ASUS Expands 11ax Lineup And Sets Ship Date

[RTN]

https://www.asus.com/Gaming-Networking/ROG-Rapture-GT-AX11000/

https://wikidevi.com/wiki/ASUS_GT-AX11000
https://wikidevi.com/wiki/ASUS_RT-AX95U
https://wikidevi.com/wiki/ASUS_RT-AX92

 

[Internet Man]

https://www.asus.com/Gaming-Networking/ROG-Rapture-GT-AX11000/

https://wikidevi.com/wiki/ASUS_GT-AX11000

Ugh, ASUS says it's a "1.8 GHz quad-core processor" in their specifications page. That would suggest Broadcom instead of Qualcomm. Then again, they also say "RJ45 for Gigabits BaseT for WAN x 1, RJ45 for Gigabits BaseT for LAN x 4" despite their press release saying it has LAN x 8.

 

[Odkrys]

I like upright stand design.. no more ?
All are high-end models.. no standard like ac68u..

 

[maxbraketorque]

All this is marketing hype until someone develops and sells some decent 3x3 or 4x4 usb 3 or laptop card ac wifi clients.

3x3 working fine in my MBP, so there is apparently good client hardware out there, but manufacturers are not biting. Does ASUS even put 3x3 or 4x4 in any of their laptops?

 

[thiggins]

I like upright stand design.. no more ?
All are high-end models.. no standard like ac68u..

8 antennas in a row on the top of the device would neither be visually attractive nor good for RF performance.

 

[thiggins]

3x3 working fine in my MBP, so there is apparently good client hardware out there, but manufacturers are not biting. Does ASUS even put 3x3 or 4x4 in any of their laptops?

I think he meant 11ax.

Three and four stream adapters have very limited application in this era of smartphones as primary devices. If you want that many streams, bridges or routers in bridge mode are more likely options.

 

[Easy Rhino]

What's a HND platform?

 

[RMerlin]

What's a HND platform?

Broadcom's platform used by these routers (and the recent 802.11ac as well such as the RT-AC86U).

 

[umarmung]

No rush for these devices. The consumer market is almost entirely dictated by the clients and only WPA3 will mark a generational shift.

Unfortunately, that may not mean much in the way of discounts for existing hardware till then.

AiMesh, especially with adaptation and reliability improvements, may give an initial lead to Asus though.

 

[Vexira]

I'm still waiting for the release date and pricing information as well as, Merlins verdict on unit support.

 

[hrana]

I'm still waiting for the release date and pricing information as well as, Merlins verdict on unit support.

Merlin’s support is the biggest factor for my needs. Regardless of the work ASUS does, knowing Merlin supports a router gives me hope that any firmware issues will be addressed. Secondly, it’s all about the client space right now. Smartphones and laptops with good and cheap mainstream 3x3 or 4x4 support is a pipe dream today, if for no other reason than cost and power usage. Thirdly, it also doesn’t help that at this point I need an AP line-of-sight in every room for the highest throughput (because I consume media locally on the network and conduct local backups unlike the average family that streams everything).

For what it is worth, based on clients, current average broadband speeds, and general use cases, I doubt these routers will catch on in any big way. Give us WPA3 across the pricing segments and we may see people start replacing their current hardware in large numbers.

 

[joegreat]

Remember - WiFi performance is primarily dictated by the Client, and the RF environment that the Client is it.

IEEE 802.11ax definition: (source Wikipedia)
Though the nominal data rate is just 37% higher than IEEE 802.11ac, the new amendment is expected to achieve a 4x increase to user throughput—due to more efficient spectrum utilization.
IEEE 802.11ax is due to be publicly released sometime in 2019. Devices were presented at CES 2018 that showed a top speed of 11 Gbps!

I wonder how this will play with all the old 802.11n and 802.11ac devices by utilizing the previous (unfinished?) MIMO and MU-MIMO standards?

Or do the router vendors expect us to buy all new devices for the ax standard?

 

[thiggins]

For what it is worth, based on clients, current average broadband speeds, and general use cases, I doubt these routers will catch on in any big way.

Wi-Fi makers will move to 11ax, as they did with 11ac and 11n before.

11ax is a CAPACITY technology, making airtime use more efficient. Enterprises need this because it will increase capacity per AP.

 

[thiggins]

I wonder how this will play with all the old 802.11n and 802.11ac devices by utilizing the previous (unfinished?) MIMO and MU-MIMO standards?

11ax works with 11ac and n devices. Probably also back to 11a and b. Vendors even say you'll see improvements using non 11ax STAs. I highly doubt that last point.

Remember, this is DRAFT standard technology right now. I don't even know if the Rev 3 draft passed its vote last month.

 

[RMerlin]

Vendors even say you'll see improvements using non 11ax STAs. I highly doubt that last point.

Didn't you observe improvements with 802.11n STAs when connecting to newer 802.11ac routers a while back? I remember you had an article on this very specific scenario.

If anything, I would expect the 802.11ax SoC to have more powerful processors (so they can handle higher throughput as well as WPA3), which might reduce latency. I would also expect the amp/filter to be of higher quality, to handle the wider bandwidth, and therefore improve noise tolerance/attenuation issues.

Whether this shows up in real life usage, outside of scientific measurements however, that remains to be seen.

 

[thiggins]

You're talking two standards back. I'm willing to be proven wrong. But only testing will tell.

BTW, not one vendor has said squat for WPA3 support. I find it hard to believe it won't be supported. But I've been surprised before.

WPA3 requires new hardware, which I hear chipmakers haven't fully baked yet. We'll see how many people are willing to spend $500 for DRAFT 11ax routers that don't support WPA3.

 

[RMerlin]

BTW, not one vendor has said squat for WPA3 support. I find it hard to believe it won't be supported. But I've been surprised before.

I guess it depends on their development timetable. If these 802.11ax SoC were developed before WPA3 was announced, then it might be too late to add the required logical blocks or beefing up the included CPU to handle these new ciphers.

Considering how quiet they are so far about WPA3 (aside from QCA mentionning the SD845 I believe), I'd be tempted to suspect that it means this first wave of 802.11ax chipset will NOT support WPA3 at launch time. Otherwise, marketing department would have jumped at the chance of adding another bullet point to their specs.

There's always a chance of a future SoC revision adding it (like Broadcom moving to a much better CPU between the BCM4366 and BCM4366E, in part to get working MU-MIMO), but that won't be of any help to people buying their 802.11ax routers this autumn.

WPA3 requires new hardware, which I hear chipmakers haven't fully baked yet. We'll see how many people are willing to spend $500 for DRAFT 11ax routers that don't support WPA3.

That is a very good argument there against rushing in for this wave of 802.11ax draft routers (on top of the draft nature of the wifi standard itself). One worth mentioning from now on to would-be early adopters. WPA3 will be a much more important technology than 802.11ax if home users want to "future proof" their investment.

 

[RMerlin]

Qualcomm's WCN3998 will support WPA3:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/02/23/80211ax_pre_standard_qualcomm/

Still haven't found any info on Broadcom however.

 

[thiggins]

Qualcomm's WCN3998 will support WPA3:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/02/23/80211ax_pre_standard_qualcomm/

Still haven't found any info on Broadcom however.

Thanks.

 

[iwod]

Remember, this is DRAFT standard technology right now. I don't even know if the Rev 3 draft passed its vote last month.

from may 2018 meeting notes

• The TG completed resolution of comments submitted on draft D2.0
• The TG passed a motion to enable the TG Editor to prepare draft D3.0 and start a 30-day WG letter Ballot.
• The TG approved the proposed PAR extension.
• The TG approved the Coexistence Assurance documents 11-18/1348r3.
• The agenda is available at: https://mentor.ieee.org/802.11/dcn/18/11-18-0635-10-00ax-tgax-may-2018-meeting-agenda.pptx