N wireless necessary?

Is N wireless necessary right now? especially, lets say for someone on a budget? in about how long do you guys think N wireless will become standard and universal?

 

The 802.11n protocol is expected to be standard by September 2008. For an average user, and certainly a budget user, it is currently unnecessary. Although it does offer great advantages, if you're on a budget, you might want to wait until it becomes standardized and official drivers are made.

Matt

 

do you use a wireless N router at home?

whats wrong with wireless G?

 

Yes, I use a (Linksys) draft N router.

There's nothing wrong with G routers, it's just the N routers are (and will be) better. They allow quicker browsing speeds and farther ranges. Check out this:

802.11g
Speed: 54 Mbit/s
Range: 35m (indoor), 110m (outdoor)

802.11n
Speed: 248 Mbit/s
Range: 70m (indoor), 160m (outdoor)

Indoor ranges differ from outdoor ranges, because outdoors there is no interference.

Matt

 

Don't let the distance fool you most have no range advantage. Those that had a range advantage was there old hardware was not that good. The antenna gain has alot to do with distance. But the speed is improved. 11n is/will be good if you move a bunch of files around internally. 11g at 54mbps exceeds ISP speeds, where the avg is still in the 3mbps. But in order to have 11n speed you must have HW that is compatable with what ever mfg you buy. Up to now ever one was doing there own thing. AS they move closer to the ratified std that should go away. The std is suppose to make all hardware compatiable with each other. Will have to wait and see. Even 11g has problems with this. As for now save your money buy a 11g, Just stay away from Belkin there hardware is not very reliable. The WRT54GL is a good unit as long as the buffalo. Linksys WRT54G and GS models are junk.

 

It doesn't affect browsing speed at all, since no one's internet connection is anywhere near the 54 Mbps offered by G wireless. So the connection from the router to the internet is the bottleneck, not the wireless setup. Unless you want to "browse" a server on your local network.

You might get better range with N wireless though, assuming you're connecting to an N router.

 

trust me, stay away from wireless N for another 5 months or so....they've still got a lot of issues to sort out with this new technology

 

It doesn't affect browsing speed yet. It will soon enough, though. Plus, I said it allows higher browsing speed, which, it does.

Matt

 

Matt, in the end, the problem lies with the ISP. Current wireless routers offer WAY faster connections that the speeds ISPs provide - unless American can get up to par and meet, say Japan for example, and move over to DOCSYS 3, we aren't going to be seeing much improvement anytime soon.

You are right that you MAY get better speeds for local network transfers, but the ISP is where the bottlenecks are at the moment (unless you can spend a few arms and legs, that is ).