Sniff Wi-Fi

With 6 GHz Wi-Fi around the corner in the form of Wi-Fi 6E, upgrading to Wi-Fi 6 becomes a risky proposition. It was just over a year ago that your humble blogger heard the "news" about Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax). The Samsung Galaxy 10 was on the market. It supports Wi-Fi 6. Our sales engineers were happy to inform us of the upgrade possibilities. Today's news is about a new technology, Wi-Fi 6E. It offers access to the 6 GHz frequency band, which is great. It is not available as a software upgrade from Wi-Fi 6 (as your humble blogger discovered recently ), which is not so great. "Future proofing" has always been elusive. As we are all experiencing right now, nothing can protect an organization from the whims of nature (human or otherwise). I wasn't saying "wait for 802.11n" in 2005 or "wait for 802.11ac" in 2011. If budget, manpower and leadership align, go for it. The reason your humble blogger says "wait for Wi-Fi 6E" today...

Two years ago tomorrow Apple introduced the iPhone 5.  It was a big deal.  It was a big deal for gadget folks who wanted a bigger iPhone.  It was a big deal for wireless LAN folks who wanted users to use smartphones with speedier WiFi.   Now the iPhone 6 has been announced and it appears to be more of the same.  Gadgeteers get their bigger iPhone.  Wireless folks get their faster speeds.  Problem is, the faster wireless speeds likely won't mean anything for high capacity wireless deployments. The big news about the iPhone 6 is 802.11ac.  Yippee!  Apple has finally adopted the latest and greatest WiFi standard in a mobile device. 802.11ac has data rates as high as 6.9 Gbps in the standard, but wireless LAN folks know that's not what happens in real life.  Real 802.11ac devices top out at a 1.3 Gbps data rate when multiple input-multiple output (MIMO) antenna systems are supported, while non-...