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Gaming: Wireless vs Powerline adapter?

For actually playing games? Powerline for less latency. For download speeds? Probably wireless if you have a good Wireless N/AC router.
 
If it works in your home...powerline.

They're kind of hit or miss...for some homes they're great and for others they don't work as well. I use one and they have a visual indicator that tells you the quality of the connection.

For my home, the powerline adapter works flawlessly. Far superior to wireless.

family_guy said:
For actually playing games? Powerline for less latency. For download speeds? Probably wireless if you have a good Wireless N/AC router.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't the d/l speeds be better on powerline as well, provided you buy one that's strong enough to support your internet d/l & upload speeds?
 
In my home, which has stone floors on the second floor that the WiFi had to go through? Powerline was better for both throughput and latency. Amazingly simple setup, and great results.

Note: it also added a low-level hum to the home theatre receiver downstairs, so I ended up not using it. As others have said, every home will be different, so buy it from a return-friendly retailer.
 
Jonboy said:
Wouldn't the d/l speeds be better on powerline as well, provided you buy one that's strong enough to support your internet d/l & upload speeds?
Click to expand...

With powerline adapters, there's alot of dependency on the wiring in your house. Not everyone will have the same experience. I have a powerline adapter connected to my PS4 in the living room, and the speed tests show it running slower than the PS4 Slim connected on the 5GHz AC band that I have in my office.
 
Make sure you test powerlines first.

I bought a powerline last month and it ended up tripping my breaker because of the extra noise it puts on the circuit. Ended up having to return it.

Which reminds me, Dell.com owes me 50 dollars...
 
I use a powerline as well. My ping went down from 70ish to under 40 on most MP games. But it hugely differs depending on the type of house and wiring and location of router etcetera
 
I've found Powerline has worked very well for me, I'm on my 3rd version of them now, upgrading them as speed enhancements come about. I've been using them for 7 years now for FPS gaming on PC with great results. My first set was Linksys and my last two have been D-Links.

EmiPrime said:
That depends on the wiring in your house for the Powerline adapter and how far away you are from your router in the case of Wifi.

Your mileage may vary basically.
Click to expand...

As the person I quoted above and others have said, your performance could be great or poor, depending on your home/apartment's wiring. When I bought my first set of adapters I lived in a house built in the 70s and I found that in the room where my PC was one power outlet gave me way better performance than the other two. So if you end up getting them be prepared for some experimentation to get the best performance.

Another thing to consider is that Powerlines are supposed to be plugged directly into wall, not through a powerbar or extension cord, so you'll need to have enough outlets for that.
 
Currently using a power line adapter right now and its great. My wireless speeds are super slow and the PS4 is too far away for an ethernet cable so we have to use the adapter. The problem is that the wiring in the house is really bad so I usually get speeds of 10 megabytes or 15 but that does much better then before when it was 700 kilobytes.
 
I use power line... One of the older 200 models.... And it always beats my wireless on latency. 100% reliable connection, too.
 
kiguel182 said:
I use a power line with my PS4 and it's fantastic.
Click to expand...

I have powerline connected to a router connected to PC/PS4/XB1

*Never* had an issue

OK, your internal wiring is a factor and I recently changed my fuse box but other than that, I don't use wifi except for portable devices...
 
Use a moca adapter if there is coax cable close to where you are gaming, it is the best possible way. Powerline and wifi can both be unreliable. If you have Verizon FiOS, your router acts as a moca adapter already, so you only need one more. If not buy two, well worth it to get a rock steady connection.

It's the same concept as powerline adapters except it sends internet connection thru existing coax lines through your house. Its basically like you are connected to the router, no sacrifice in speed or latency and won't be disrupted if a breaker trips it if your home is older or TV electrical is poorly done.
 
Depends on a lot of factors, but Powerline adapters are pretty great and convenient. Was better than Wifi in my situation.
 
Powerline. We install these all over this area and compared to wireless its insane. Then again with breakers and such you might have some issues. the best thing though is you can just plug a wireless extender to a powerline adaptor for some other devices(none gaming) too. They are insanely affordable and as of late REALLY well made.

thecrunked said:
Use a moca adapter if there is coax cable close to where you are gaming, it is the best possible way. Powerline and wifi can both be unreliable. If you have Verizon FiOS, your router acts as a moca adapter already, so you only need one more. If not buy two, well worth it to get a rock steady connection.

It's the same concept as powerline adapters except it sends internet connection thru existing coax lines through your house. Its basically like you are connected to the router, no sacrifice in speed or latency and won't be disrupted if a breaker trips it if your home is older or TV electrical is poorly done.
Click to expand...
Interesting. Powerline has a 99% up which is well within the 5 star rating for reliability. I think your confusing the hardware with the issues that can happen with any system when outside issues impact its delivery service.
Though other adaptors are of course fine they also have issues and yes Moca as well. Its not magic. But its best to not junk up the situation.
 
Powerline is about 10Mb/s slower than wired on my 60Mb/s connection, which is no big deal to me. My only problem, and only reservration when recommending them, is that sometimes they just freeze up and drop the connection and need to be reset. I don't know if that's a typical problem with the technology or specific to the ones I bought. I have TP-Link 200s. In any case, they're generally very good, though I changed over to using a 50ft ethernet cable due to my SFV habit, just to eliminate that one issue I was having.
 
Powerline is FANTASTIC when it works, but it might not depending on your home. Older houses or just poorly wired ones sometimes run into issues. Assuming you're good on that front, they're great for consoles or other single devices in spots that would be obnoxious to run a cord to. Easily better than wifi if you're running into latency or signal issues.
 
It's very situational neither perform as well as natural ethernet or a fiber connection of sometype. Speed wise you should be good above 200Mbps though the closer to a gigabit you are the better.

Powerline Pros

Just like ethernet when it works

Powerline Cons

Just as bad as bad wifi due to a bad signal quality issues.

Wifi Pros

Very useful when it works if you don't like wires

Wifi

Non duplex
Packet aggregation which adds micro delay
Currently all wireless drivers suffer from heavy bufferbloat once the signal switches speed or loses strength
The more people on the ap the worse your latency and bandwidth will suffer.
 
Powerline is heavily dependent on the quality/age of the electrical system in your domicile. AC WiFi can be significantly faster and more stable in many cases. Don't assume that everyone saying "powerline duh" is considering the fact that their homes might be much newer than yours, or that they may be comparing to wireless routers / receivers from a decade ago rather than the newest tech. In my home, powerline adapters capped out at around 50mbps regardless of which outlets I chose (I tested it extensively), whereas my AC laptop maxes out my internet connection at 250mbps easily. In terms of latency the difference is negligible (in my case, I mean). So make sure that if you buy powerline adapters you do so from some place you can return them to if they don't work out for your particular location.
 
renzolama said:
Powerline is heavily dependent on the quality/age of the electrical system in your domicile. AC WiFi can be significantly faster and more stable in many cases. Don't assume that everyone saying "powerline duh" is considering the fact that their homes might be much newer than yours, or that they may be comparing to wireless routers / receivers from a decade ago rather than the newest tech. In my home, powerline adapters capped out at around 50mbps regardless of which outlets I chose (I tested it extensively), whereas my AC laptop maxes out my internet connection at 250mbps easily. In terms of latency the difference is negligible (in my case, I mean). So make sure that if you buy powerline adapters you do so from some place you can return them to if they don't work out for your particular location.
Click to expand...

and wifi is prone to interference or range. Powerline isn't slow you can get a gigabit adapter for nothing.

If you powerline is caping out 50mbps let alone Mbps you're not doing something right if it's an internal test. Same for a speed test within your isp networks. You can claim all you want but unless you're going to show iperf test I really doubt your methods.

Latency is not neglibible from wifi. Actual people who have shown in test show that wifi causes spikes in certain situations which are unavoidable. I even linked it so short of you having custom drivers no one has for wifi outside of the bufferbloat team, which would would mean you use custom firmware as well that is an impossibility.

Can't stress it enough OP test what's better for your unique LAN situation and minimize bufferbloat if you're dealing with gaming/streaming/voip
 
I have Wi-Fi through my Verizon FIOS router. I have a 30 mbps connection, which ends up being about 3.9 mb per second max speed. If I use it for gaming, downloading, or streaming to console or PC, it will never maintain steady speed - often it will drop down into the low 1's or so, and sometimes it will be in the 200 kb per second range.

I bought a Netgear Powerline 1200 adapter, and the downloads are constantly at 3.9 mb per second now. Best purchase I've made regarding internet by far. My house is 15 years old, so the writing is fairly recent. YMMV.
 
If you have more than one router, what about a wireless bridge, or router-to-router setup? Essentially a "wireless Ethernet link". There's a couple prerequisites, but when you get it going, it's incredible. My desktop and consoles are all wired to my E4200 router, which is bridged to my ASUS. Super stable connection over 5Ghz AC, indiscernible from a full wired connection. Better than a direct wireless connection when gaming and streaming, IMO.
 
In both cases, your mileage may vary. A lot.

I think spending the money on a better wireless router is a better investment overall, as your other devices (laptops, smartphones, smart devices, etc.) can take advantage of it. You could also try to relocate your modem near your main gaming TV and just run ethernet.
 
renzolama said:
Powerline is heavily dependent on the quality/age of the electrical system in your domicile. AC WiFi can be significantly faster and more stable in many cases. Don't assume that everyone saying "powerline duh" is considering the fact that their homes might be much newer than yours, or that they may be comparing to wireless routers / receivers from a decade ago rather than the newest tech. In my home, powerline adapters capped out at around 50mbps regardless of which outlets I chose (I tested it extensively), whereas my AC laptop maxes out my internet connection at 250mbps easily. In terms of latency the difference is negligible (in my case, I mean). So make sure that if you buy powerline adapters you do so from some place you can return them to if they don't work out for your particular location.
Click to expand...

I'll take the full duplex and lack of bufferbloat over wifi anyday. A consistent connection for multiplayer is always favorable compared to high speeds with shit latency.
 
If you have a wireless AC router, then wireless. PS4P will have an AC wifi chip, and X1 already has it. Makes a huge difference.
 
So... sorry to bump this thread, but I figured it’s better than starting a new one. Guy from Comcast recommended I try this since only a mesh router would work in my house due to lots of brick walls. Are there any in particular you guys could recommend? Thinking about buying one from Best Buy tonight and just returning it if it doesn’t work.

By the way: how the hell does this even work? I thought the guy was fucking with me for a minute until I googled it.
 
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