Software 1.03.06 and Edimax 7711UAn wireless adaptor

[Ezra Pound]

Black Hole : The tools are available even before you are entitled to post links, they get removed when you click the "post" button.

I would have though that this problem would only be seen by 'New Members'

 

[Jasperoni]

Guys,

As a final footnote on this isssue of the latest Edimax 7711 USB adaptor not working with the Humax with software 1.03.06.

I purchased an "old" version of the Edimax off eBay, first ensuring with vendor that it did not have the Win8 logo on the box. This just has a logo on the box saying "Support for Windows 7". Guess what, it worked straight off didn't even need to reinput the SSID, security or password. Thus it would appear to confirm Ezra's amendment to his list of wireless adaptors HERE.

(Also mangaged to insert a link after the previous tutorial!)

 

[Ezra Pound]

I would try the new Digiflex in another device, say a laptop (with the wi-fi turned off) to prove that is is working

 

[Ezra Pound]

The P.C. probably does need drivers but the Humax doesn't, it does need to see a certain 'type' of USB dongle that uses the RALINK 3070 chipset. When you installed the drivers on the P.C. did you manage to get the Digiflex working? at least this will show the dongle isn't faulty

 

[Brian]

I just purchased a Digiflex adaptor (the one recommended by Ezra as working with HDR Fox T2 - i.e. Digiflex £6 (inc. shipping) from Amazon as I had been using an old 54mbs Edimax unit which seemed very slow (rarely above 1Mb transfer speed and I wanted to try to achieve a faster transfer rate) and the Digiflex is 300mb

I'm fairly certain that the Digiflex adaptor in your link is Not the recommended one. I Think that THIS ONE is the recommended one, as it is only a 54Mbps device.

Edit: It seems that the link in the wiki now points to a different Digiflex product.

 

[Black Hole]

All users should bear in mind that unless a WiFi dongle is specifically advertised as based on the 3070 chip, whether or not previous experience with a particular make of dongle shows it to work, there is no guarantee that the maker (or more likely OEM re-badger) will continue to supply units based on the same chip.

Even if the advert says 3070, what are you going to do? The only way to show that the supplied item is not as described (and therefore have a claim under the Sale of Goods Act) is to break it open. Practically every set of fine print says something to the effect "reserve the right to change the specification without notice".

However, the distance selling regulations do permit one to reject an item for any reason whatsoever within (I think) 7 days of receipt, provided returned in an "unused" (ie resalable) condition, and the seller must refund your purchase price (but not cost of postage - which is why many things on Amazon/eBay are listed as 10p + £6.99p&p). One is therefore recommended to do these "suck it and see" experiments by on-line purchase rather than shop retail.

 

[Ezra Pound]

The poster that recommended the Digiflex ( Jasperoni) HERE, confirmed that THIS LINK to Amazon product number 1376683740 was the correct item. That same link was inserted into the WiKi, It is possible (although very unlikely ) that amazon have re-used product number 1376683740 to list a different Digiflex item.

product number 1376683740 is now described as :- Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle 300Mbps For Windows 7 / 8 / XP / Vista

Brian's new amazon link (HERE) is this :-

product number 0QEMEWP6QAJ1T4CHR343 described as :- DIGIFLEX Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle For Windows ME/CE/2000/XP/Vista(32-Bit)/Windows 7

As the originally recommended item was simply called a Digflex I am not sure which item Jasperoni purchased, if he is reading this maybe he can tell us if it has any identifying text on it

 

[MontysEvilTwin]

I have recently added an additional HDR-FOX to my setup and luckily I had a 'good' spare Edimax EW-7711UAn to use. As a new spare, I ordered a TP link dongle: if you search online you can find a list of dongles with the Ralink 3070 chipset and the site wikidevi.com has quite detailed info about specific dongles and versions (incl. chipset). However, I ended up with a different version to those listed which looked identical but used a different (incompatible) chipset.

I don't think you will find a 300 Mbps dongle with the right chipset, but there are a few 150 Mbps models around. The Edimax EW-7711 series dongles (all 150 Mbps) are quite popular, but there are issues with recent examples of the 'UAn' version (see this thread) which have been found to be incompatible with the HDR-FOX: this is a shame as the old version of this dongle is superb. I have recently (<2 weeks ago) bought UMn and USn versions through Amazon and have had success with both. The UTn version also works but I have found other issues. To summarize:

Edimax EW-7711 UTn (V1.0D): a small form factor dongle. This one is not widely stocked any longer. An Amazon seller, UK surplus central, has them and I bought a couple from them two months or so ago. These dongles work OK for iPlayer etc. but the gain is not great and they need a strong signal. They were OK for streaming of SD content from another HDR-FOX but were hopeless at streaming HD content from an SMB share. If you do order from the above seller, they also sell through eBay and charge less for the same item! A note of caution, the wikidevi site also lists a version 2 of the UTn which uses a different chipset.

EW-7711UMn (V3.0A): A compact dongle, bought from Avides through Amazon. Worked fine with the HDR, some slight intermittent stuttering when streaming HD content (from SMB share).

EW-7711USn (V1.0D): A large dongle with antenna, bought from Amazon. Good strong signal, good performance (similar to the 'good' UAn version) even with HD content streamed from an SMB share. This dongle is quite chunky and if plugged directly into the HDR, it blocks the HDMI port. It does come with quite a long USB lead, which allows the dongle to be hidden out of the way and keeps the HDMI port clear.

With these dongles, and a good strong signal, the connection speed (as displayed by the Humax) will be a maximum of 65 Mbps, or 130 Mbps if your router is set up for dual channel 'n' type operation. What the actual maximum speed is anybody's guess. What I did find is that single channel (up to 65 Mbps) is fine with a good connection for HD streaming: dual channel operation did not noticeably improve matters. With the UTn dongle, where HD streaming was poor, dual channel operation did not help.

 

[Brian]

The poster that recommended the Digiflex ( Jasperoni) HERE, confirmed that THIS LINK to Amazon product number 1376683740 was the correct item. That same link was inserted into the WiKi, It is possible (although very unlikely ) that amazon have re-used product number 1376683740 to list a different Digiflex item.

product number 1376683740 is now described as :- Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle 300Mbps For Windows 7 / 8 / XP / Vista

Brian's new amazon link (HERE) is this :-

product number 0QEMEWP6QAJ1T4CHR343 described as :- DIGIFLEX Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle For Windows ME/CE/2000/XP/Vista(32-Bit)/Windows 7

As the originally recommended item was simply called a Digflex I am not sure which item Jasperoni purchased, if he is reading this maybe he can tell us if it has any identifying text on it

I posted a link to the Digiflex adaptor in #20, and Jasperoni confirmed that it was the correct item in #25, this was definitely a 54Mbps device. Amazon seem to have changed something at their end, as it now links to a 300Mbps device costing £7.99 + £1.99 postage. The wiki link was the same as my link in #20, and my new link in #48 is to a 54Mbps device for £4.99 + £1.99 postage. Perhaps Jasperoni can once again confirm whether this is the correct item. If this can not be confirmed, perhaps the Digiflex should be removed from the wiki list.

 

[MontysEvilTwin]

Reading your comments with interest.....especially MontysEvilTwin #52 as my previous dongle (the one I wish to upgrade to a faster one) is actually the Edimax EW-7711USn which is showing in the Humax settings as 54Mbs and not 150Mbs as reported?

If you already have an Edimax EW-7711USn, I doubt you will find a better replacement. I have not found a 300 Mbps dongle that uses the Ralink 3070 chip set but, of course, there may be models out there. If your router is set for single channel operation, which they usually are by default, the max speed the Humax will show is 65 Mbps; this could be lower depending on the quality of the link. In dual channel mode it will be up to 130 Mbps. I have single channel mode set up and typically I can download an iPlayer programme at a steady 15-20 Mbps (according to Web-If: I have custom firmware), and this is probably limited by my internet speed rather than the network.

 

[Jasperoni]

The poster that recommended the Digiflex ( Jasperoni) HERE, confirmed that THIS LINK to Amazon product number 1376683740 was the correct item. That same link was inserted into the WiKi, It is possible (although very unlikely ) that amazon have re-used product number 1376683740 to list a different Digiflex item.

product number 1376683740 is now described as :- Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle 300Mbps For Windows 7 / 8 / XP / Vista

Brian's new amazon link (HERE) is this :-


product number 0QEMEWP6QAJ1T4CHR343 described as :- DIGIFLEX Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle For Windows ME/CE/2000/XP/Vista(32-Bit)/Windows 7

As the originally recommended item was simply called a Digflex I am not sure which item Jasperoni purchased, if he is reading this maybe he can tell us if it has any identifying text on it

Hi, I think there maybe some confusion here..... I have never purchased a digiflex adaptor, mine was the Edimax . If you look back through the posts you will see the original Edimax purchased from Amazon which said it was Win 8 compatible did not work but I managed to buy one from eBay which did not have the 'compatible with Win8' logo and it was this that worked fine.

 

[Brian]

Hi, I think there maybe some confusion here..... I have never purchased a digiflex adaptor, mine was the Edimax . If you look back through the posts you will see the original Edimax purchased from Amazon which said it was Win 8 compatible did not work but I managed to buy one from eBay which did not have the 'compatible with Win8' logo and it was this that worked fine.

May I refer you to your post #19, part of which I have included below.

Was about to order a Devolo unit from Amazon when just for the hell of it I decided to try an old "DIGIFLEX Wireless Internet USB Adaptor WiFi Dongle" which I bought for £3.99 via Amazon back in 2010 - they are still available at this price.

Are you now saying that this was not correct?

 

[Jasperoni]

May I refer you to your post #19, part of which I have included below.

Are you now saying that this was not correct?

Hi, was just about to reply to clarify this. Had completely forgotten about the Edimax episode, old age is my excuse.... Anyway if it helps the Edimax adapter I was talking about just says "Wireless 54Mbs Adapter" on its casing, no other identification at all so whether this is an identical unit which is now sold on Amazon I do not know as it was purchased a long time ago. Sorry for any confusion.

 

[Brian]

Hi, was just about to reply to clarify this. Had completely forgotten about the Edimax episode, old age is my excuse.... Anyway if it helps the Edimax adapter I was talking about just says "Wireless 54Mbs Adapter" on its casing, no other identification at all so whether this is an identical unit which is now sold on Amazon I do not know as it was purchased a long time ago. Sorry for any confusion.

Edimax??? we are talking about Digiflex here.

 

[Jasperoni]

Hi again, now had a chance to look back thro these various posts...... In # 20 Brian asks, in an edit, if this was the unit. I don't think I ever saw this post and did not respond to it since the next post #21 is on the next page. I did not thus confirm that the item pointed to was the same and if I had see this post I would definitely have noticed that it referred to a different item to the one I used. Suggest that the list which Ezra maintains is edited.

 

[Jasperoni]

Edimax??? we are talking about Digiflex here.

Typo mistake

 

[Brian]

Hi again, now had a chance to look back thro these various posts...... In # 20 Brian asks, in an edit, if this was the unit. I don't think I ever saw this post and did not respond to it since the next post #21 is on the next page. I did not thus confirm that the item pointed to was the same and if I had see this post I would definitely have noticed that it referred to a different item to the one I used. Suggest that the list which Ezra maintains is edited.

Your post #25 was your response.

I hope your DIGIFLEX WiFi dongle will be OK when you re-site your Humax. I must admit that it's not a brand that I am familiar with, perhaps Ezra can add it to his list of working dongles.

Edit: Is yours by any chance one of THESE.

Yep, that's the one, expensive bit of kit isn't it!!! . Couldn't put a link to it as am not allowed to post links etc being a neewbie to the forum.

 

[Jasperoni]

Ok, ok difficult trying to look at previous posts from a small handheld unit And it was a while ago!

My fault apologies although looking at the item pointed to in the post it is physically different to my unit so think Amazon may have changed the item????

 

[Brian]

Not to worry, I think that the best thing would be for Ezra to remove the Digiflex from the wiki list.

 

[dooferdog]

Shi*, Wish I'd seen this before buying a second 7711UAn.... Mine doesn't work either whereas my old one does. This one has the 8.1 compatible on the box...