The IT Nerd

Here’s a question that hit my inbox a few minutes ago:

A question for you. I have a router that is capable of doing both 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. Which one should I be using?

Thank you!

Thanks for the question. The answer is that it depends based on your situation. Each band has advantages and disadvantages. With 2.4 GHz you get better range which is useful in a large environment, but you are more likely to suffer from interference from items like baby monitors, cordless phones, Bluetooth devices, and other WiFi routers that are on the 2.4 Ghz band. But with 5 GHz you get shorter range due to the fact that the greater the frequency, the shorter the range. But you’re less likely to have interference problems. Thus it might be ideal for apartments and densely populated areas where everyone and their dog has a WiFi router.

Another consideration is performance. The 2.4 GHz band is fine for those who access the Internet for simple browsing and email.  These applications do not take too much bandwidth and work fine at a greater distance because they are not as time sensitive. If however you do a lot of online gaming or your do Netflix, then you want to try to get your devices onto the 5 Ghz band.

Finally, you want to make sure that your router is capable support both bands at the same time. That it gives you the flexibility that you might need to fit whatever your use case is to get the best wireless Internet access in your environment.

This entry was posted on October 7, 2014 at 2:18 pm and is filed under Tips with tags WiFi. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.