Buy Draft 11n!

Normally, so much sarcasm in one article would destroy my brain, but your article was right on the money. I felt like I wrote it myself!

I'm trying to figure out how you got this article written. I tried to imagine you typing it yourself, but just don't think it would be possible with your thumb so firmly pressed against your nose and all your fingers wiggling. So maybe you dictated it, but who could possibly understand you with your tongue so firmly planted in your cheek?

Finally, I decided the article must have written itself.
:roll:

I just feel sorry for all those Americans who don't seem to understand sarcasm as well as those of us from on the other side of the Pacific or Atlantic...

("but this stuff doesn't work! the guy at that website told me to buy it!"     )

I sincerely hope it was sarcasm. I almost lost my lunch reading this. The idea of buying a home network that isn't based on any standard is ridiculous. Not because you'll have to buy every piece of equipment on that network to match the "Pre-N" mess you choose, but you'll never be able to use that new receiver that works on the 11.n standard (with out spending more money). If you have a few hundred bucks to waste on a "Pre-N" router and NIC cards go for it. I'll hang with 11.g until 11.n rolls out, because I'd rather invest the money I save on humor lessons. Maybe that way I'd enjoy articles like this in the future.

If you've gotta have the 11n speed ASAP and you're not concerned about your network's ability to operate with or in the vicinity of older wireless networks, or the ability to buy a replacement NIC/router in the future, then by all means go for it. I guess it depends on your personal needs and how much you want to risk...and wether or not you want to support the idea of "draft" hardware.

And c'mon, 1Freak, don't insult the (imo) brilliant use of sarcasm and wit in this piece. Sarcasm may be (in general) overused nowadays, but Tim wrote a good one here.

Thanks for the comments guys. One key issue that didn't make it into the article is the industry's continuing insistence that video streaming will work in the 2.4GHz band because more bandwidth will solve all interference problems.

Unlike 11b and 11g, the 11n standard doesn't specify a frequency range. This means that 11n products could be dual-band (2.4 and 5GHz), and in my opinion, should be.

Manfs made a half-hearted attempt a year or so ago with resurrecting dual-band wireless, but it was quickly abandoned to hop on the MIMO train.

Whenever I raise this point with wireless chip makers, they say they're making what their customers want. When I ask the wireless product manfs, they say the same thing. I always tell them that since they constantly tell consumers that 11g does everything, they're just hearing back their own echo.

Exactly...they're making what the average person will buy, not necessarily what they want (even though they might not know what they want or what's good for them).

Wireless chip makers like Broadcom are probably more concerned with their stock prices lately than bothering to make the best product possible. Probably good news for stockholders, but consumers lose overall.

Ah, this article was not serious. For a minute there I thought Tim has been drinking the Wi-Fi Kool-Aid.

Remember...

The early bird gets the worm, but it's the second mouse that gets the cheese.

WHAT A JOKE!

Why buy technology likely to change in one year? It hasn't even been approved yet! Waste of money! Now you'll probably convince a bunch of people who nothing about anything to get it. Wonderful. Sorriest advice I have ever heard.

Ah the dangers of using sarcasm. Some don't notice, and they think you've lost it.

My concern is:
pre-N DigiTimes


Now, my laptop has 11.g and I don't plan on throwing that out any-time soon... For desktops, I could always replace NICs which tend to be far cheaper than laptops...

I suppose I could get a add-on card for laptop but I hate those... or upgrade internal wirless card... but that is annoying too...

However annoying and painful standards may be, they are still very important .

Ah the dangers of using sarcasm. Some don't notice, and they think you've lost it.

I have to admit, I didn't really read the article just the title.

So yeah, I thought he lost it.
 

i reckon it all depends on what you want your wireless network to do.
Who even needs 11n is what i'm wondering.
if you want to share an internet connection, you may as well buy 11b, unless you want to share it with more than 10 people at once (even then, that averages 1Mb/s, more than enough for any normal use).
If you want to transfer large files around your own computers, i'd keep that to the security of a wired network (and still, 100Mb ethernet beats 11g, and Gigabit beats anything 11n could give)
Streaming video? why bother? it'd be a lot easier to copy from your fileserver to your local HTPC before you watch it, rather than risk the signal cutting out halfway through a movie.
at any rate, the cost of buying access poins etc far outweighs the $1/m for cat5e, unless you want to run a network the size of a uni.

the only conceivable place that could justify a fast wireless network, in my view, is some guy on a farm who wants to watch HD videos on a tractor while ploughing a field.

(although, there could be people who want to buy 11n just to jam their neighbours' networks...)

I guess we will all need wide-screen monitors on our tractors to go with
those in our cars then!

Having come through school as a EE and being a network engineer, I
have to say that I completely agree with what Tim and DrCroubie have
said. And yes, sarcasm is a good thing - it just has to be recognized as
such.

In the big scheme of things, everything is consumerism! You know, you
need to purchase this product because it will give you the biggest,
bestest, shiniest newest capabilites and make you the first and baddest on
your block! They are just playing to what has been beaten into us from
our first days in grade school... Of course, it is even worse when
someone actually believes everything that the talking heads/salespeople
actually say and they have to have it for their very own. When was the
last time anyone ever believed what a salesman said?

Ok, the rant bit has been reset....

Wireless is a good thing, but it is not the be-all end-all. It does have its
purposes and uses - but it can't do everything. Remember, you always
have to ask yourself "what do I want to do", then find how to do it
(hopefully) correctly. That said, you have to look at what you really want
to do, and how you want to do it. There is a place for wireless - it just
can't do everything that everyone wants it to (or at least not yet).

I have worked as a network engineer all my professional life, and was
lucky enough to be there at the start of the spread of the internet and
networkinging (anyone remember Bitnet?). Should we use standards? You
bet. After all, that is what has made many of the things we take for
granted interoperate correctly. Too bad we can't do something to the
companies that produce the pre-standards gear (besides not purchasing
their product).

As it is, I can access my home network from my neighbor's back yard
even with my power turned down and 1mb/2mb turned off. I can also see
many wireless networks, including two up the street from me that have 10
and 12 associated users (of course, those are the ones that are wide-open).

Just remember that your internet connection is probably the slowest part
of your network anyway! Either that, or your -11n AP is allowing all your
neighbors to download faster via your internet connection!

case in point, look at my rig below. it does what i want it to (yes that includes games too, good ones like Unreal, Blood2, HalfLife, Alpha Centauri, C&C, Warcraft2, and, my favourite, TuxRacer).

Also, i've got ADSL2+. I'm so far from the exchange i'm only getting 4500/1000, instead of the max 24000/1000. I've got bittorent open most of the time, plus general webbrowsing, aMSN, etc, and i still barely use 2000kbit/s in a peak load. I could share this with 11b easily, don't even need 11g, let alone 11n.

consider this, for a minute. who was Gigabit? who uses it (regularly, for 100MB or bigger file transfers)? Now who thinks they'll actually need more than 50 or 100Mbit for more than a combined hour per year?

Enjoyed the sarcasm  

But really, what difference does it make when all it takes is a firmware upgrade to make the wireless AP and NICs conform to the final 11n standard.

I only see one real problem and that is interfering with neighbors wireless.

But personally, I'll stick with my Gigabit home network that cost me $70 for a 5 port giga switch and the wires that i bought over a year ago that work just fine at giga speeds (all my motherboards have gigabit nics built in)

The issue here is to look at the difference between what manufacturers say and the policies they set. Not ONE manufacturer is willing to guarantee that any stuff they're pushing out to the market new will be upgradable or even interoperable with the final 802.11n standard.

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/01/31/no_guarantees_for_11n...

Does wireless N offer better environmental penetration?
In SA we use a lot of steel and build houses with bricks and mortar, with a 8.5 dbi outdoor antenna I can’t even get proper coverage in my garage 20 Meter away from my ANT24-0801 D-LINK 8.5dBi Gain Outdoor Antenna

No. The current products all use the 2.4GHz band, just as 802.11b and g
products do.