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7Gbps Wi-Fi Networking Kit Could Launch In 2010
Mark.JUK writes "Wireless Local Area Networking (WLAN 802.11) adapters capable of speeds 'up to' 7Gigabits per second could be in stores by the end of this year. The Wireless Gigabit Alliance (WiGig), which seeks to advance the worldwide adoption and use of 60GHz wireless networking technology, has published a unified specification for its approach and opened an Adopter Program. The move means that WiGig members can now begin developing a Wi-Fi kit that uses the unlicensed 60GHz spectrum."
Will this "new, magical and unicorn-like" WiFi travel further? Far enough for municipal WiFi to effectively cover its citizens? If so then the increased coverage is more important than the speed improvement (even though the speed bump is might impressive).
At 60GHz you need line-of-sight to make a connection.. walls, buildings, trees, are all a signal killer; much more so than at 2.5/5 GHz. In general in a cluttered environment, your signal will propagate further with a longer wavelength (lower frequency, think AM/FM radio). So in short, no. It will not travel as far.
For line of sight point-to-point applications you can get very high gain from a 60GHz dish (same size dish as 2.5GHz is electrically much larger in wavelengths), though they will probably be more expensive with the tighter manufacturing tolerances required for the smaller feed parts.
So the higher the frequency of your signal, the more bandwidth you can get. Easy to understand why. However there is a tradeoff, and that is distance/penetration. Low frequency signals can travel extremely long distances, and penetrate through material well. The ultimate example is the sub communication systems like Seafarer. That system, operating at a 76Hz carrier, could penetrate the entire Earth and send signals to submerged subs anywhere, at a rate of about 3 characters per minute.
So as you go up, the opposite is true. Go up to the 100s of GHz and you can carry astounding amounts of data if you like, but you find that the air itself will attenuate your signal a whole lot, and forget about a wall or the like.
This is why there's competition for various ranges of the spectrum, like 700MHz. One range is not as good as any other. Were that the case, we'd have no problem as there is plenty of space up in the high GHz range. However it's not. Low frequency spectrum can be very useful for things.
At 60GHz, you are going to need line of sight pretty much. It might penetrate a bit of stuff, but you can forget about having an access point 5 rooms over that goes through a few walls.
For a point-to-point outdoor link it'd work ok, though it would be the kind of thing that would suffer from reduced data rate or a completely dropped signal in the rain and rain plays hell on signals that high frequency.
So I can see it for special cases, but the next WiFi it will not be.
You have an 802.11g router that's rated at 54 Gbps?
The cable company ran fibre down the next street last year. They're offering 50mpbs now (+ phone + video on demand, so there's enough headroom that they could easily offer 100mbps), and they'll keep upping it every few years, as demand (marketing) warrants.
Most homes have more than one computer nowadays. Moving files between them, or to / from your smartphone?
Also, since you finish transmitting the data quicker, you free up the channel for other users that much quicker.