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Wi-Fi Alliance Announces Start of WiGig Certification

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Julio Urquidi

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The Wi-Fi Alliance yesterday announced the launch of its Certification program for 60 GHz 802.11ad products. 802.11ad is a short range / in-room standard that marries Wi-Fi authentication and connection management technologies with significantly higher bandwidth provided by using 60 GHz frequencies. 802.11ad can provide raw data (link) rates up to 8 Gbps for distances up to 10 meters.

The Alliance listed the following products that make up the initial test bed for 802.11ad interoperability certification:
  • Dell Latitude E7450/70
  • Intel Tri-Band Wireless
  • Peraso 60GHz USB Adapter Reference Design Kit
  • Qualcomm Technologies 802.11ad Wi-Fi client and router solution (based on QCA9500 chipset)
  • Socionext 802.11ad Reference Adapter
The Alliance has great hopes for 802.11ad adoption, forecasting 180 million chipsets shipping in the smartphone market in 2017.

For more information, check out the Wi-Fi Alliance WiGig page.
 
I also saw a Lenovo Yoga product yesterday on their website that shipped with WiGig support. No idea who manufactures their client, probably a good chance it's Intel as Lenovo often uses Intel in their high-end products.
 
I also saw a Lenovo Yoga product yesterday on their website that shipped with WiGig support. No idea who manufactures their client, probably a good chance it's Intel as Lenovo often uses Intel in their high-end products.
Intel and QCA are the big 11ad chip vendors right now.
 
Based on driver availability on their support page, Lenovo uses an Intel 18260.

The product is the Thinkpad Yoga 260.
 
the main question of what are the benefits to the normal home wifi system as far as i know the 60 gig wifi doesnt have great coverage in the first place and the speed will be limited by normal giga ethernet and you will only get any benefit from 60gig with if ether streaming from something higher that a giga ethernet connected device or streaming between 60gig wifi clients

how i see it 60gig will have its place but in access points per space or room connected back to a switch higher that giga ethernet and streaming from a nas faster than giga ethernet

so it looks like the race to 60gig wifi may all leave us waiting for better backhaul to make it viable

i see samsung are promoting 60gig wifi as more a casting solution from one device to another

pete
 
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the main question of what are the benefits to the normal home wifi system
11ad is not a whole house connectivity solution. It is short range only.

I can see it helping normal house Wi-Fi by providing an alternate path for large file transfers and screen mirroring.

VR gaming is also a potential biggie.
 
hi tim

yup i can see its place but i think it should be our responsibility to make it clear to users that this is the case and for normal wifi use the x10 isnt anything better than the R7500
 
hi tim

yup i can see its place but i think it should be our responsibility to make it clear to users that this is the case and for normal wifi use the x10 isnt anything better than the R7500
I think I've made that clear in previous articles regarding 11ad, including the TP-Link Talon review.

I'll continue to do so, especially since the number on the box includes something that nothing to do with Wi-Fi performance.
 
11ad is not a whole house connectivity solution. It is short range only.

I can see it helping normal house Wi-Fi by providing an alternate path for large file transfers and screen mirroring.

VR gaming is also a potential biggie.

11ad cannot penetrate walls - in fact, a simple piece of paper can seriously impact the link - it's physics...

Tim's use cases above are pretty spot on with the intended use - note that 11ad should have extremely low latency compared to other 802.11 variants...
 
11ad cannot penetrate walls - in fact, a simple piece of paper can seriously impact the link - it's physics...

Tim's use cases above are pretty spot on with the intended use - note that 11ad should have extremely low latency compared to other 802.11 variants...

The more I look at it, the more it feels like a high performance Bluetooth alternative to me.
 
The more I look at it, the more it feels like a high performance Bluetooth alternative to me.

good point , which would mean you wouldnt necessarily need a router as part of that mix as the devices would communicate directly between them selves

i can also see case where ppl would have the router behinds a tv or the like and thats problematic for normal wifi , would cause 60gig to just not work
 
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Most of the use cases (not all) have been targeted at point to point direct connections... the VR goggles that Tim H. mentioned is one, another would be wireless HDMI or laptop docking station.

One interesting application could be the home media center, where 11ac is the bridge to an 11ad wireless hub, and then all the media center components just use 11ad, and route back as needed thru the 11ac link for content (either hosted locally on another machine or via the internet)

It's interesting tech, but it's not the same use case as 11ac...
 
It's interesting tech, but it's not the same use case as 11ac...


this tech might go the way or 3d tv , great selling point at the time but no one uses it so it became redundant and ppl are left with an expensive feature they dont use

certainly a case where the platform may be there but will the peripherals live up to the hype and develop into a usable product , guess only time and technology and user demand will tell

pete
 
this tech might go the way or 3d tv , great selling point at the time but no one uses it so it became redundant and ppl are left with an expensive feature they dont use

certainly a case where the platform may be there but will the peripherals live up to the hype and develop into a usable product , guess only time and technology and user demand will tell

pete

In many ways, it fulfills the promises that Wireless USB made, but was unable to follow thru on due to political issues within the 802.15 working group(s)...

Now they need to get the prices down to a reasonable level for 11ad chipsets, at present, they're pretty expensive due to the 60GHz frequency... but that'll come in time.
 
Sounds like super-bluetooth.
In a way, it is. 60 GHz has always been a point-to-point technology.
With 11ad, however, the connection process works just like Wi-Fi. AD networks appear in the same network connection app as Wi-Fi. You just choose, enter the passkey and connect.
 
I think WiGig holds a lot of promise. It is the missing link for ultraportables like the Macbook and Zenbook 3. Wireless connectivity and high speed file transfer will make having only one USB type C port much more tolerable.
 

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