Aiport Express - channels and muticast rate

Question

Im using an airport express for my home network and wondered about the various settings to try out. Firstly does the channel make any difference to signal strength? I've noticed several neighbours have wireless networks on channel 1 so wanted to switch from that.
also regarding mutlicast rate. setup comes set as 5.5 and wondered what the various other options do, ie: which would be best for performance as oposed to furthest range.
11=best 2=furthest?
Cheers

Answer 1

kladzer welcome to the discussions.
See if this doesn't explain it for you.
Channels are important to understand because they affect the overall capacity of your WLAN. A channel represents a narrow band of radio frequency. Since radio frequency modulates within a band of frequencies, there is a limited amount of bandwidth within any given range to carry data. Therefore it is important that the frequencies do not overlap or else the throughput would be significantly lowered as the network sorts and reassembles the data packets sent over the air.
Knowing that the 802.11a specification operates at radio frequencies between 5.15 and 5.875 GHz, and that the 802.11b and 802.11g specification operates at radio frequencies in the 2.4 to 2.497 GHz range, we can see that the 802.11a has a wider frequency band, allowing more channels and more overall throughput. The wider frequency band allows 802.11a to support up to eight non-overlapping channels. However, 802.11b/g standards support only up to three non-overlapping channels.
Each channel is capable of carrying the maximum throughput for its standard. Therefore, the 802.11b and 802.11g standards have a maximum of three non-overlapping channels, each carrying 11 Mbps throughput (33 Mbps total) and 54 Mbps (162 Mbps total) throughput, respectively. The 802.11a standard has a maximum of eight non-overlapping channels carrying a maximum 54 Mbps throughput each (432 Mbps total). (For more on Wi-Fi standards, check out this Quick Reference guide.)
The frequency ranges and channels may vary by country. In the U.S., the 802.11b (2.4 GHz) standard operates on 11 channels. All but three of those channels are overlapping channels. Channels one, six, and eleven are the only non-overlapping channels.
Most manufactures set their default channel to one of the non-overlapping channels. D-Link products, for example, default to channel six. You have the option of selecting which channel your WLAN operates on in order to avoid interference from other wireless devices that operate in the 2.4 GHz frequency range. Examples of this would be 2.4 GHz cordless phones and X-10 wireless products.
The biggest advantage of 802.11b is that it's the most widely deployed wireless LAN technology and provides good wall penetration and indoor range. The advantage of 802.11a is that it provides increased network capacity and interferes with other wireless devices far less than 802.11b products do.
So to answer your question, unless you have a specific reason for changing it, I would suggest you keep your wireless channel configured for the manufacturer's default settings. If, however, you must change it, for the best performance I would suggest trying to use one of the other non-overlapping channels first: Channels one, six, and eleven. Other then interference issues, there really is no other reason or advantage to selecting another channel.
Cheers Don