Smartphone and Mobile Devices Predicted to Rapidly Adopt 11ac
Smartphone and Mobile Devices Predicted to Rapidly Adopt 11ac by UCStrategies Staff
In just three years, seven of 10 smartphones will be equipped with “super” Wi-Fi capabilities, according to ABI Research’s market analysis.
ABI Senior Analyst Josh Flood predicts that the upcoming 802.11ac Wi-Fi standard will be quickly adopted by smartphones and other Wi-Fi capable mobile devices. The 802.11ac is expected to be much faster due to its exclusive operation in the nearly untouched 5-GHz frequency. Although he forecasts that companies may quickly incorporate this new 802.11ac, the biggest benefits will not be seen for several more years.
ABI Research’s new report “Mobile Device Enabling Technologies” claims that the 802.11ac has a much quicker connection speed while offering increased reliability. Moreover, its power consumption is much lower to that of the 802.11n. According to Flood, “it’s also capable of multiple 2x2 streams and should be particularly good for gaming experiences and HD video streaming on mobile devices.”
In that context, the mobile device most likely refers to larger-format devices rather than smartphones. This is because smartphones are predicted to have single-antenna 802.11ac radios, which only support one data stream. The newer 11ac is still similar to the 11n in that it uses multiple antennas for sending and receiving, which leads to much higher data rates.
This new Wi-Fi is nicknamed “Gigabit Wi-Fi” due to its 3x3 antenna configuration causing a PHY rate of slightly more than 1Gbps. Despite its increased performance boost, the batteries are not expected to drain out more rapidly thanks to a more efficient chipset. For example, the chip vendor Broadcom claims that their new chipset for 802.11ac will be six times more efficient than that used in the 802.11n.
This battery efficiency is also reflected in recent Bluetooth technology. Flood states that 65 percent of mobile devices were equipped with “Bluetooth Classic” in 2012, but that the fourth generation of Bluetooth, called “Bluetooth Smart Ready,” is exceedingly more power efficient. Depending on the user’s behavior, Bluetooth Smart Ready could “extend the possible usage of the technology by a factor of five to 10 times,” according to Flood. Due to this increased efficiency, he forecasts that it will only take two years before Smart Ready devices surpass the Bluetooth Classic. (RP) Link