Wireless Tips

I find that reducing the MTU really improves network performance when I am using my Apple Powerbook G4 on wireless networks with weak signals. Particularly, I find that SSH and FTP are helped by this. With the default MTU of 1500 bytes, connections often stall permanently. With the smaller MTU they keep going in a more stable manner. If anyone wants me to speculate on what I think is going on with this, you can email me and we can discuss it. Otherwise, just try it for yourself and if it helps, great! Here is the command I use on the command line of my Mac:

	sudo ifconfig en1 mtu 150

When I use my Apple Powerbook G4 on a weak wireless network, I have found that it will work for a while and then the wireless connection seems to go dead. Almost nothing I can do seems to bring it back. Playing with the wireless menu, switching wireless networks, turning the wireless device off and on again; nothing seems to help. But I have found something that works great! Reboot the Mac. This is so stupid, and the Mac is supposed to be Unix and Unix people don't like rebooting their boxes for no good reason, but it is the only way to get my Mac back online. This problem only occurs with weak signals. I have no idea what is really going on with this. Of course I would rather be running Linux. Getting a Mac was probably a mistake for me. I really miss the stability and no-bullshit openness of Slackware Linux.