Not considering interference by other devices, does it matter whether you set your Wi-Fi router to a lower or higher channel of the 2.4 GHz band? Is the range the same?
2 Answers
In general, the power allowed on any of the 2.4GHz channels is the same, so the range is the same. However, some regulatory agencies have strict rules about out-of-band emissions on the edge of the band, and if a manufacturer was having a problem getting their radio to pass the out-of-band emissions test at one edge of the band or the other, they may have chosen to work around the problem by decreasing their transmit power on band-edge channels (1 and 11, or 1 and 13) to get below the failure threshold.
So, without actually carefully measuring the power output of your box using radio laboratory equipment, it's hard to say, but channel 6 might be a better choice on some boxes rather than a band-edge channel.
In the 2.4 gig band it doesn't make a different (assuming that all the gear can see the channel - different gear has different channels as some countriess have fewer bands).
In the 5 gig band, the higher frequencies typically allow for more power, also this.