Google wifi questions

Sounds spot on to me.

I don't know what to tell you about that other than to say that wifi is incredibly variable and subject to all kinds of interference and obstacles, both visible and not. It really is a miracle that it works at all.

First, understand that wireless signals do not radiate evenly in all directions. Every device has a different radiation pattern, so they have weak zones in different places. It could be that you can find another spot in the same room where the google wifi is faster than the eatel. Or maybe not.

Do you have both wifi signals active at the same time? Are they on different channels? If they are on the same channel (or close to it), they may interfere with one another and the slightly stronger signal "wins". If they are on different channels, maybe the eatel is using a less crowded one and the google might be faster if they switched.

Maybe your phone just "prefers" the eatel (or vice-versa) for whatever reason, perhaps it is just better at tuning in the eatel signal. Think of an analog radio dial... if you get close to a station you can hear what's being played and said even if there's a little static, but just a little bit more tuning could clear it up. Just a little bit of "static" can slow down wifi by a lot.

You can login to the google/eatel routers and check which channels they are using. Or you can download a wifi scanning app on your phone to see not only which channels your routers are using, but also all your neighbors.

Most likely you are on 5GHz though, which has a lot of channels and less interference. My best guess is the speed discrepancy you are seeing has something to do with the radiation patterns of the devices, or just some quirk with your phone. Have you tried with multiple devices? Is the google wifi always slower?

In real world use I doubt you will notice the difference in upload speed.