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Meet the new champ of Wi-Fi: notebooks

While PDAs and cell phones show the allure of portability, it's notebooks that are poised to become champions of the wireless LAN.
Written by John Blackford, Contributor
COMMENTARY--It's ironic that notebook PCs, the original champions of portability, have remained tethered to phone lines while cell phones, pagers, and wireless PDAs roam free. You could do the budget for a billion-dollar company using a notebook PC in your backyard—or in a rowboat—but to send that report via e-mail, you would have to drag your notebook back to the phone jack (or Ethernet connection, if you were lucky).

That's about to change, as notebook manufacturers begin to build wireless

capability into their products and the number of places you can use wireless LANs skyrockets. What's more, the interest stirred up by wireless phones and PDAs could even create demand for those same capabilities in notebooks, unleashing a laptop renaissance that could cut into the success of smaller wireless devices.

No, I'm not suggesting the demise of cell phones or wireless PDAs. But wireless notebooks do offer compelling advantages. Their screens are dramatically larger than those of even the most generous PDAs; their keyboards are large enough for touch-typing; and they're outfitted with multigigabyte hard drives, CD-RW and DVD drives, and more. Even the most advanced cell phones and PDAs can't touch these capabilities. But they do offer extreme portability, so clearly they're here to stay.

Until recently, notebooks could not communicate wirelessly from remote locations, unless you happen to be lucky enough to live in a city in which services like Metricom's wireless Ricochet Internet access are available. One notable exception has been Apple's two-year-old AirPort wireless LAN for Mac notebooks. But despite an early lead, a lack of widespread adoption prevents use of the AirPort outside selected companies and locales.

Now, not only do Dell, Compaq, Toshiba, IBM, and Apple offer wireless networking with notebook PCs, but they also employ the same wireless standard, 802.11b (recently rechristened "Wi-Fi" for marketing reasons). This standard not only ensures that notebooks can communicate with one another, but it also practically guarantees critical mass.

But just as the Universal Serial Bus didn't become universal until there were plenty of USB devices to connect to, 802.11b won't become commonplace until a lot of locations are outfitted with 802.11b equipment—and with compelling applications. With these two factors in place, the trend toward wireless-LAN notebooks will likely snowball as convention centers, airports, and hotels begin offering wireless connectivity. Even more ready for wireless networking are college campuses and business parks.

Easy access
The conveniences of wireless networking are immediately appealing. For instance, you may soon be able to walk into a convention center with your notebook, sit down anywhere, and check your e-mail. You'll also be able to download news releases from participating companies, take a quick virtual tour of the show (complete with highlights and presentations tailored to your interests), and possibly even arrange meetings with vendors and colleagues attending.

According to a recent Dataquest survey of 200 technology managers, 50 percent plan to use wireless networking in their companies in the next year or two. At present, more than two-thirds of all wireless LANs are based on Wi-Fi, and that percentage is growing.

The reason is simple: Wi-Fi is mature technology that's an extension of decades-old Ethernet, the business standard for wired networks. It's also capable of a very respectable 11Mbps transfer rate, with a good range that enables Wi-Fi clients to roam as far as 100 yards from an "access point," though keeping within 50 yards ensures full-speed transfers.

Later this year, products based on a newer version, called 802.11a, will begin shipping. The updated version will be capable of 54Mbps, more than enough to handle full video, though the hardware will be significantly more expensive, at least initially.

Both wireless standards are easier to install and maintain than wired LANs, though PC Cards and access points cost more than wired Ethernet equipment. But cable won't need to be strung through ceilings and walls, and Wi-Fi is cheaper than Ethernet in the long run.

As for notebooks, they're hot sellers, even without much help from Wi-Fi. Desktop PC sales stalled over a year ago, but notebooks grew more than 20 percent from the fourth quarter of 1999 to the fourth quarter of 2000, according to Dataquest. With widespread adoption of Wi-Fi, notebooks could again excel as mobile users' product of choice and mount a serious challenge to desktop PCs.

john__blackford@zdnet.com


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