The pair are among scores of chipset makers releasing wireless gear based on the draft 802.11n standard, despite the IEEE recently delaying ratification of the standard, effectively to 2008 or so.
The standard, though important, is somewhat diminished with respect to the end game it is trying to achieve, said, Mike Hurlston, VP and general manager of WLAN at Broadcom. We already have interoperability today, so I’m not that concerned about when the actual standard ends up occurring.
The promise of 802.11n is faster wireless broadband speeds than existing 802.11g technology. The newest flavor of WiFi uses MIMO, or multiple-in, multiple-out, technology, which enables chips to use more than antenna to handle multiple data signals at once.
The concern is that with a slew of products based on a draft spec is making it to market and they may not be able to talk with each other. Once the standard is ratified, there may be chaos if these draft products don’t comply.
A slew of wireless gear, including routers, mini cards in notebooks and WiFi access cards have already made it to market. Research house InStat recently forecast about 20% of WiFi chipsets shipped next year would be based on draft n.
Irvine, California-based Broadcom is among several vendors whose draft n products have been interoperability tested by the nonprofit group WiFi Alliance. Atheros and Broadcom publicly announced interoperability testing, and Broadcom said it has tested with several others, but declined to name them. The WiFi Alliance also is not naming the companies it is testing for draft n interoperability.
Director of marketing Mark Hung said Santa Clara, California-Atheros continues to test with other vendors. I think so far all the industry players see the benefits of interoperable products, Hung said. I would have to say it’s been a pretty cooperative environment so far.
Besides, the companies said they did not expect any major changes to the final spec.
I think there’s so much market momentum now that we’re going to be dealing with very minor changes with the specification between now and 2008, Hurlston said, based on the assumption the standard does indeed get ratified in 2008.
He also noted the Enhanced Wireless Consortium already had hashed out the major differences between vendors’ various draft n technologies. It means the major WiFi silicon makers already had been forced to compromise on what the 802.11n will and won’t contain, he said.
The current draft n contained most of the major items of give and take between the technology companies, Hurlston said. I would say the major compromises, the major issues between the various companies have already been hammered out.
Between now and when the standard is eventually ratified, we’re really dealing with minor, sort of administrative issues, he added.
There are, however, 12,000 proposed amendments to the existing draft spec. Atheros’ Hung admitted there was a certain level of risk in vendors’ strategy to get draft n product to market, but added this type of risk was not unusual in the industry.
Hung also noted that changes to the final spec required a 75% approval vote by the IEEE’s working group. At the most recent IEEE meeting, new proposed technical changes received just a 35% or so approval vote, he said. We’re confident that our products will be interoperable in the future, he said.
Both vendors also have invested in additional flexibility in their draft n products, so they can be upgraded should the final standard be technically tweaked. Broadcom’s Hurlston said it had added extra engineering time and area on the silicon to allow for this additional programmability. This extra effort certainly didn’t come for free, but he declined to quantify the expense.
Hung said only really major changes [in the final spec] will make it impossible for us to be fully complaint later on.
If there are minor changes in the final spec, users of draft n gear would be able to upgrade their products to comply via downloadable firmware from vendors’ websites, Hung said.
While it may be argued that silicon makers have rushed their products to market ahead of the final 802.11n spec, the vendors counter they are not necessarily early, but rather the IEEE is late.
Already, it has been four years since 802.11g was ratified, which is beyond the average two- to three-year product lifecycle typical in technology.
Hung pointed out it takes at least 18 months to develop a new chip, and the industry already had invested in engineering capability for 802.11n with the original expectation it would be ratified this year.
Hurlston also said existing 802.11g-based WiFi had become fairly commoditized and the ability for vendors to differentiate their end products was somewhat limited. Everybody thought there was an opportunity with 802.n to differentiate, to offer a higher price point, to breath new life into the wireless market, he said.
Indeed, the price tag of draft n gear sometimes triples that of their 802.11g counterparts.
The vendors also agreed that, despite their decision to launch product ahead of an IEEE spec, the IEEE remained an important force in the industry. I sill think that IEEE is extremely relevant, Hurlston said. To discount the IEEE is wrong. And I hope that the public at large doesn’t take away from this activity that this is an outcropping, although I can see why you would ask that question.
Broadcom’s draft n chipsets currently can be found in mini cards embedded into notebooks from Acer and Dell, as well as routers and adapter cards from Linksys, Buffalo and Netgear. During the next year and a half, Hurlston said Broadcom expects to announce at least three or four new notebook customers for its draft n silicon, as well as a few new adapter card customers.
Atheros also has announced Dlink, Belkin, Linksys, Trendnet and others as its draft n gear customers. During the second half of this year, the company also expects to announce more networking customers, as well as PC customers that will bring notebooks to market with Atheros draft n chipsets, Hung said.
