Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Computing
  3. Reviews

Qualcomm Atheros accelerates your network with Streamboost

Matthew S. Smith
By
Image used with permission by copyright holder

If you’ve ever tried to play an online game or watch a video while downloading a large file you’ve likely noticed a reduction in performance. And then you may have wondered – why? A file doesn’t need to download at maximum speed, so why is it greedy even when other programs are demanding the same bandwidth?

The answer is load-balancing, or lack thereof. Most of today’s network adapters are quick, but not smart. They will consume as much bandwidth as possible no matter the demands of other programs connected to the same network. Dealing with this is a minor annoyance for  a single user, who may have to alt-tab out of a game to pause a download, but it can be a huge headache for multiple users on a home network. A file download on a single PC can hurt performance for everyone else on the network.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Qualcomm Atheros has the solution with its new Streamboost technology. This feature, which is built into its latest 802.11ac router chip, can balance load between multiple systems by detecting usage per system and program. It can balance load automatically or do so on the basis of user-specified settings. Is someone causing problems with torrents? Just restrict that system’s bandwidth to free it up for others.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

These functions are pieced together with an intuitive router backend that uses icons instead of text. It updates in real time so a network’s owner can see how bandwidth is being used while it’s being used.

Recommended Videos

We took a look at this technology in action at Qualcomm’s CES booth. The company sat us in front of an Alienware laptop to play Team Fortress 2 while a high-definition YouTube video looped on a separate PC. With load-balance turned off the streaming video caused occasional lag spikes that briefly, but noticeably, reduced performance. Turning Streamboost on eliminated the problem entirely.

Related

Want it? We do too. Unfortunately the tech is slated for an unspecified high-end router from D-Link that will come out later this year. Other routers will probably follow but, since Streamboost is associated with a high-end 802.11ac chip, these too will no doubt be expensive products.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Matthew S. Smith
Matthew S. Smith
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Matthew S. Smith is the former Lead Editor, Reviews at Digital Trends. He previously guided the Products Team, which dives…
Qualcomm says Oryon chips are faster than Macs’, but we’ve been here before
Qualcomm representative unveiling a new chipset.

Qualcomm wants to "revolutionize" PCs ... again. At its annual Snapdragon Summit, the company announced the first processor under its Snapdragon X branding for PC. The Snapdragon X Elite is a system-on-a-chip (SoC) designed around Qualcomm's Oryon CPU and Adrendo GPU that comes with a dedicated neural processing unit (NPU).

The CPU includes 12 high-performance cores nestled into three clusters. These cores run at 3.8GHz, according to Qualcomm, but two of them can boost up to 4.25GHz at a time. In addition to the CPU and GPU, the X Elite SoC sports LPDDR5x memory on a memory interface that can deliver 136GB/s of bandwidth.

Read more
Qualcomm claims its laptops destroy Intel chips in AI tasks
Qualcomm super resolution demo superimposed on a Microsoft Surface Pro 9.

Qualcomm super resolution demo superimposed on a Microsoft Surface Pro 9. Image used with permission by copyright holder

Qualcomm just announced that AI code optimized to take advantage of the full capabilities of the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 runs some processes faster than low-power Intel chips. That will make the long-lasting Lenovo ThinkPad X13s and Microsoft Surface Pro 9 more attractive to AI enthusiasts who want to run Stable Diffusion for image generation and other AI apps locally without sacrificing portability.

Read more
You’re putting your router in the wrong spot. Here’s where to put it instead
The Netgear Nighthawk AXE11000 Tri-Band Wi-Fi 6E Router on a table.

There are lots of ways to boost your Wi-Fi speed, from buying a new router to creating a mesh network. But something that anyone can do, regardless of the hardware they're working with, is make sure the router is in the right place for the best possible speeds. While where you put it might be limited by phone sockets and cable lengths, knowing where to put your router can make a big impact on its performance.

Here are a few tips on router placement to help you make the most of your connection.

Read more