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from the like-a-laser-with-a-very-wide-beam dept.
Qualcomm's new Wi-Fi chips are meant to rival 5G speeds
Qualcomm is launching a family of chips that can add incredibly high-speed Wi-Fi — at speeds up to 10 gigabits per second — to phones, laptops, routers, and so on. It's the start of a new generation of this super-fast Wi-Fi standard, but it isn't going to be used to speed up your typical web browsing. And whether it catches on at all remains an open question.
[...] WiGig relies on a connection standard known as 802.11ad, which can hit speeds up to 5 gigabits per second over close to 10 meters, according to Dino Bekis, the head of Qualcomm's mobile and compute connectivity group. Qualcomm's latest chips move WiGig up to a new generation of that wireless standard, called 802.11ay, which Bekis says can reach speeds twice as fast, and can do so up to 100 meter away. The Wi-Fi Alliance says the new standard "increases the peak data rates of WiGig and improves spectrum efficiency and reduces latency."
So why not just use this as normal Wi-Fi, given how fast it gets? Because that range is only line-of-sight — when there's literally nothing in the way between the transmitter and the receiver. This high-speed Wi-Fi is based on millimeter wave radio waves in the 60GHz range. That means it's really fast, but also that it has a very difficult time penetrating obstacles, like a wall. That's a problem if you want a general purpose wireless technology.
[...] It's not clear if this will really catch on, though. While there's definitely room for adoption from VR gamers, the earlier version of this tech has found minimal pickup in its couple years on the market. Asus recently made interesting use of it with the ROG Phone, which is designed for gamers. And Qualcomm says it's working with Facebook to use this tech for its Terragraph project, which wirelessly delivers home internet connections.
With 5:1 "visually lossless" compression, 10 Gbps could be enough for 5K @ 120 Hz.
Also at Engadget.
Related: AMD Acquires Nitero, a Maker of Wireless Chips for VR Headsets
Intel to Cease Shipments of Current WiGig Products, Focus on WiGig for VR
VirtualLink Consortium Announces USB Type-C Specification for VR Headsets
Wi-Fi Alliance Rebrands Wi-Fi Standards
(Score: 2, Informative) by Grayson on Thursday October 18 2018, @07:40PM (3 children)
This requires literal line-of-sight.
We messed around with some versions of it and it was bad enough that, moving around, walking through the line of sight, moving your hand in gestures, and even putting a piece of paper in the line of sight.
All of these seriously degraded or completely blocked the signal.
It's perfect for something like an AP directly over a cluster of desktops that you need high-speed access in the middle of the room, but don't want to run new wiring. But, in any situation where the line of sight can be broken it completely fails.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 18 2018, @10:11PM
It's what's needed for good untethered VR, i.e. a desktop PC communicating to a VR headset within a room. Otherwise, we have to ride the heck out of Moore's law in order to cram the best CPU, GPU, and perhaps more (neuromorphic component?) into a smartphone SoC. With tricks like foveated rendering [theverge.com], Seurat [google.com], etc. it may be possible to achieve great standalone VR. And maybe we will bust out of the death of Moore's law by making vertically stacked transistors. But WiGig is a good option that can allow you to put a multi-kilowatt monster to work in the corner instead of on your head.
While there will be line of sight issues, there is a possiblity that beamforming can be used by 60 GHz devices to bounce off walls:
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2011/07/beamforming-your-data-how-wigig-will-offer-7gbps-speeds/ [arstechnica.com]
Also, it or another wireless standard would need to get above 10 Gbps at some point in order to target very high resolutions and framerates. 32K at 240 Hz, anyone? [soylentnews.org]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 19 2018, @02:22AM
I sqaw the first d3esigns... was for server rooms. Special "triangular" bays in "round" racks, the center was hollow, with an antenna pointing into the hollow space. This allowed the servers to talk without needing any connections, except power that snaps in when unit is inserted. The outside also had antenna, so they can talk to the next tower. No more fibre or ether cables (mostly).
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Friday October 19 2018, @08:11PM
This'll be great for wireless monitors and projectors and other displays hanging over people or sitting in the same AV cabinet or right nearby. Nothing to get in the way if placed using good judgement.
I might not want to use it for my primary desktop's monitor connection (anyone tuning in can see and all that--unless the encryption is rather good and not worth worrying about)... but for a TV or game console system or something that can hook 5 things up with no wires except for maybe an S-Video_to_NewFangled-Dongle or whatever for this to work? If it isn't horribly expensive, count me in. I already do some weird stuff. Making it clutter free would be an improvement...
I am a guy that has a vacuum tube amp for my gaming computer, so I am willing to be bleeding edge like that sometimes ;)
As long as expectations are in line with what it can actually do, some things that come with limitations turn out to be an actual plus when used properly--even creatively.