The icon implies it has five distinct steps (bars), but for me, it is nothing more than a good\bad (on\off) indicator. Four bars is the same as five - I get all the speed my ISP offers. at three bars or less, it says "limited connection", which ends up being zero, nada, zip. No web pages load, no email can be retrieved, nothing. Anyone else have the same issue?
Well, my notebook probably has better antenna in LCD frame, so I can feel the difference in every of five steps...
It depends on your bandwidth and connection. If you have a 2MB/s max connection to your router, and a higher internet speed, you'll notice the difference between 4 and 5 bars quite dramatically. If you have a very high bandwidth connection to your router like 802.11n or better, and your internet bandwidth is only like 2MB/s then you won't notice the difference between 4 and 5 bars.
(would have replied sooner, but kept getting "Database error"?) Thank you MDL for the replies and suggestions. No android devices here, but I do use InSSIDer Home (from metageek) to find uncrowded channels. No one around here using 5 or 8, so I selected 8. Router is D-Link DIR-655. From reading the replies, I guess I don't see any difference from 4 to 5 bars as 4 bars is delivering the max my ISP package offers, 30-32Mbps down, 6-6.5Mbps up. I use the OOKLA Speedtest site for the numbers, don't know how accurate it is though. Still scratching my head on why 3 bars results in absolutely nothing, but as long as I have a usable connection, I'll live with remaining ignorant. (Yes, I know, not the first or last time). Admin, may as well close this thread. Looks like there are way more important and exciting threads than this.