Atheros Readies 802.11e Chipset

Just as consumers are getting used to surfing the Internet on home wireless networks, Atheros Communications is hoping they'll embrace multimedia wireless networks using an upcoming product that improves the quality and range of wireless signals.

Atheros makes wireless LAN chipsets for WLAN equipment vendors. It plans to release the AR5005VA chipset later this year to bring improved wireless networking capabilities to consumer electronics devices such as DVD players, set-top boxes, and digital televisions, says Craig Barratt, president and chief executive officer at Atheros.

Atheros envisions the new chipset as the brains behind an unconnected home media network in which a set-top box or PC share multiple video signals with flat-panel televisions arrayed around the home, Barratt says.

The chipset adds smart-antenna technology to improve range and signal quality, Barratt says. Smart antennas make use of multiple antennas and sophisticated chips to actively search for wireless devices and beam their signals directly to those devices, rather than simply broadcasting a signal over a wide area like "dumb" antennas.

New Standard

The AR5005VA chipset will also include a predraft version of the 802.11e standard for wireless quality of service. The 802.11e standard is designed to address some of the problems that plagued early wireless home media networks, such as dropped frames from videos or poor audio quality.

Customers who purchase products based on the predraft standard will be able to download the completed standard when it is finalized by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Barratt says. The IEEE is currently considering final proposals for 802.11e, and the ratified standard should be available early next year.

The features enabled by the draft 802.11e standard are too important to wait for the final standard, Barratt says. There is a chance the IEEE could alter the standard beyond the point at which it would be available as a software update, but Atheros is confident that the final standard will very closely resemble the draft standard, he says.

That was the case when chip manufacturers such as Broadcom released products based on the draft standard for 802.11g, says Will Strauss, principal analyst with Forward Concepts in Tempe, Arizona. The final 802.11g standard was available as a software download, and Broadcom carved out a commanding lead in the market for 802.11g silicon because it was first to market with a product, he says.

"There's something to be said for getting out there first with a product, if Atheros is confident enough in their design. (They) are confident that theirs is easily updateable," Strauss says.

Focus on Media

The AR5005VA chipset will be used in stand-alone products that connect to televisions and DVD players, but can also be built right into those devices, Barratt says. It will support all three major 802.11 technologies, but 802.11a is expected to be the protocol of choice for home wireless media networks, he says.

Networks based on the 802.11a standard have access to 12 separate nonoverlapping channels, reducing the chance of interference with other wireless devices. The 802.11b/g standard runs on the commonly used 2.4GHz frequency and can only use three channels.

Consumers didn't care as much about small interference problems on their wireless data networks, Strauss says. However, those same consumers will not accept dropped frames from a video or patchy audio connections, he says.

The install base of 802.11b/g wireless networking equipment is much larger than that of 802.11a equipment, but Japanese consumer electronics vendors are convinced that future home media wireless networks will run on the 802.11a standard, Strauss says.

The chipset is available with two or four antennas, and a four-antenna version costs $19 in quantities of 10,000 units. Samples are available now, and products should be available by the end of the year.