WBA Field Trial Demonstrates How
Wi-Fi 6E And 6 GHz Maximize Speed, Coverage And Capacity For Home Networks Of
The Future
The Wireless Broadband
Alliance (WBA) announced
results from a new field trial that highlight the benefits of using Low Power
Indoor Wi-Fi 6E for a wide variety of demanding residential applications,
including video collaboration for telecommuting, multiplayer gaming, augmented
and virtual reality, streaming video and more.
Conducted by
CableLabs and Intel, the trial took place in a 3,600-square-foot, two-story home
with a basement and the drywall, wood and other building materials typically
found in a suburban residence. The Wi-Fi 6E enabled
laptops with Intel® Wi-Fi 6E AX210 wireless cards were placed in various
locations throughout the home and tests were conducted using a Wi-Fi 6E enabled
access point from Asus.
The trial
featured a range of tests on the downlink and uplink comparing throughput
achieved on the 5 GHz and 6 GHz bands for wide channels (80 MHz and 160 MHz).
CableLabs and Intel also analysed the Wi-Fi 6E performance compared to Wi-Fi 6
on the 5 GHz band in the presence of overlapping neighbouring access points.
The trial’s key results include 1.7 TCP Gbps downlink and 1.2 TCP
Gbps uplink speeds when using 160 MHz channels on Wi-Fi 6E in locations close
to the access point. The larger channel bandwidth and the associated increase
in total EIRP transmit power based on the channel
bandwidth helped maximize both coverage and speed throughout the home.
These results clearly
demonstrate the real-world benefits of using Wi-Fi 6E enabled devices over 6
GHz rather than 5 GHz. It is important to note that although Wi-Fi 6 devices
perform better than Wi-Fi 5 devices over 5 GHz, next-level user experiences are
possible with Wi-Fi 6E and the additional bandwidth available in the 6 GHz
spectrum.
Tiago Rodrigues, CEO of the
Wireless Broadband Alliance, said: “This field trial by CableLabs and
Intel shows how Wi-Fi 6E and 6 GHz spectrum maximize coverage,
capacity, throughput and the user experience in one of the most demanding
real-world environments: people’s homes. Between HD and 4K streaming video,
multiplayer gaming, dozens of smart home devices and videoconferencing for
remote work, today’s home Wi-Fi networks are the foundation for how people
live, work and play. This trial highlights that Wi-Fi 6E is more than capable
of shouldering that load, especially when paired with 6 GHz spectrum.”
Lili Hervieu, Lead Architect of Wireless
Access Technology at CableLabs, said: “CableLabs has been
a proponent of making the 6 GHz band available for unlicensed use, and we were
honored to conduct the Wi-Fi 6E trial in one of our employee’s homes for a
truly real-world experience. The results confirmed the benefit of Wi-Fi 6E for increased capacity and data rate
that will support the growing demand we are seeing for a large variety of
applications and for new emerging technologies.”
Eric A.
McLaughlin, VP Client Computing Group, GM Wireless Solutions Group, Intel
Corporation, said:
“Intel’s mission is to enable great PC experiences with industry leading
platform capabilities like Wi-fi 6E. The wireless trial, in collaboration
with CableLabs and the Wireless Broadband Alliance, helps demonstrate the
versatility of Wi-fi 6E on Intel platforms. The speed, latency, and
reliability improvements enabled by the new 6 GHz spectrum, with larger
channels and freedom from legacy Wi-Fi interference, will help dramatically
enhance user communication, entertainment, and productivity.”
Source: Wireless Broadband Alliance media announcement
