802.11n Cannot Soon Be the New Generation Wi-Fi Standard

Draft 1.0 of the 802.11n standard has failed to secure the necessary 75% approval from the IEEE organization to advance to the final standard. This failure has sparked significant controversy as many companies have already begun selling products based on the specifications of Draft 1.0.

The 802.11n project was approved by the Joint Proposal (JP) alliance and became the draft standard of IEEE at the beginning of the year. The 802.11n standard, which is expected to be officially recognized by the end of 2006, promises a data transmission speed of 100 Mb/s, significantly faster than the current 802.11g technology.

However, this latest development further underscores the warning from experts that consumers and businesses should wait until the final specifications are completed before purchasing products that support 802.11n.

“The standardization process is still lengthy and there will be many significant changes. No one can predict what the final version will look like,” asserted Craig Mathias, an analyst with the wireless organization Farpoint (USA). Farpoint recently conducted tests and found that the performance and compatibility of Draft 1.0 did not match the advertised claims.

Broadcom, which currently supplies chips based on Draft 1.0 to wireless router manufacturers Netgear and Linksys, has disputed these results. They also believe that the 802.11n draft will not differ much from the official standard, as any major changes can only be made after securing at least 75% approval from IEEE members.

T.N.