HONOLULU-The IEEE 802.11n task group voted 184-0 in favor of a joint proposal for the 802.11n standard for high-speed Wi-Fi.
The vote ends months of bickering and maneuvering by competing Wi-Fi technology developers.
While the new standard is not 100-percent completed yet, chipmakers are expected to begin hawking chipsets compatible with the new 802.11n standard. Final ratification of the new standard is not expected until 2007.
The standard utilizes multiple input, multiple output technology, which was developed initially by Airgo Networks Inc. MIMO enables a device to have multiple antennas that can process more than one data stream at a time, which helps speed up the transfer of data. In tests, data rates of up to 600 megabits per second were reached using the 802.11n standard.
