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Hardware

54 Mbps/100 Mbps Wireless LAN 177

Posted by CmdrTaco from the i've-got-no-strings-to-hold-me-down dept.
carbon60 writes: "Proxim seems to have very quietly released 802.11a based products. 54 Mbps in standard mode and 100 Mbps in "2X" mode. The main website lists the products." They're a little more expensive, and I dunno about Linux drivers, but still, that's some fast wireless action.
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54 Mbps/100 Mbps Wireless LAN More

54 Mbps/100 Mbps Wireless LAN

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  • Great range! (Score:3, Informative)

    by kevin42 ( 161303 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:23AM (#2435931)
    All of 20 feet is going to be real useful!

    Also, the 2x mode is proprietary so you won't be able to mix with other vendors cards.

    But it's a good start.
    • I think it has the potential of replacing wired networks, maybe with one access point per room.
    • Stimpy, you idiot! Actually, the range of these devices, if matched with similar power output and similarly sized antennas, will actually be greater than an 802.11b device. These proxim boxim are fully 802.11a compliant as well, so you never know when some interesting integration to Bluetooth devices.

    • Re:Great range! (Score:5, Informative)

      by RocketScientist ( 15198 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:50AM (#2436050)
      This uses a 5 Ghz piece of spectrum. The antennas can be smaller or have more gain for their size, which would enhance range. This would be great as a point-to-point link with highly directional, high gain antennas (like a 12 element yagi or something).
      • Generally speaking, the higher the frequency, the lower the traffic. The highest frequency services in wide-area local use are in the 2.7 GHz band (for Sprint's wireless broadband service), 1.9GHz (for digital cellphones) and around 1.8 GHz (for DBS/DSS services).

        The wavelength of a 5 GHz signal is a little less than half that of a 2.4 GHz signal; at the low power we're talking about for 802.11x signals (less than a tenth of a watt peak emitted power), a 2.4 antenna should work with a 5 source.

        It also means that it is more subject to physical interference, and that bullhorn antennas are now an option ;)

    • Re:Great range! (Score:5, Informative)

      by eggboard ( 315140 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @10:11AM (#2436143) Homepage
      Read the press release and post your comment, eh?

      802.11a runs up to about 150 feet indoors *at full speed* where 802.11b can run more like 300 feet. (These are just random numbers, of course, because internal obstacles like plaster coated chicken wire stops transmissions.)

      But 802.11a has a number of step down speeds: if it can't do 54 Mbps, it drops to the next, and so on. I believe it has 12 stepdowns to 802.11b's 4 (1, 2, 5.5, 11).

      This means that where 802.11b might be able to run at 1 Mbps at a few hundred feet from an access point, 802.11a could still be running at 12 Mbps.

      Further, when you get out into the open landscape and can do point-to-point, you can run miles and miles, just as with 802.11b. Or, with an access point mounted externally for a neighborhood or campus.

      And 802.11a uses the 5 GHz band, which is uncrowded and reserved, unlike 2.4 GHz (Bluetooth, HomeRF, cordless phone, microwave oven interference).
      • I personally use the 802.11b spectrum in my office along with many of my co-workers. That 300 foot range can be more then tripled by the many different optional and affordable antennae arleady offered by companies like Logitec. My only worries are security, but it seems like the new 802.11a protocol is facing those and is giving hope to the inevitable one day turn to a completely wireless internet world.

      • Re:Great range! (Score:4, Insightful)

        by kevin42 ( 161303 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @11:33AM (#2436558)
        Actually, no I didn't just read the press release and post my comments. I read the press release weeks ago when it came out, and I've actually got a few of these cards on order.

        Your point about stepping down is true, my point though is if you look at the speed/range on a chart you will see that the only way you will get that 100mbps throughput is at 20feet with no multipath. Even 11mbps 802.11 will drop down to 2mbps very quickly.
        So what's the point of worrying about 100+ megabit when you are actually only going to get a couple?
        Still, like I said it's a good start. As you said the band is clearer. This card is only meant for early adopters and enginering people really. It's a preview of what's coming.
    • I have personally run 802.11b on a single hop at 7mi with 2 yagies, and over 25mi on a dish (but i do have to admit it was on 100 ft tower). Allthough i have not tried it, I could probably get that easily with 802.11a. It is just a matter of the gain and your intended line of site.

  • Maximum range? (Score:1, Redundant)

    by drinkypoo ( 153816 )
    Anyone know about how much range it should be possible to get with a real antenna?

    • Re:Maximum range? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:49AM (#2436047)
      Acording to this article [80211-planet.com] on 80211 planet [80211-planet.com] You should be able to get 3x the speed at the same distance you get from an 802.11b card.
    • I had the fourth (or so) comment under this story, and the first one about range. How is this redundant?
  • Suffer the pain of running wire enough and the price doesn't seem so high.
  • Dammit! As soon as I finally buy a wireless solution for the house, this becomes available. I just (3 weeks ago) bought a Compaq Ipaq ConnectionPoint base and wireless PC card for my laptop. 802.11b. Oh well, it still kicks ass being able to sit upstairs where it's warm and surf, hack PHP, whatever. You'd be amazed at how much faster you can type when you're not shivering.

  • Question (Score:4, Funny)

    by British ( 51765 ) <british1500@gmail.com> on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:31AM (#2435966) Homepage Journal
    Does it work with NetStumbler?

    • NetStumbler (Score:5, Informative)

      by hoggoth ( 414195 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:53AM (#2436066) Journal
      I was about to ask 'Whut in da heck is NetStumbler' but instead I got off my butt and
      found out for myself: [pcmag.com]

      Network administrators deploying an 802.11b wireless network need site survey tools to help plan locations for access points. Once installed, the access points need to be checked periodically to ensure they are providing adequate coverage.

      Some wireless network cards provide reasonable survey tools, but the freeware Network Stumbler is far superior to most. The program captures signal strength and signal-to-noise statistics, but perhaps more important, it helps network administrators identify and locate rogue access points--those that employees may have installed without central IT's permission--as well as determine whether or not WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) is being used, to help prevent potential security breaches.

      • There's several cracks of it out and about. Combine it with NetStumbler or something similar and you've got a security issue- sweeps won't get you anywhere unless you're lucky enough to be doing the assessment when the SOB that's breaking into your net is there at the time. Unfortunately, almost everyone can't afford an audit of their net and those that can really pretty much can only afford it about once a month.

        This is not to say that 802.11(b) is not useful- far, far from it. This is analogous to having a car with or without airbags. Would you drive a car without airbags? Most people will say "sure" or at least "maybe" because a car's too useful in and of itself with or without that extra level of security. Same goes for 802.11(b).

    • Re:Question (Score:5, Informative)

      by sllort ( 442574 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @10:02AM (#2436111) Homepage Journal
      Does it work with NetStumbler?

      Yes. 801.11b and 802.11a are physical layer protocols. Toms hardware has more details [tomshardware.com], but basically they operate in different frequency bands but once you get to link layer the differences begin to dissolve. by the time you get to network layer, it's the same protocol. which means it has all the same security holes outlined by the recent paper on the subject [eyetap.org] and exploitable by airsnort [sourceforge.net].

      So yes, you can use NetStumbler to steal more bandwidth now. Whether or not someone will figure out how to solve the solved problem of mutual authentication for the wireless community remains to be seen.

  • I'm sure this is good for somebody (Score:5, Insightful)

    by vanguard ( 102038 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:32AM (#2435972)
    I'm sure this is good for somebody but my 11mb wireless lan is already 11 times faster than my net connection. Locally, I rarely every transfer large files between machines.

    It seems to be that good 'ol 802.11b is still the price/performance leader. And with a range of only 20 feet, I can't see much use for 802.11a in my house.

    Maybe when cards that support both 802.11a and 802.11b are cheap enough I'll start buying those. That's what it took for 100 mbs lans to take over, that's probably what it will take for 54 mbs wlan to take over the marketplace.
    • my 11mb wireless lan is already 11 times faster than my net connection


      While .11b systems have a theoretical line transmission rate of 11Mb/s, most implementations struggle to achieve 6Mb/s or so of network-layer throughput, e.g. see here [oreillynet.com] and here [signalground.com]. That's only a couple of times the capacity of a T1 line. Hopefully the .11a systems will increase the speed by several times yet again.



      Tim

      • I'm sure this is good for somebody but my 11mb wireless lan is already

      It's good for me, because I want an 802.11b LAN (ahem, technically a NAN, Neighbourhood Area Network...) and this will get the price down.

      At today's prices in the UK, it would cost me cost me £400/$600 to equip my home LAN with 802.11b (firewall, 2 desktops, 1 laptop), and it was even more back when I put in a wired LAN with 10/100 CAT-5 for £120/$180.

      I couldn't justify the extra £280/$420 to go wireless just on the geek chic factor, and now that I'm wired up, I'm even less inclined to throw away my CAT-5 and go wireless.

      Which is exactly the reason why 802.11a will drive down the prices of 802.11b. 802.11b manufacturers will have to persuade people that's it worth their while installing it now. If 802.11b prices don't drop to the point where it's a no brainer, IT departments (and nerds) will ask why they should pay 50% of the price for an "obsolescent" technology that only gives 10% of the bandwidth. OK, we know that 802.11b isn't actually obsolescent (I want it!) but that impression is going to be a factor from now on.

      So sure, I don't want or need 802.11a, but I'm really glad to see it finally make a commercial appearance.

    • It may not be a necessity for your slow internet connection, but at these speeds you'll be able to have things like wireless video servers and other fun things. You'll ultimately be able to carry your info/entertainment appliances around anywhere in your house and wirelessly access the equipment that serves them. I've had to crawl under my house many times to snake the various cables around down there, and it's a real pain. Particularly so when I reconfigure a room and now the wiring is in the wrong place. In the future, you'll just move the television, computer, or whatever to its new location, and there you are.

      As for range, this article [80211-planet.com] says, "We carried the workstation around our offices with some freedom within a range of 75 feet or so with no deterioration in quality until very substantial impediments (heavy concrete walls) interrupted the signal."

      A 75 ft distance would be more than enough for most homes, if the WAP were in the center.
  • You could use this as a GREAT way to transport internet to non-cabled places (or poorly cables places)
    Get a full 100Mb link (as a backbone) to a town and split it there to 1 or 2 Mbits... you could serve a lot of people that way!
    Would sure come in handy where I live!!
    • This is exactly what's happening in Naperville, IL. Yes, in the city in which Lucent's HQ is located, we have no good broadband connection (and the phone lines are bad too).

      A company called AccessBig [accessbig.com] is using Proxim's equipment (including the new 802.11a stuff) to do this. A couple of other companies in the area are using other (802.11b-only, as far as I know) systems. The backbone connections to AccessBIG are less than 100Mb, I believe, but should be more than adequate for the city (so far).

    • You live in an odd town. 20' from end-to-end. Could I suggest a 20' chunk of cat 5? Heck, swing by the office and I'll give you 30', then you can name a street in the town after me...
  • I've read the product page, but can't quite decode it. Does it also support 802.llb?

    • Re:802.11b (Score:2, Interesting)

      by morcheeba ( 260908 )
      It doesn't look like it does. The two sandards are on different bands (2.4G vs. 5 G), and the spec sheet says the radio only works in the 5.15 GHz to 5.35 GHz range. It'll be a while before the infrastructure is built up and will also be especially slow until dual-band base stations become available/cheap.
  • Superfast wireless is really cool, but the point is moot if you want to surf the web through these things. Most web content is accessible at 56K, right?

    Of course, if everyone had one, then we wouldn't need the physical net. Peace, Love, and Anarchy [wirelessanarchy.com]

    • They're CardBus, so you can't use a dusy ole 486 for a wireless gateway.

      • They're CardBus, so you can't use a dusy ole 486 for a wireless gateway.

        And why not? As long as the MB has a free PCI slot, that is.
    • I'm looking to set up a wireless network, and looking for fast wireless sloutions since space and placement of equipment is an issue.

      Most web content is available at a faster rate, AFAIK. Who would host a site on a dialup connection any more when broadband is relatively inexpensive now?
      • I meant that while sites are hosted on big fat machines with big fat connections, the speed to the user is generally slowed by network traffic, switching, routing, so forth.

        I think someone once said, "You _are_ the weakest link." Which kinda sums up how the internet works.

  • Linux drivers (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Snootch ( 453246 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:43AM (#2436023)
    Dunno about Linux drivers

    Well, Proxim did a good set of (albeit binary-only) drivers for Linux, which work swell under 2.4 or later - I should know, I'm using one right now :-)

    Seriously, I'd expect that Proxim will either release a driver for this soon, or it will be covered under existing ones.

  • Again old news... (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Mik!tAAt ( 217976 )
    How do I feel that this is already posted (perhaps here? [slashdot.org]) Oh well, must be one of those Deja vu-thingies, I guess.

  • Better names ( slightly off topic ) and Wi-Fi (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sien ( 35268 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:46AM (#2436033) Homepage
    Is anyone else out there sick of talking about 802.11b ( and 802.11a ) ?
    It talks way too long to say. It needs a better name. In an interesting section on the wireless internet [economist.com] at The Economist they suggest the name Wi-Fi, which stands for Wireless fidelity or some such silliness. How do people feel about this? Personally as silly as the definition seems to be it seems better than talking of 802.11b. Also, is anyone using this name ?

  • channel bonding? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by uslinux.net ( 152591 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:46AM (#2436036) Homepage
    Does anyone know what the channel seperation is on the 5 GHz band? On the 2.4 GHz band, you can combine channels 1, 6, and 11 (since they require 5 channels of seperation) with three wavelan adapters and a combiner/decombiner on each end of a point-to-point link. At 2.4 GHz, you can max out at 33 Mbps/sec by doing this - at 5 GHz, combining two channels would get you 108 Mbps - or more if there are more channels to work with.
  • $249 is not to bad (list) for a new offering like this

    in 3 months, it'll be $150 on pricewatch

  • Ahh, the wonders of physics. (Score:4, Informative)

    by kc0dby ( 522118 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:51AM (#2436056) Homepage
    In such a short time, we've gone from the days where 80m long radio waves were considered "shortwave" and anything over 100 Mhz was "unusable" to our new modern dreams of Multi Ghz signals and waves getting so short that we are tempted to measure them in millimeters. Lo! What brave new world is this?

    The great thing about really, really tiny waves is the antenna size. While nobody would want to venture the project of making a 24dbi parabolic dish for use with AM radio signals at 500kHz, $80 will get one to your doorstep ready for 2.4Ghz. Now that we are in the upper 5Ghz range, it will finally be feasible to build a mega-super dish where the actual radiated power is in the mega-super-ka-jigga-trilla-watt range. Maybe we could get rid of that whole line of sight problem with Moonbounce [nitehawk.com] communications. Of course the ping time would be seriously worse than the average satellite... The "big sattelite" is just a little outside of geosync orbit..
  • I'd assume (just based on the name) that 802.11a came out BEFORE b, Why did 802.11a NOT catch on and 802.11b did?

    Anyone?

    • Re:802.11b vs 802.11a (Score:4, Informative)

      by halfpuppy ( 201511 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:59AM (#2436093)
      802.11a was set as a standard, but, until now, no company has made it economical enough to produce the hardware. I don't think it will "catch on" until there's at least one more company making these cards, and driving down the price a bit.
    • Actually the specs for 802.11a and 802.11b where approved at the exact same time.

      Not sure why 11b got popular and 11a didn't.

      There were products in both the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz space back long before the 802.11? existed. Maybe
      the IEEE folks thought 5 GHz was going to take off first, and they just got it wrong. Or more likely, the 5 GHz working group got started before the 11 MB/S 2.4 GHz group.

      Kevin
      • Not sure why 11b got popular and 11a didn't.

        You are in luck...

        The reason is because there is some component overlap between 802.11b and Digital Cellular industry, so far as the radios go, so manufacturers could take advantage of economies of scale, and didn't have to develop any new technology. This allowed for more rapid deployment, and attractive pricing.

  • Home Networks Need Not Apply (Score:3, Informative)

    by bill.sheehan ( 93856 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @09:55AM (#2436078) Homepage
    This is not a product for the home LAN - the range is far too limited. You'd require some kind of repeater in every room.

    Fortunately, the main use for wireless in home LANs is to share Internet access. Since mine is capped at 1.5 Mbps, it doesn't matter that 802.11b only runs at roughly twice that. (I know it's rated at 11 Mbps, but true throughput is far less.)

    Digital video over wireless will just have to wait.

    Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball...

  • Products (Score:2, Interesting)

    by skrowl ( 100307 )
    Right now they're only offering the wireless access point and a cardbus card. If you don't have a PCMCIA slot or your laptop doesn't support cardbus, you're boned.

    I assume they'll bring out PCI cards any day now, but it's interesting to do a product launch w/o supporting desktop computers at all!

    This should be enough bandwidth to stream videos without jerks... imagine putting a computer with TV out in your living room and watching all of your ::ahem:: non-pirated / non-porn movies from your computer on your couch!
    • I've already seen companies that produce a CardBus card and then come out with a PCI solution....which is nothing more than a simple PCI-Cardbus bridge which you then plug their Cardbus card into. If Proxim doesn't bring one of these out on their own you should be able to find them around.

      When I used to work on PCMCIA products we used a lot of these in desktops for development/test as it was cheaper than buying laptops....not to mention a lot handier for debugging hardware - we ripped apart a couple of laptops so we could scope the bus, but we rarely got them back together right. :)
    • The PCI cards are always PCI to PCMCIA adapters. You can just pick up a nicely supported linux one off eBay that uses ISA and features two PCMCIA slots in an 3.5" drive slot for $24 + $8 shipping (or you could wait and bid on the other auctions but this guy is selling a couple hundred of them at that price buy it now so...). I'm waiting for mine to get here after failing to get the DWL-650 PCI to PCMCIA card to work (almost there, not quite). Here is the eBay link for more details:

      here [ebay.com]

      I have nothinhg to do with that auction besides having brought two of them. I'm not 100% positive they have linux support but I'm pretty sure they do... I'll be finding out later this week when they arrive.

      Downsides: ISA slot
      Upsides: ISA slot, two PCMCIA slots in an easy to access form of a 3.5" drive face (think pcmciacompact flash adapter for digital cameras - cheap at $10), should work just fine with linux.

      If anyone has any tips on the DWL-650 card please do share them! The /proc/pci information for the card is:
      "CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c475 (rev 128)."
      When I insert the Dell/Orinoco wireless adapter it shows up but the drivers don't seem to detect it in the PCI card..

  • Given similar power and antenna size, 802.11a range is about the same at 802.11b.

    Seems to me that this is going to do for the price of existing 802.11b hardware what 100Mbps hardware did to the price of existing 10Mbps hardware.

    This is great, because 802.11b is easily fast enough for most home broadband. The $19.99 802.11b card was already on the way, this will make it show up faster.
  • I had been digging on WLAN back when it was just the 2.4GHz option in sight.. The tweaks possible to 2.4GHz w/ directional antennae and what-not to link friends' homes and to possibly go into business in rural communities where DSL/cable aren't yet available were tasty prospects.

    Then 5GHz crept up on me a few months ago. I just somehow missed it.

    Now I'm just going to keep stringing CAT5 through my apartment when it's needed and wait for the wireless storm to pass and all prices to drop.

  • proxim and linux (Score:2, Informative)

    by andy_from_nc ( 472347 )
    I've been using a proxim wireless lan for quite some time albiet the 1.5mbps. I've been reasonably happy with the range and okay with the performance (who cares if you get >1.5 if you're just sharing cable internet). However, I must say the driver support is a weakness. The drivers are maintained by a third party whose site is not always up. Apparantly the guy had to pay for the privilege. (http://www.komacke.com/distribution.html). So while I'm happy with it for the cost and what it does (especially considering its > 2 years old), I think I'll be looking for more standard stuff when I upgrade.

    As for range on this: I can go upstairs but it only works on half of the upstairs. I can generally travel downstairs anywhere I want. The laptop version has a shorter range unless you replace the silly nub antenna.
    I still thing wireless has a bit of a ways to go (especially the cheap stuff) mostly in the area of range and price before it replaces good ol wire.

  • RoamAbout, Linux (Score:3, Informative)

    by InfluxSoft ( 528767 ) <(gro.tfoSxulfni) (ta) (todhsals)> on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @10:16AM (#2436166) Homepage
    I believe Enterasys Networks (formerly Cabletron Systems) RoamAbout R2 Wireless was the first wireless access platform that offered 54 Megabits per second (Mbps) performance based on the 802.11a standard (w/advanced Layer 3-4 capabilities)
    http://www.enterasys.com/roamabout/

    And yes support for linux is there...
    I've seen demo's with a Compaq IPAQ running Linux using these wireless cards
  • Sounds like nothing more than a power-guzzling alternative to Bluetooth, which is a nice way of saying "worthless".
    Range and security are what people want.
  • With such a short range, a VERY limited product line (where is the desktop hardware?!), and a 2x mode that is proprietary, is anyone really going to jump on these just yet?

    I know I'm certainly not switching--this just isn't good enough to replace Cat5 yet. Plus the price is too high and the range is too low to attract consumers away from 802.11b. I'm going to hold off until there is a much larger selection of products by more than one company before I even think about 802.11a.
  • At some point in the very near future, the wireless capabilites will outstrip the wired capabilites. Right now, the fastest single hard connection to a computer that I'm aware of is Gigabit Ethernet.
    • I know, it's redundant and a bit off topic, but it's so fun to talk aobut it.
      The 10 gig ethernet standard will be finalized in a few months. It's fiber only, no copper. There are some products already available. Broadcom's website says they have an 8 port switch that's currently available for around $2000 per port.
      What I want to know is that if this Broadcom switch has eight ports at 10Gb each, does that mean it can take an 80Gb fiber and distribute it into 8 10Gb streams? Or is it that each port is a 1Gbps stream and the whole switch can handle 8Gbps?
      If it's the former, wow! Managing such oceans of bandwidth for the price of a mid range automobile. You could set up quite a promiscuous wireless network with a feed like that eh? Hosin' down the whole city with bandwidth. Let's see, how many 1Mbps streams can you cut 80Gbps into? Or perhaps more importantly, how much can you get bandwidth for at such wholesale volumes?

  • Intel Wireless. (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Intel also is releasing an 802.11a product. Details at www.intel.com
  • > Experience 100 Mbps wireless networking in your
    > conference room, classroom, or office

    Why do they show a model lying on a couch with a wireless laptop?

    While engineers pummel the hell out of the wireless handheld market trying to save their jobs their marketing has become a bit paranoid.

  • Just in time... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Spamlent Green ( 461276 ) on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @11:02AM (#2436392) Journal
    ... now that I've finished wiring my house -- convincing myself all the while that all my effort was worth the extra bandwidth...

    Well, at least now I have a whole new relationship with my attic and with the spiders in the cellar that wireless would have never permitted.

  • Range Information (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Perhaps the Proxim press release is a bit unclear on the range issue. The 802.11a products can step down to several lower speeds to tradeoff range versus bandwidth. The result is comparable range to 802.11b, but higher bandwidth.

    There's a good paper discussing this issue in technical detail here [atheros.com].

    (The Proxim product, as mentioned in the press release, is based on the Atheros chipset).

    Second, 802.11a has more channels available than 802.11b. That means that there's less chance that nearby networks (at your neighbor's house, for example) will interfere with your network (when nearby networks use the same channel, each sees reduced bandwidth).

  • Does a higher frequency have any effect on the fresnel zone? I'm surrounded by similar hight buildings that currently block effective point-to-point for me. If I could get a rise of 2 more meters, I could make it to where I want to get to now w/ 802.11b .3 miles away. I buy this in a second if it fixed my problem.
  • I have been looking forward to the nokia rooftop
    router because it allows non line of sight installation as part of a multipoint meshed
    wireless design. (Too costly though) ;-(

    After taking a quick look, it now seems as though both proxim and enterasys products do the same.
    Does anyone know if there are 802.11b access points that do this as well?

    Once 11a products flood the market, it should make the 11b access points become dirt cheap and
    if they have multipoint routing, we could see community wireless nets become a reality.....

  • Radiation levels? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by djelovic ( 322078 )
    What are the radiation levels of 802.11a and 802.11b compared to common household appliances?

    I use my laptop 10 hours per day and I'm not sure I want my brain bombarded with energy all that time.

    Dejan
    www.jelovic.com [jelovic.com]
    • According to an article at onlamp [onlamp.com]:
      802.11b transmits at 2.4 GHz, the same spectrum as microwave ovens. The cards use less power than a mobile phone.
      Cisco warns that their PCMCIA card should be more than 2 inches from your body, and the access point's antenna should be at least 6 inches away from anyone. I hold my laptop on my lap. (That is where the name came from, after all.) If I get cancer on top of my right thigh, I know who to blame.
  • I thought 802.11a was the 2/1M one, and .11b was the 11/5.5/2/1M one... where'd this 55M stuff come from?

  • Can these things step down to 802.11b? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by trcooper ( 18794 ) <coop@@@redout...org> on Tuesday October 16, 2001 @02:27PM (#2437498) Homepage
    The thing I'm interested in is whether these can step down and work with existing 802.11b hardware, similar to what 100bt cards do on a 10bt network.

    I'd guess no, and that will hurt things somewhat. 802.11b has a reasonable home following, and I don't see a lot of users upgrading their home networks to 'a', because they don't need the additional bandwidth in most cases. (If I want video, it's probably going to be on a stationary device I can run a cable to). A lot of corps may implement 'b' because of the extra range and bandwidth, so your laptop would need two cards in it... which would suck.
  • What we have here is an ethernet card (essentialy) that is not compatible what so ever with any other ethernet card in the world. Its nice to see some speed increases comming out of the wireless industry, However the use of FULL spectrum cards sickens me. about the time u run ur microwave or use ur spiffy new 2.4 ghz cordless anywhere near it, u start getting tons of interfearance. I would recommend sticking with lynksys if u want a cheap solution, (altho its DSSS for home use) however if u want somthing that u and 10 of your freinds can use in the same room at the same time without interferance issues, id go get a FHSS card, like breezecoms.
  • Who has them for sale? I tried the first three reseller links on Proxim's web page and none of them had 802.11a stuff listed. Or rather no one has Proxim's 802.11a stuff. Several people have Intel's.
    CDW [cdw.com]
    Insight [insight.com]
  • If they use the Intsil (sp?) PRISM chipset or something compatible enough, perhaps the drivers from the Linux WLAN project [linux-wlan.com] may work.

    If not, I bet Mark's planning to make 'em work.

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