that if there is an inturnal solution and there was for xp... i also dont like how files are handled where i can click on when it was made and select the files, i prefer needing to click the name like xp, and resent when people tell me to get separate program for moving files... its like they are telling me that they know windows 7 is broken, and here is the work around.
I have noticed how the WiFi connection time is much slower than I'd like. Hopefully there is some truth to Microsoft's claim.
Windows7 flow1) Scan all networks for a long time2) Is the preferred network around?---Yes3) Connect to preferred networkWindows8 flow1) Is the preferred network around?---Yes2) Connect to the preferred network.WOW! Really improved!
You do have a pont, but nevertheless it is an inproved algorithm, and sometime all it takes is the simpliest approach to get better results, for me, in this case it should be why did they not do this in the first place?
Also, sometimes it´s the simplicity if the algorithms that shows the difference between programmers.
Very funny the part that has still left me bewildered is how lan to wifi and wifi to lan transfer are almost always limited to 1mb per second even when the device is placed right next to the router and connected on lan at 100mbps anyways with atleast 54mbps on the wifi device too:@
Very funny the part that has still left me bewildered is how lan to wifi and wifi to lan transfer are almost always limited to 1mb per second even when the device is placed right next to the router and connected on lan at 100mbps anyways with atleast 54mbps on the wifi device too:@
Being too close to the router can be just as bad as being several floors above or below the router, maybe even worse.I transer files on my 54Mb WiFi G and I get much more than a few Mb/s.
Windows7 flow1) Scan all networks for a long time2) Is the preferred network around?---Yes3) Connect to preferred networkWindows8 flow1) Is the preferred network around?---Yes2) Connect to the preferred network.WOW! Really improved!
The steps are more or less the same but the individual steps are faster than they used to be. Did you not look at the picture provided? It shows this.
Why can't they just fix this in Windows 7? Aren't Win8 and Win7 (as with Vista -> Win7) based on the same architecture?
I thought the zenith of speed was Windows 98, reliability, Windows 2000... XP was a resource hog!
XP is much lighter than 2000. Just disable the extra crap like the Firewall and the Themes and you are done. I've been using it in a Dual Proc PIII w/128 or 256MB for a long while.
You do have a pont, but nevertheless it is an inproved algorithm, and sometime all it takes is the simpliest approach to get better results, for me, in this case it should be why did they not do this in the first place?Also, sometimes it´s the simplicity if the algorithms that shows the difference between programmers.
That was my point. The Google approach we can call it. But I've been doing that before they existed.
The steps are more or less the same but the individual steps are faster than they used to be. Did you not look at the picture provided? It shows this.
That's how they sell you that... and it seems YOU are buying.
What you see is a FASTER scanning. And what I see is a SHORTER scanning. You will not get the same results. You just look for the preferred network and you are done. When you are OUT, you'll have the same scanning time OR will have less available networks on the list.
The IP time is more or less the same. And the Network ID is completely out of the picture. It's not something that belongs to WiFi. I believe it will broadcast for a shorter time. If you are at Starbucks you really don't mind discovering computers.