Bridging between Win8 laptop and Win7 laptop

JP Knighten · 30 Jan 2014

Hi Everyone,

I have 2 laptops, an HP Pavilion dv7 and a Dell XPS M1530. I have a 75Mbps internet connection to my router. My HP laptop internet wireless download speed is approx. 75-85Mbps depending upon the server I need to access. My Dell can only reach a wireless internet speed of 15-20Mbps. I'm trying to bridge my HP to my Dell with cable to achieve a higher speed for the Dell. I'm having problems, can anyone give me step-by-step guidance on how to achieve this.

Help is truly appreciated,

Thanks, JP

Shadowjk · 31 Jan 2014

What is wrong with connecting the HP laptop to the router? You would get much better stability and latency this way.

To bridge the wired connection on the Dell laptop to the wireless connection you can create a Network Bridge that will bridge the interfaces although the results of this can be quirky and you may have issues with regards to routing since the HP laptop might need to be on a separate subnet that the router would not know how to get to.

Still, it is worth a shot.

Network Bridge - Create or Delete

Hope This Helps,
Josh :)

chev65 · 31 Jan 2014

Bridging won't fix a connection problem, in fact bridging will effectively cut the bandwidth in half making the problem worse.

Installing the latest driver version will most likely fix the problem.

This Dell XPS has been around since the XP days and will require updated drivers as Dell has ended support for this model years ago, like Vista days.

You should have one of the following wireless NIC's installed. Once we find out which wireless card you are using then we can try and find the latest driver version which should fix the slow connection problem. Look in Device Manger for which wireless NIC is installed.

Dell Wireless 1370 WLAN MiniPCI Card, Wireless 1470 Dual-Band WLAN miniPCI Card, Wireless 1390 WLAN MiniCard, Wireless 1490 Dual-Band WLAN MiniCard, Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card, Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card Desktops, Wireless 1395 WLAN MiniCard, v.4.170.25.17 /

Installer package for driver version 11.1.1.22 and Intel PROSet/Wireless Tools version 11.1.1.3 supporting Intel(R) Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN Mini Card and Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection Mini Card on Windows Vista operating system.

Dell won't have the drivers for this but Intel or Realtek will have updated versions. I'm surprised that Windows update didn't get this problem fixed.

Drivers & Downloads | Dell US

JP Knighten · 31 Jan 2014

Hey Chev65,

I'm using the Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card.

You seem to know what your talking about. Thanks, I'll waiting for your reply. Meanwhile, I'll look for the latest driver also.

chev65 · 31 Jan 2014

JP Knighten said:

Hey Chev65,

I'm using the Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card.

You seem to know what your talking about. Thanks, I'll waiting for your reply. Meanwhile, I'll look for the latest driver also.

I searched the Dell forum on this particular 1505 mini card. I find threads like the one below where many people have the exact same complaint as you with very low speeds barely connecting etc.
'Dell Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card' problems - Networking, Internet, Wireless Forum - Networking, Internet, Wireless - Dell Community

They go on with similar complaints to the bottom of the page where there is a link for the most recent driver that is supposed to work very well with Windows 7, "second link below for this driver". Installing this driver is the best chance for getting this older card to work. Let me know how it goes.

Driver Details | Dell US