Do you remember the time when Wi-Fi just got widespread and started appearing in apartments? We cannot judge for you, but we still remember the same two thousand and seven. An important year! First iPhone release, flourishing Core 2 duo, exit Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, Portal, Bioshock… Your computer, most likely, was still connected to the LAN at that time, and if Wi-Fi was present, it was most likely needed to connect a “work” laptop or such an anachronism as a “pocket personal computer”. Fourteen years later, the use of Wi-Fi has become so widespread that it seems impossible to imagine life today without “connecting to the matrix” of any kind of device.
Why is the Internet important and why is Wi-Fi better than a wired connection?
What did Wi-Fi give us in 2007? We started going online more often, and now not only at home. Happy owners of the first iPhones, “netbooks” like the Eee PC or just laptops weighing several kilograms were able to work, make Skype calls, watch YouTube, communicate in ICQ or QIP, write in LJ and emerging social networks – not only sitting at “Computer desk”, but now in a cafe, at the airport or just sitting on the couch. We began to perceive more information on the move, and the speed of perception, the volume and quality of the formats of this information grew exponentially every year, and in 2019-2020 the milestone was crossed – we were finally able to transmit “gigabit” via Wi-Fi.
Of course, the importance of this is connected not only with the fact that in synthetic tests we were able to juggle gigabits per second between computers on the network, but also with the real benefit of such an increase in maximum bandwidth. After all, what does it mean to receive or send 1 gigabyte of data in one second?
Wi-Fi 6 and how the new standard affects users’ lives
The size of the classic Russian novel “War and Peace” is approximately 315 kilobytes, which means that when we transfer one gigabyte by air, we transmit 3,174 volumes of “War and Peace”, which is approximately one minibus stuffed with paper. And today almost everyone can transmit information on such an “industrial” scale, provided they have quick access to the Internet (after all, you need to take information somewhere?).
What preceded the achievement of such a milestone as transferring a gigabit of data over the air in one second? Wi-Fi standards and specifications have evolved, and over the past 15 years, we have witnessed a change in three whole generations: from 802.11g to Wi-Fi 4 and continue to Wi-Fi 6. Each such transition was accompanied by an increase in the maximum Internet speeds of providers, the introduction of new “Carriers” such as fiber optic cables, as well as new content formats: HD, Full HD, 2K, 4K, 8K, VR… Devices capable of reproducing this content have also developed: in addition to computers and smartphones, which is obvious, televisions have become the main consumers of the Internet at home. If earlier we connected “satellite” or “cable”, then in recent years, more and more Internet providers with IPTV took on this task, and now it is YouTube, Netflix, Twitch and a huge variety of video on demand services, as well as music subscription services …
We have witnessed how the popularity of various storage media has gone: people are selling their DVD and Blu-Ray collections, the word “drive” or “drive unit“Already sounds like something prehistoric, these devices are already difficult to find in computers, and they began to be removed from consoles. Today, even despite the market manipulations of investors with Reddit, many do not even think to go buy computer games in stores, but simply upload them to Steam, PlayStation Store or Microsoft Store… To download a new AAA + title, we have to wait for 80 GB of data to be transferred to our console via Wi-Fi. Right here Wi-Fi 6 and comes to the rescue.
Key Features and Benefits of Wi-Fi for Gamers
What does Wi-Fi 6 give gamers? In short, they have the ability to free themselves from wires and maintain exceptional connection efficiency. In the best case, the wireless connection will be equal to the already mentioned “gigabit” via cable. At the same time, it becomes permissible to move within the coverage of such a network without losing performance. But the importance lies not only in the high speed that we can get, but also in keeping the server response low. Thanks to the OFDMA and BSS Coloring technologies used in Wi-Fi 6, connected devices will not only be able to transmit data even more efficiently over the air, but will also be protected from radio interference from neighboring Wi-Fi networks.
In general, with Wi-Fi 6, you can connect your gaming laptop, PC with built-in Wi-Fi 6 2X2 MIMO adapter, new smartphone or PlayStation console to a wireless network with the speed and performance equal to gigabit Ethernet. And in the future, with the advent of Wi-Fi adapters with multiple antennas, with the transition of the local network and Internet tariffs to the 2.5 Gbps standard, even their support will not be a problem for routers with Wi-Fi 6, which are available today.
Well, with all of the above, you should not limit yourself to games. One of the most important advantages of Wi-Fi 6, in connection with which it is called High-Efficiency Wireless (high-efficiency wireless network), is maintaining a high quality of work in noisy air conditions, a large number of connected clients or downloading large amounts of data. In other words, a productive router with Wi-Fi 6, with a high bandwidth Internet tariff, will be able to more efficiently and more stably transmit a video stream to TVs and wearable electronics, allowing you to simultaneously play games without reducing performance and increasing ping.
Key features and benefits of Wi-Fi when building a smart home system
Well, it’s easy to guess what will happen to our houses in the future. In the 19th century, the world saw a light bulb for the first time, and in the 21st century, we can say: “Alice, turn on the pink light,” and artificial intelligence will send a command to an electrical appliance that will complete the task assigned to it. For a large number of innovations from the Smart Home area, Wi-Fi is also indispensable. And the smarter our homes become, the more data around us will be transmitted over the air, and the greater the need for a fast and efficient Wi-Fi connection.
Today Wi-Fi is becoming a convenient environment for implementing smart home solutions. Smart home systems using Wi-Fi are usually easier to install and cheaper. All that is needed to create some kind of basic automation is the presence of a smartphone and an Internet connection to connect smart devices with a cloud service. In this case, the cloud service acts as a “hub” or “hub”, that is, an additional physical module is not required to manage all “smart” gadgets, and a mobile application or a voice assistant will perfectly cope with this task.
Well, then everything will depend only on how “advanced” you want your home to be: whether you need cloud-based control of lighting, electrical appliances, heating, or whether you want your refrigerator to order food itself or the washing machine to send you a message to your phone … Whether you need to monitor energy consumption for energy efficiency, or you want to create a video surveillance system – everything will depend on your imagination and budget. And, of course, thanks to Wi-Fi, all this can be realized today and without wires.
Prospects and trends in the development of these areas, requests from users
Wireless data transmission technologies, “smart systems” for the home and various gaming and multimedia gadgets will undoubtedly strive for some common denominator. Today we see Wi-Fi Mesh systems that come with a built-in speaker and voice assistant. Or we see cloud gaming services that allow you to play the latest games on remote servers, broadcasting content to any screen. The potential for the development of new solutions in the field of communication and entertainment will only expand – after all, now we spend more time at home, and our requests for fun pastime will only grow.
Modernity is no longer possible to imagine without Wi-Fi. We are now seeing the active adoption of Wi-Fi 6 – a standard that aims to solve the problem of noisy bands and break the threshold of connection speed, but Wi-Fi 6E is not far off – a completely new specification that will introduce the 6 GHz range and even higher speeds – thanks to the ability to use 7 additional channels of 160 MHz within the range. While this standard is at the stage of certification and testing in various countries.
The volume of transmitted data and connections is growing exponentially every year, as well as the pace of scientific and technological progress. We have no doubt that completely new developments are not far off that will surprise and benefit society. And if they are related to wireless data transmission, then we will also participate in them.
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