Buffalo Ships Pre-Standard 802.11n WLAN Gear

from IDG News Service

Faster wireless LAN equipment based on the draft of a new standard came out of the chute Thursday from Buffalo Technology (USA).

The company announced a combination router and access point, a PC Card adapter for notebooks and a PCI adapter for desktops. The router and the PC Card client are on sale now and the PCI component will be available next month, the company said in a statement.

The products are based on Draft 1.0 of the IEEE 802.11n standard, which boosts the real throughput of WLANs beyond the 100Mbps speed of the typical wired Ethernet connections to a PC. The standard, which includes the use of multiple antennas, also is designed to increase range and connection stability. The draft version of the 802.11n was approved in January, but a final standard is not expected until next year.

Networking vendors typically release pre-standard gear as a specification takes shape. Sometimes these products can be upgraded later via software to meet the standard and interoperate with other vendors’ equipment, but changes can take place throughout the standards process. The Wi-Fi Alliance, which puts the Wi-Fi label on WLAN products, doesn’t certify them for a new standard until it is complete.

Buffalo, an Austin, Texas, unit of Japan’s Buffalo Inc., is a relatively small player in the U.S. consumer WLAN business, according to analyst Greg Collins of Dell’Oro Group. Netgear, a bigger competitor, has also announced draft 802.11n gear, and other vendors including Cisco’s Linksys division will probably follow suit soon, he said. Consumers who buy both a draft 802.11n access point and a client from the same vendor now should get much better speed and range than with existing products, Collins said, but he cautioned that they are likely to see prices fall by 10% to 20% by year’s end.

Buffalo’s products can deliver as much as 300Mbps of throughput, the company said. The increased speed and stability make the gear well suited to VoIP and high-definition video, Buffalo said. All the products are backward compatible with the 802.11b/g standards, so they can be used in mixed networks with older equipment, according to the company.

The AirStation Nfiniti Wireless Router and AP (access point) features an integrated four-port 10/100Mbps Ethernet switch and can be used as either a router or an access point, according to Buffalo. It also can be used as a bridge or repeater to extend a WLAN and features a connector for an external antenna to increase signal strength.

The AirStation Nfiniti Wireless Notebook Adapter, designed for PC Card slots in notebook PCs, and the AirStation Nfiniti Wireless PCI Adapter for desktop PCs, also include external antenna connectors. All the products support both the WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) and WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) security standards, according to Buffalo.

The router/access point and notebook adapter are on sale now from http://www.pcconnection.com, with estimated street prices of $179 and $129, respectively, the company said. The PCI adapter also has an estimated price of $129.