Finding New Connections When WiFi Is Not Enough

THE spread of Wi-Fi, the wireless protocol that has fueled the growth in Internet access from coffee shops to McDonald's to your local library, has sown the seeds of its own obsolescence.

Certainly the rise in wireless hot spots has been phenomenal. While almost all newer laptops come with a built-in Wi-Fi radio, all of this connectivity is not enough. Networks are straining under the load of sending video, and users are demanding connections from moving vehicles and while traveling cross-country. And the ability to wirelessly connect cameras, cellphones and even printers is not far off.

Fortunately, a new collection of technologies is coming to the rescue, with the goal of providing near universal coverage. These technologies are being developed on the shorter range, where Wi-Fi is too expensive or cumbersome to handle multiple devices; and on the longer range, where Wi-Fi signals are too weak.

Intel, Motorola, Freescale Semiconductor and other chip vendors are working on the next series of products to extend the range and flexibility of wireless networking. Unfortunately, no single product or technology will solve all of Wi-Fi's deficiencies.

At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month, several new wireless products were demonstrated, showing the beginning of what is possible.

Each of these products uses somewhat different technical solutions. Let's sort it all out here:

EXTENDING WI-FI Present Wi-Fi connections use 802.11b or 802.11g wireless standards, which can reach about 200 feet and send data at about 50 megabits a second, still about half of typical wired Ethernet speeds. There are efforts now to extend Wi-Fi, using the 802.11n standard, which would increase the radio signals with multiple antennas and transmitters inside a single device. And while the 11n standard will not be available until later this year, many products with multiple antennas and transmitters are already on the market from companies like Belkin, Linksys and Netgear.

The issue here is that none of these "pre-n" products will be compatible with other manufacturers' equipment, and at best, coverage will improve only a few dozen feet over the existing 802.11 products. "I think the 11n products will be more reliable than 11g, especially when it comes to sending video wirelessly," said Craig J. Mathias, a wireless analyst and the founder of the Farpoint Group, a wireless technology consulting company in Ashland, Mass.

WIMAX Going further afield is a group of products under the WiMax standard, or 802.16, which can reach longer distances at higher speeds. There are two distinct groups of products, one for fixed point-to-point connections (between two Internet providers or two radio towers, say), and one that connects to mobile users. The fixed products are available to customers now, and the mobile products will be on the market later this year.

WiMax "ends up looking like a wired Ethernet connection to the user, and has the same simplicity of use," said Scott G. Richardson, vice president and general manager of Intel's Service Provider Business Group. "Plus, the similarities to Wi-Fi are going to make WiMax successful."

In addition to giving the cable and DSL providers a run for their money, WiMax will also be competing with cellular providers that have their own advanced data offerings. The cellular providers use two different technologies: Evolution-Data Optimized (called EV-DO) from Verizon and Sprint, and Enhanced Data for Global Evolution (called EDGE) from Cingular.

Both have different speeds but are about 5 to 10 times as fast as current cellular data products. Laptops with built-in wireless broadband networks are available now from HP Compaq (nc6140), Lenovo (ThinkPad Z60, T60, and X60) and Sony (VAIO TX series). Verizon offers a discounted rate if you decide to go this route, or you can get a PC Card and pay an additional a month to connect to these higher-speed networks.

OTHER SOLUTIONS There is plenty of innovation also happening on the shorter-range side of things. These technologies, which go under names like ZigBee Alliance, WiMedia and wireless U.S.B., can support higher data rates but operate at much shorter distances than Wi-Fi. The crucial thing will be finding a single device that can connect everything.

Bluetooth has made some inroads in this sector, but mainly for wireless phone headsets. More promising is the WiMedia Alliance, an industry consortium led by Intel that is trying to set a single radio standard. "We will work with cellular handsets, PC's and various other consumer electronics," said Stephen Wood, the president of the alliance.

WiMedia Alliance is competing with a different technology called Cable-Free U.S.B., developed by Freescale Semiconductor, a company in Austin, Tex. Both groups were trying to form a unified standard called Ultrawide Band, but recently agreed to go their separate ways. Freescale's U.S.B.-powered technology is available in products from the Belkin Corporation and Gefen Inc., say company representatives.

"We have gone after consumers who want the benefit of wireless without new software and drivers, or to buy any new device," said Martin Rofheart, director of UWB operations at Freescale.

Meanwhile, the WiMedia camp "has done a ground-up redesign to optimize their approach for the best possible radio performance," Mr. Wood said.

Then there is ZigBee, which is taking aim at remote applications for the home and office. "We are not trying to do wireless headsets, or synchronize cellphones with P.D.A.'s," said Bob Heile, chairman of the Zigbee Alliance. "We are trying to do sensors and control applications."

Still, there is plenty of room left for Wi-Fi. In Texas, Austin Wireless City Project is a nonprofit group promoting free wireless access throughout the city. Richard MacKinnon, the president of the organization, asks businesses with existing Internet connections to subsidize deployment of transmitters around Austin. Mr. MacKinnon says that more than 30 cities worldwide have efforts under way to spread wireless coverage around their business districts. "We found that business owners will subsidize coverage because it is good for business to attract customers who are using Wi-Fi," he said.

The project sells its software for a few hundred dollars and has seen tremendous growth in the Austin area, with several thousand users a month logging on to its network. So the challenges ahead for Wi-Fi are to keep innovating and to serve as the glue to hold all these new wireless technologies together. Or it could serve as a new form of urban renewal and as a business stimulant, attracting well-heeled laptop users wherever they roam.