Can a wireless home network become overloaded? If so, how? What are the differences between an open wireless network ie....hospital, coffee shop or airport and a home wireless network other than the security issues. Do those public wireless networks get overloaded? If not, how is that resolved?
Some routers are able to handle more clients than others, most domestic routers can handle between 10 and 50 as their maximums although if you go much over about 5 devices browsing simultaneously over WiFi on an average connection the slow down will be noticeable. Industrial ones can handle many more very smoothly because of a better Internet speed etc.
If you want an idea (and a laugh) of how WiFi overload problems occur juat google iPhone 4 WiFi problem WWDC 2010. The 2.4GHz band (which most WiFi works on) has limited bandwidth and only 11 channels (10 in some places) which can limit the amount of users able to use WiFi at once (although it's still quite a high number).
The other limitation is how how many requests a router can handle per second if you get 60 people all trying to access sites at the same time a lot of process handling is required.
Oli
Thanks Oli, that clears up some of the confusion. BTW, like the quote in sig area.....freaking halerious.
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