I recently upgraded to a Netgear dg834g v2 Modem/router. This is a 802.11g Wireless router and the network speed should be 54Mbps. However whenever I download anything the speed jumps around erraticly from 54mb to as low as 1mb. I am getting these figures from the windows Wireless networking icon, are these accurate? My Internet connection is 1.5Mb, I am just worrying that the drop in connection speed is adversely affecting my donwloads. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

As an addition, I now know that these are accurate speeds. I have tested my connection speed at a variety of sites and the result was 700-800kbps when it should be 1500kbps (at least). I have tried downloading a 50mb file off the net through the wireless network and have recieved an average transfer rate of 50-70kBps,. I then connected to my router via ethernet and downloaded the same file. I recieved a steady download rate of 160KBps! I am using a Netcomm NP5420 Network card and I am running the latest drivers and firmware in both my card and the Router. Thought the latest driver for the card was the one it came with.. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Wireless connection speeds are misleading. If the system tray says you are connecting at 54Mbps, that really means 27Mbps transmitting and 27Mbps receiving is your actual throughput. If you have more than 1 computer connected to the wireless router at the same time, divide 27Mbps by the number of connected computers for your actual throughput. Interference will affect all wireless connections and it sounds like you have some. Your download speeds are set by the slowest part of your connection, which sounds like your ISP. Your system tray is also misleading. If I take my computer and hook it up to a 100Mbs switch, my system tray will say I am connected at 100Mbs. If I then uplink that 100Mbs switch into a 10Mbs hub, my system tray will STILL say I have a 100Mbs connection, even though I will never actually get above 10Mbs, because of the hub. So don't believe everything your system tray tells you... HTH