While most people are familiar with the Wi-Fi access points sold by the big box retailers for home use, there's also a market for license-free Wi-Fi in larger areas such as apartment complexes, company and university campuses, and hotels.
Serving such a large area with the limited amount of 2.4 GHz spectrum available can be difficult. Ruckus Wireless introduced a new product this week that appears to have the capability of greatly increasing Wi-Fi speed and reliability in large systems.
The new Ruckus Smart Wi-Fi outdoor products use dynamic beam forming to automatically direct transmissions to the best performing signal path on a per-packet basis using a real-time feedback mechanism inherent in the 802.11 protocol. Ruckus claims this on-the-fly adaptability gives their products a three- to four-fold improvement in range and performance, while providing wire-like reliability.
The units can be configured in a mesh topography to provide reliable coverage over wide areas, eliminating the need to run Ethernet cabling to every access point. The "BeamFlex" multidirectional antenna array is able to deliver up to 7 dBi gain, while providing nulls as deep as 15 dB for interference rejection. Sensitivity is specified as "-100 dB."
For more information and details on the technology, see www.ruckuswireless.com/.
