Testing:

Testing the Actiontec WCB3000NK01 will be broken in to two main sections, with a few tests to be evaluated in each.

The first section will center around the transfer rates possible to the Windows Media Center PC located in the second floor bedroom. This is the same system that has used Wireless N and a 200Mbps powerline adapter to connect to the router located in the basement of my home. We will test throughput in a few ways, comparing the Actiontec hard wired connection, wirelessly connecting the PC (with a N300 adapter) to the Actiontec wireless extender, wirelessly connecting the PC to the router in the basement, and a hard wired connection using the powerline adapter.

The first set of tests in this first section involved using Speedtest.net to compare the speed of the Internet connection to this PC using the four methods mentioned in the previous paragraph. The service plan from my ISP is rated at 100MB/s down and 30MB/s up and at a desktop wired to the router in the basement it is possible to approach 120MB/s down and 40MB/s up.

The first graph shows the download speeds achieved using Speedtest.net which connected to a server in NYC (all tests used the same server). Here we see that the hardwired connection to the Actiontec WCB3000N almost maxes out what I know a good hard wired connection can provide. The wireless connection to the Actiontec extender is very impressive, too. Testing the wireless connection directly to the basement shows why it was a failure for streaming HD, and the powerline speeds are better, but not great, which explains why watching and recording simultaneously could be an issue.



Upload speeds are of less concern for this system, but they were worth nothing anyway. The graph below shows that all connection methods provide decent upload speeds, but that the hard wired connection to the Actiontec device were clearly the best.



The second phase of testing in this first section involved copying a DVD rip (4.25GB MPEG) from a server in the basement to the Media Center PC in the bedroom. While I would usually just stream DVD or Blu-ray rips straight from the server, this approach made it easier to quantify the speed. What we see is that the speeds are not record breaking, but that being hard wired to the Actiontec WCB3000N is the only way to do it to make sure you have enough bandwidth.