Is WI Fi b good enough to stream FLAC?

[ed_vh]

I have had an old PC running as my slim server on an ethernet connection to a router of the 602.11b type. My wireless squeeze 3 has run fine like this to date with flac streams. But my old PC is very noisy.

I have just got a new mac and thought I would run the slim server on that and save the energy consumption of the world by retiring the noisy PC. The problem is the mac is wireless, and the router is only b. Is this likely to have a high enough data rate for flac streaming? What happens if I have both my squeezebox and my laptop running softsqueeze, any chance of passing both the streams? If not would wireless 602.11g do the trick or has the mac really got to be hard wired to the router?

Any advice appreciated!

Ed

PS Does that all make sense?

[radish]

You can certainly get FLAC one way over a 802.11b link, as you have demonstrated. The problem with having the server wireless as well is that the data has to go over the wireless link twice, effectively doubling the required bandwidth. It _might_ work, but you're at the edge IMHO. Much better to just toss the 802.11b router and get a g one for $20. That should work OK with a wireless server and a couple of clients, but a lot of people will still recommend wiring the server if you possibly can.

Really it all comes down to your interference, signal strength, layout etc so it's impossible to give any answers with 100% certainty - give it a go and see what happens!

[Mark Lanctot]

Well it wouldn't cost anything to try it out.

But yes, you will likely experience problems. A wireless server isn't recommended, especially with 802.11b. The best real-world throughput you can get with 802.11b is 5 Mbps. Since FLAC is ~1 Mbps this would be good for one wireless hop (wired server, wireless Squeezebox).

Add overhead and throughput reduction with distance, walls, floors and interference with other devices and it gets worse. A 2-wireless hop (wireless server, wireless Squeezebox) might work in ideal conditions but you are not likely to have these.

Add simultaneous streaming to Softsqueeze and it'll get worse still.

But try it out and let us know what happens. It won't cost anything. Just don't be surprised if you have issues.

[wunder]

I ran this way to start with (using Flac). It mostly worked fine, but I occasionally had stuttering, especially if there was any type of load on the server.