Intel Unveils 802.11s
Intel has unveiled plans to release a new wireless networking standard called 802.11s. It is touting the new standard as easily configurable, high bandwidth, and flexible enough to cater to the home and small office user.
Source: GEEK.comThe technology behind 802.11s is mesh networking, which up until now has not been viable for home/office users. Currently it is only used over very large areas, such as a city or the industrial sector. More importantly, there is no interoperability between those mesh networks and other standards such as 802.11b/g. 802.11s is meant to change this, though, and Intel has developed the standard to be able to communicate with other popular wireless standards.
The advantage of mesh networking systems is that they configure themselves and are intelligent. A mesh network can figure out the best route for information to take across the network based on the quality required, meaning a video stream could take a different route to a webcam that requires much less bandwidth. 802.11s will also allow wireless nodes to find one another and create a link.
Intel also talked up a new bit of 802.11s technology it calls Mesh Portals. Mesh portals allow older (and newer) wireless standard technology to be recognized and incorporated into the network.
Intel hopes to get its 802.11s proposal together by the end of 2006, with the standard hopefully being in place by 2008.
0