News "Wi-Fi 7 Stomps on the Gas"

[AntonK]

Wi-Fi 7 Stomps on the Gas At 40 gigabits per second, it’ll be four times as fast as Wi-Fi 6

“Wi-Fi 6 already reaches a level of performance that exceeds the Internet service available to most people. Yet the standard isn’t letting off the gas. MediaTek plans the first demonstration of Wi-Fi 7 at CES 2022 (the standard is expected to be released in 2024). Wi-Fi 7 is expected to boost maximum bandwidth up to 40 gigabits per second, four times as fast as Wi-Fi 6. Such extreme bandwidth is obviously overkill for Web browsing, but it’s a necessity for streaming augmented- and virtual-reality content. This rapid improvement stands in contrast to the struggles in cellular networking. In theory, 5G can meet or beat the performance of Wi-Fi; Qualcomm claims its latest hardware can hit peak data rates of 20 Gb/s. But the reality often falls short.”

Interesting!

Anton

 

[torstein]

Alright, I’m gonna start saving for the Asus BE86U then… and all the other stuff i need to take advantage of wifi7.

i wonder how fast the speeds will be in practice outside the lab.

whats your guesses? 1/2 of claimed speeds?

 

[Tech Junky]

whats your guesses? 1/2 of claimed speeds?

Considering I have a WIFI6 AP / AX210 adapter and squeeze 1.5gbps out of it with a link rate of 2400mbps I would say 50% "might" happen.

A lot of the speed claims run into another issue and that's the physical ports. I don't care if your device pushes 6gbps and only has a 1gbps port on it since it will max out at 1gbps. Similarly other devices such as cable modems claiming the same and only having a 2.5GE port on them to connect to your LAN.

In a DC setting there are 40GE ports via SFP the rate of adoption on consumer devices still being stuck at significantly lower speeds dictates the overall speed you can achieve. Going outside of the box and building your own router though can break the glass ceiling if you want to opt for higher speed ports on a NIC. I run 5GE on mine for the simple fact the NAS Raid goes at 400MB/s which is just under 5GE.

If you throw enough money at tech you can achieve your goals.

 

[IAAI]

Alright, I’m gonna start saving for the Asus BE86U then… and all the other stuff i need to take advantage of wifi7.

i wonder how fast the speeds will be in practice outside the lab.

whats your guesses? 1/2 of claimed speeds?

you are optimistic

 

[L&LD]

MediaTek Gives World's First Wi-Fi 7 Demo, Touts 2023 Market Arrival (screenrant.com)

I don't know what the absolute WiFi 7 speeds will be, but I can get much more than 1/2 of expected speeds today with WiFi 6 and Intel AX210 equipped clients.

Combined with the lower latency WiFi 7 offers, it will be an obvious jump not just for WiFi 6/6E connections today, but also from anything lower too.

If I were to bet, I'd guess in the 80% range of the connection speed (specs, unseen).

 

[Tech9]

Interesting!

"Wi-Fi 7 is expected to boost maximum bandwidth up to 40 gigabits per second, four times as fast as Wi-Fi 6."

10Gbps Wi-Fi 6 is more interesting for me. Where is it?

 

[L&LD]

What Is Wi-Fi 6? - Intel

When 40Gbps WiFi 7 is even theoretically available to buy, 10Gbps theoretical is not interesting at all.

Next year, even WiFi 6E will be old.

 

[Tech9]

Most current Wi-Fi 6 devices are 2-stream with max link rate of 1200Mbps. They can't reach even Gigabit throughput. This is what Wi-Fi 6 is for most users. Theoretical maximums are used by router manufacturers for marketing purposes. Wi-Fi 6 is around from 2019. What we have available today as clients? A laptop and 2 phones. Wireless backhaul is still the main Wi-Fi 6 advantage.

 

[Tech Junky]

Most current Wi-Fi 6 devices are 2-stream with max link rate of 1200Mbps.

Agreed / also since they tend to have 1GE ports on them you're going to run into a bottleneck

Theoretical maximums are used by router manufacturers for marketing purposes.

Always the case when people are shopping looking for the biggest numbers when not taking into account the physical port speed being 1GE or now more prevalent 2.5GE.

Wireless backhaul is still the main Wi-Fi 6 advantage.

Meh, it's more about how the signals / traffic are sorted and moved across the data planes. Backhaul is more geared towards "nodes" than STA's.

---------------------------
In general though what is most restrictive by consumer grade systems is a 2x2 antenna layout.

When moving outside of consumer grade equipment you hit 4x4 antenna layouts and thus handle traffic better.

To the more extreme end you have 8x8 systems as well meant for dense environments with a ton of clients connected at the same time.

What do 1x1, 2x2, 3x3, 4x4, etc., mean in MU-MIMO technology?​

These figures indicate the number of antennas in a wireless AP, router or endpoint and thus the number of simultaneous spatial streams it can support. A Wi-Fi 5 Wave 2 AP might bear a 4x4 label, for example, indicating it has a four-antenna configuration -- with four transmitters and four receivers -- and can support four concurrent spatial streams. A 2x2 smartphone has two antennas, while a 1x1 device has just one. A Wi-Fi 6 AP has up to eight transmitting and receiving antennas (8x8), enabling it to simultaneously transmit to eight 1x1 clients, four 2x2 clients, two 4x4 clients, etc.

5 things to know about MU-MIMO technology in Wi-Fi networks | TechTarget

Wi-Fi's MU-MIMO technology plays an important role in high-efficiency wireless networking, enabling a single access point to connect with multiple client devices at once. Learn the difference between MIMO vs. MU-MIMO, MU-MIMO vs. SU-MIMO and more.

www.techtarget.com

10 limitations of MU-MIMO in Wi-Fi

It’s a big breakthrough in wireless connectivity, but don’t let MU-MIMO’s limitations catch you off guard. Here are 10 ways to get up to speed on MU-MIMO Wi-Fi.

www.networkworld.com

In my case I'm using a business type AP to server WIFI and LR's hit 2400mbps but, throughput is limited by the adapter hitting ~1.5gbps over the LAN. Phone tops out with a LR of 1200.

The limiting factors at this point for 802.11ax/e are the adapters / AP's. In the case of adapters everything I come across has an AX200 / AX210 and gets marketed under different sellers / packaging and missing from the market are Qualcomm / Realtek based options for some reason even a year plus into the release. On the HW side with AP's there's still only a handful of options for 6 let alone 6E unless you want to spend a ton of cash on them. There are some AP''s on the edge of release though in the near term and prices will drop to more competitive levels as they flood the market. 6E HW though seems to be moving at a snail's pace even though the client HW is gaining market share.

The issue I see is Laptop OEM's shipping cheap adapters that lead to complaints about slow speeds when connecting to higher end WIFI systems. The supply chain still pumping out older tech doesn't help move adoption along either. Cutoff the old tech and move to the new tech and thins would progress a lot quicker. Depleting the old adapters and forcing them to a secondary market / resale kills off obsolete tech. There's no reason for any company to still be selling B/G/N setups but, you still find them. AC while still "recent" is already over a decade old at this point.

 

[Tech9]

There's no reason for any company to still be selling B/G/N setups but, you still find them.

What is AC/AX on 5GHz better than N on 2.4GHz for an IoT device?

AC while still "recent" is already over a decade old at this point.

No. Wi-Fi 5 is from 2014.

 

[L&LD]

What you're missing is that with 4x the throughput (assuming with the same number of streams) it will still be much faster than WiFi 6 or 6E.

Using WiFi 6/6E merely for backhaul is a disservice to the connected clients. Almost any AC Wave 1 (or Wave 2) client benefits from AX class routers. Regardless of the actual ISP speeds being used. The latency decrease is noticeable.

An RT-AX68U that replaced an RT-AC68U (top router pick, even today, by most uninformed consumers) completely transformed how the network responded for a customer today.

Their ISP speeds are only 60/10. But their older client devices never felt so fast to them.

 

[Tech9]

Almost any AC Wave 1 (or Wave 2) client benefits from AX class routers.

Technical explanation, please. Without many customer stories, if possible.

Existing AC clients benefit from AC Wave 2 in AX routers, not from available AX.

 

[Tech Junky]

@Tech9

AX enabled HW on both low/high bands performs better. Even for remedial IOT devices you'll see less drops in connections on either band.

 

[avtella]

Depends in day to day real world use I’ve noticed little to no difference going from an R7800 to an RAX80/RAX120 and now an RAXE500. Same with going from a 9260ac to an AX200/210 aside from benchmarks. On 5Ghz for example the jump from AC to AX in real world for me hasn’t been all that great vs what marketing has been pushing, best case I saw between a 9260ac vs AX200 was like 10-15% gain at best if I recall correctly, when testing with the RAX80/120 in AC and AX modes, my old charts are somewhere in these forums.

None of my family members noticed any latency or speed differences while I switched through these routers.

 

[L&LD]

Is Wi-Fi 6 Worth It

Wi-Fi 6 Pt 2

RT-AX88U Upgrade https://www.snbforums.com/threads/b...ta-is-now-available.60037/page-31#post-531024

RT-AX86U vs. RT-AX88U

Report - 2x RT-AX68U upgrade over 2x RT-AC86U in wireless backhaul mode

 

[Tech Junky]

5Ghz for example the jump from AC to AX in real world

I can think of about doubling the speed from 866mbps >> 1.5gbs going from AC to AX.

 

[Tech9]

you'll see less drops in connections

I still have 4x Cisco N access points in use. The number of drops is zero. What is less than zero?

I can think of about doubling the speed from 866mbps >> 1.5gbs going from AC to AX.

No. 866Mbps >> 1200Mbps.

 

[avtella]

I can think of about doubling the speed from 866mbps >> 1.5gbs going from AC to AX.

There were quite a few 4x4 AC routers that had HT160 support, my R7800 limited by its gig port would do ~960 Mbps to a 9260ac. Same card on an RAX80 and RAX120 was 1000+ Mbps at a 1733 Mbps link… (tested to an SSD on the RAX80 as it’s gigabit limited, but much faster storage performance vs R7800)

Biggest improvement for me on AX was the 2.4 Ghz band close to 2x gain in my testing.

Intel AX200 / NETGEAR RAX80, RAX120 Test Results

I tested the AX200 against the 9260AC (in a Dell Inspiron 7577), using the RAX 80 and RAX120 . Test was done one floor below the routers' location (about 12-15ft away.). I noticed about a 10-15% gain in performance on 5 GHz between ac and ax modes. Between n and ax on 2.4 Ghz @ HT20 there was a...

www.snbforums.com

Having said that I would recommend an AX router for new purchases as it’s newer, meaning longer firmware support vs an old ac model and of course new features to go along with it for any new clients.

 

[Tech9]

Biggest improvement on AX

It's cheaper AX 2x2 routers can go faster to common AX 2x2 client.

 

[thiggins]

You guys know the main way Wi-Fi 7 increases throughput is by using more bandwidth, i.e. 320 MHz channels and 4096 QAM? Which means you get those big numbers only in 6 GHz.

I suspect it will take another upgrade of clients, too. It's unlikely current RF front ends don't have the bandwidth and/or lower EVM to support all those new (and much closer together) constellation points.