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ASUS Guarantees Draft-N Upgradability
Glenn Fleishman writes, "One of the most irritating things about draft-n wireless gear being released this year is that there have been no guarantees from any chipmaker or manufacturer that today's devices — loosely based on the IEEE 802.11n Draft 1.0 — will be upgradeable through firmware to the final standard. Several computer makers now bake draft-n adapters into their laptops as an option, which is even more troublesome. Today ASUS, which uses the Broadcom chipset, said that they will swap out hardware if necessary for any draft-n gateways and adapters they ship until the end of 2006. If firmware upgrades aren't enough, they'll replace your hardware, with you paying just the shipping. Of course, they're guaranteeing compatibility with the March 2008 expected ratified version of 802.11n, but it still means that you won't be left with equipment that only works well with itself."
You really get a nice band for your buck with A in a crowded area. Dorms or big cities are full of B/G devices hogging up the spectrum. Switch to A and watch your real world speeds jump up quite a bit. It works like a charm in my apartment.
Tim Smith - Ramblings from Nerd Land
That'll teach those pre-N-draft-802.11 not to jump the gun!
If firmware upgrades aren't enough, they'll replace your hardware, with you paying just the shipping.
The question is where to? This really has no value if they have you ship your card / router / motherboard to China via insured courier...
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Several computer makers now bake draft-n adapters into their laptops as an option .......I'm waiting for the brownie option myself
So if you buy an expensive card today, and there's a small chance they'll give you an inexpensive free replacement in two or three years.
Whoop-dee-freaking-doo.
I agree, this will be a boon to cafes and such other places not usual usual early adopters, as those kids in the dorm rooms or concrete appartments. And those with huge properties. I think main idea here is reachablility not speeed. I doublt it will be over 5Mbits a second, unless you sit under the router and have RF transparent surroundings and furniture.
I'd take a walk on cynical side. G has given me only about 30-50% improvement in general uses. not 5x.
2c.
as someone who regularly uses NAS storage for streaming video over 802.11g I can confirm in the real world that only some HD content will run real time well enough to watch. Higher bitrate content approaching 20Mbps while still underneath the real world transfer rates of that kit becomes unreliable, even when there is no other b/g traffic being broadcast in the area. Transfer rates don't stay as a solid line, and video streaming needs some headroom for buffering and catch up if anything glitches or something else gets broadcast. The same content is rock solid on 100Mb ethernet or the matched pre-N stuff I used. Not at all unlike mounting single layer DVDs that are less than 5Mbps and not being able to stream them well over 11b. I haven't rushed out to buy any pre-N though, but I'll be happy to use it when it's more reasonable.
Saying "no one can use it" about network bandwidth right night is kind of like saying no one can use it about RAM in the 80's - you're assured of being wrong much quicker than you think. Hell, some people's consumer internet runs faster than 11g can now.
I've been using wireless for several years (who here on /. hasn't??) and this seems to be a solution looking for a problem.
... even though the most of what I do involves streaming FLACs around the house. It seems to me as if all this speed stuff only chews up the entire ISM band and is more about channel aggregation than about something truly innovative. I can't imagine the range or total throughput can be good when myself and all my neighbors keep crowding the entire spectrum.
802.11n is (yet another) way of shoving 10 pounds of shit through a far smaller pipe than is really available. 802.11a/b/g really serves me well in all the things that I do
Really folks, how expensive is it to hardwire all the goodies that absolutely need the speed?? I'm probably missing the point.
// Agent Green (Ian / IU7 / KB1JQO)
// IEEE 802.3: All 10base Are Belong To Us
I can attest to this. I've been running Kismet on long drives between colleges in Pennsylvania, and I haven't seen a single 802.11a access point. I've stopped even scanning A just so I can get more packets on the BG band.
ttuttle is a rankmaniac
I care.
I live in a big house, wireless A just doesn't have the coverage I need if I want to sit in my living room and browse the internet.
Wireless B has decent range but isn't as fast as the wireless A, so if I want to transfer a file from my desktop (in the bedroom where my router is) to my laptop, I would have to go upstairs. I'm not lazy but I would rather not have to go all the way upstairs just to copy a file, I might as well just lug around a 500GB external hard drive everywhere I go.
Wireless G was great, it had good coverage and good speed, but signal degrades as it reaches farther and some areas of my house, like the porch get very weak and intermittent signals. Wireless N is perfect for my situation and I for one am happy to see that ASUS is willing to hook me up with something even more functional if there is no easy fix for my draft-n network.
Some people use wireless for different things. I use mine for convenience at my home, this is perfect for me and I do indeed care.
i just got an n draft router because on my new laptop i got the n draft wireless card and so far i have had no problem with it so and i dont have to worry about compatablity because almost no place has n draft so i dont really see what the problem is...
Like anything else, it will be unstable for the first year, then become mainstream. No reason to "get ready..."
Yea, but only if you dont care about distances. The only thing I have liked so far about the Draft-N devices is the throughput you get at greater distances. Sitting directly in front of the router my throughput was still only about 32Mbps on average (65 max in small, infrequent bursts) but was getting 2Mbps throughput at a distance where I couldnt even see my 802.11a router.
Nobody? OK no cream.
A house decked out in "pre-N" or "draft-N" stuff that isn't compatible with anything from any other manufacturers sounds like an excellent extra step in security. If you're out and about, most of this stuff will happily drop to G or B.
I never understood how people can be involved in the standards process while simultaneously allowed to undermine it. This seems like a strongarm tactic to me.
What did you eat today? http://www.atetoday.com/
RIGHT?!
Fuck asus and their promises. I have their router that is suppose to support an external HD and bittorrent. Well gues what? It works like shit, it works so bad it is completely useless.
Connect a HD to the router? All your files will be acessible from the outside via an anonymous FTP connection. NO FUCKING WAY TO TURN IT OFF. Also be prepared for the router to completely stop responding at random times if it has a HD connected.
Every torrent I tried to download never even started downloading. They just sat there.
That there's progress being made in wireless but not wired? State of the art isn't even close - multi OC-192 vs. ~100 mpbs.
That bandwidth needs are static, so by increasing link speeds we can catch up? LOL.
That you expect the laws of physics to be broken? The RF spectrum is by it's very nature shared. There are some technologies which make more efficient use of a given spectrum (CDMA, OFDM), but they still must content with physical reality - increasing the number of communications channels decreases bandwidth.
Or are you simply being sarcastic, since you haven't a clue about the technology or physics, and are therefore unable to reply with anything intelligent?
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
If I remember correctly, the estimate for running a wire is about $100 for the first wire to a location, and an additional $10 for each additional wire to the same location.
Now this assumes that you have relatively new type construction. E.g. Drywall where you can put small holes in it and fish the wire through. Older type construction (say Plaster on Lathe in The US...), or Italian type construction (Plaster on Cinder-Block for interior walls? Gimme a break.) will cost significanty more.
If you are willing to put your wires on the wall with clips so that everyone sees it, It costs almost nothing. Except for the wife's continual noises about "ugly".
I suppose the real question is one of ease: At commodity prices, a Wireless Base unit (802.11g) and card (802.11g) will cover most homes and work well for everything but streaming video - for $100. It will take something like a half-hour to setup. Additional client cards are under $50.
In my house (US, built in 1909) and similar ones, you would have to cut a channel in the plaster from your patch-panel to every drop point. This would take a few hours with a circular saw and carbon cutting blade. Then someone will have to drill through all of the petrified joists. Then the wire would have to be pulled (another 15 minutes/drop). Then it would cost several hundred (to over a thousand) to cover it back up. In some homes you will have to do this anyhow, as the wall construction is Plaster over Wire Mesh, over Joists. (Think no wireless reception through it.) However, putting a wired network in an old house is expensive. Putting one in a new home costs less, but still more than WiFi.
my $.02
Multiple access points.