Half of PC giants will support WiGig next year
Standard will be finalized within weeks and supporters like Marvell expect very rapid uptake to support HD video
Published: 29 June, 2011
The standard that is likely to sweep the board in the 60GHz band, WiGig, is only weeks away from being finalized, with its supporters' club publishing a new release of its draft specification and claiming significant progress towards the gigabit, short range platform.
This would target many of the applications currently being addressed by extensions of Wi-Fi in 5GHz, and by other 60GHz would-be standards such as WirelessHD. These include home HD video networks, and fast connection for PC peripherals.
The WiGig Alliance published version 1.1 of its MAC/PHY specification, addressing various issues in the original draft and improving the beamforming technology, an important component of the standard for enhancing rates and range despite the high frequencies. The achievable data rates are said to be between 3Gbps and 7Gbps.
The group also published to its adopters a 'WiGig Bus Extension', which defines an adaption layer for running PCI Express on top of WiGig. There will be a similar adaption layer for USB (called WiGig Serial Extension) to bring the main fast peripheral interconnect technologies into the game.
As well as the PCI Special Interest Group and the USB Implementers Forum, WiGig has also formed partnerships with the Video Electronics Standards Association and with HDMI Licensing, planning to wireless adaption layers for DisplayPort and HDMI in future. And the group has settled potential conflicts with other Wi-Fi activities, notably the 802.11ad effort in 60GHz. The two initiatives have now aligned their technical approaches, though there is still an 802.11ac project looking at using 8x8 MIMO to boost data rates in 5GHz.
According to WiGig chairman Ali Sadri, the technology group could have a certification program for its MAC/PHY spec ready in about a year. That would form the basis for certification programs for the higher layer protocols to follow in another 6-12 months. Eight test companies, including Aeroflex, Hittite Microwave and Rohde & Schwarz, have joined the WiGig Alliance in anticipation of those certification programs. Initial plugfests could be held as early as October since two firms - Panasonic and Qualcomm Atheros - have already announced chips even ahead of the final standard, in order to jumpstart the certification process and take a lead in achieving commercial reality.
Most Wi-Fi silicon providers, such as Broadcom, Intel and Marvell, are enthusiastic. Bart Giordano, director of product marketing for wireless at Marvell, told EETimes that he expects half of tier one PC makers to include 60GHz in notebooks during 2012, creating a large market in a very short period of time.
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