Looks like things go further:
http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/05/broadcom-first-gigabit-speed-802-11ac-wireless-chipset/
Promises 256QAM Modulation schemes, MuMIMO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-user_MIMO
and other nice stuff. As 256 QAM only operates with low noise I hope there are better filters
on these new chips.
Given the pain we have all dealt with as we have moved into n, I doubt we’ll see any perceptible traction with Mikrotik support any time soon.
Sure. But as n is going to mature, it will be with 802.11ac. At least it gives some prospect to the
future. As it will be in every laptop very soon the market will give us hightech for a very low price
again.
Last time I read up on 802.11ac it sounded less like an outline of a plan and more like a bunch of excited kids deciding what their first car is going to be like.
“I want it to be fast”
“I want it to be better against interference”
“I want it to use larger channels”
“I want it to use rainbows and unicorns”
The local cable company changed over to 256QAM recently and it was very difficult, took a year or more before they got the cable plant where it needed to be, and they are shielded from most interference.
I think 802.11ac will cut about half of the proposed features out and blow 802.11n out of the water, but I don’t think it will progress until they stop trying to do the impossible.
We use 256QAM for years. It’s standard for licensed gear and works great. Motorola PTP600 does higher modulations
in 5GHz for years giving good results (If you’ve the money). Of course it needs better conditions than
64QAM but for short or clear links it gives a boost. Let’s see how Broadcom/Atheros does the job.
I am very interested in what they can do with it.
I guess its one of those “reach for the stars and pull back as necessary” plans. Not a bad thing, but I prefer to under sell and over deliver.
I still have issues with 54mb ptmp in a fairly rural area.
the 256QAM modulation will be great for me. I run backhaul links between .5 miles and 5 miles with VERY good SNR so I suspect that 256QAM wont be a problem for me.
I don’t really expect to deliver to the average customer at this modulation considering I frequently deliver at just 16QAM modulation with excellent results. That said, I can deliver 64QAM to a huge number of subscribers today but hard setting the rate on the radios gives more predictable performance (no latency spikes when reaching the max throughput for the given link for example)
Qualcomm Atheros have QCA9890 3x3 and QCA9892 2x2 802.11ac chipsets and “Qualcomm Atheros is sampling its 802.11ac chips to customers in the second quarter of 2012…”.
So… when we should have info from MT team about compatibility & new cards from Mikrotik?
Commercial crap
interference is interference u cant be better against interference it is there in the air
and the question is how to avoid interference
That was my entire point.
802.11ac isn’t going to end up being the savior of WISPs. If anything it sounds like it has more liabilities.
0ldman, I’m not really arguing, but what specifically are you thinking will be liabilities? Are you speaking of other device interference, or other wisps that are irresponsible with spectrum?
ac’s 8X8 MIMO capabilities is like 3/4 of beamforming. It doesn’t steer the beam by timing tx on multiple elements, but does tx on multiple elements in slightly different directions/polarities which can improve SNR on the client side. Also, with 8 receiving elements and algorithms to identify desired transmitions it can avoid noise and even filter it. a -3dB improvement on the client and on the AP side is a very nice gain.
Now, 80Mhz channels in ISM band is probably going to cause some grief…
cool. how about 802.11ad chips too in RB then ? they complimentary for ac[just 60GHz derrivative], if im read specs/standard well/correct.
its not something bogus/narrrow-demanded, like 802.22 =)
or widely used but irrelevant yet[like ZigBee]to networking -)
802.3ad doesn’t requre radio support and can be run across two wireless links now. No special 802.11ac+.3ad work is required.
oh, sorry, my typo. 802.11ad meant 
http://www.ieee802.org/11/Reports/tgad_update.htm
that wouldn’t be[because air absorption and nearly-zero wall-penetratio]any interests of ISP[significant portion of MikroTik consumers], but would be quite attractive for home consumers, corporations and integrators.
Ah, that makes MUCH more sense 
60Ghz isn’t so bad for short hops. Current EIRP is 40dBm and 500mW radio. There is a proposal in the FCC to take this to 82dBm EIRP when the antennas is >=51dBi.
The curious thing to me about ‘ad’ is that it is simultaneous tri-band of 2.4,5,60Ghz. For WISP service, this is a short range backhaul with integrated 2.4 and 5Ghz backups. 60Ghz has a tiny fresnel which is nice to work with.
The ‘catch’ with 60Ghz is that it is attenuated more by O2. This isn’t so bad though because O2 levels remain pretty consistent through weather and seasons. Unlike frequencies that attenuate significantly in H2O (2.4, 24), 60Ghz links should be more consistent. I recall reading an anecdote somewhere that 60-90Ghz perform better in fog or snow because the moisture displaces O2, but I can’t find that on google atm.
presently only SoC horsepower demands throttling 60Ghz band market penetration[ie cost of chips], just like how 10G-Base-T halt in advances last 6 years, depsite CAT6a and CAT7+ cables/connectors and chips improvements.
similar issues - prevent creating affordable holo-displays and holo-storage, too, for reference, and portable/operative DNA pocket sequencers/verifiers.
yes this is right, the problem is that many people doesnt understand what really is 802.11ac. Beamforming(later revisions I think) and MuMIMO(later revisions) are the most expected. There more spatial streams on both sites, and because of better characteristic of this spatial streams, using computer algorithms it can be more effectively filtered noise. Because more streams on ap site, more streams or client site..and both sites can better know the enviroment - what is noise, and what is wanted traffic. On this are based other competitors like Ruckus, Cisco…that have working solutions…
Also this can lead to adaptive filtering of enviroment…Because radios are built for various enviroment, and every enviroment is different. But when some radio is in one enviroment this enviroment is pretty stable…so radio can adapt to it…
rado3105, this brings up a good point about 'ac. It’s not beamforming, but it accomplishes some similar things.
It’s more ‘beamselection’. The receive elements are all individually capable of tx and rx. The radio may determine that client x is most visible (better signal, SNR, or lack of echos or noise) on elements 2, 4, 7 and can then chose to ignore or lessen the impact of signals that look like client x on the other elements. This, in a multi-user MIMO setup, would allow for client y to be communicated with on some other combination of elements, 1,2,5. If these two clients are either near each other, or in such a position that some refraction or echo makes them look like they are near each other on some elements, the radio can scrap the signal received on the less than optimal elements.
just to illustrate why 'ac isn’t beamforming, 'ac will transmit on all elements it chooses to at the same time. AP > client x would tx on 2, 4, 7 (or whatever was learned to be best for the client) at the same time. beamforming would delay the tx on certain elements to cause a wavefront peak at the client like two waves in a pond colliding and aggregating their power. The delay determining the aggregation points. 'ac and beamforming will handle rx almost identically because the beamforming transmitter handled calculating the delays, the receiver should get symbols from the elements synchronously.
So, a beamforming AP doesn’t really need a beamforming client for async communications, though the client would need to be aware of the AP in the sense that it should reply back with the timing difference of the beacons used for beamforming. That’s really a firmware thing though. A beamforming client would be an improvement though as it would be able to tx with beamforming as well as return better data to the AP about beacon strength as well as timing. Basically faster, more accurate timing and element selection.
I was primarly writing about PtP…you mainly about PtM
It’s effectively the same as far the this conversation goes. minus MU-MIMO. It’s PtMP with only 1 client. I doubt there will be many efforts to create a specific PtP type 'ac connection, it will be just like nv2/airmax/802.11 are today, a PtP has an AP and a client.