Thursday 19 January 2017

WiFi System : BANA

What is WiFi System?


A WiFi System is a collection of WiFi Routers  which talk and cooperate among themselves to form one single big WiFi Network. For users it looks as if there is a single WiFi Router with wider range of coverage. To say in little technical words, a WiFi System is nothing but a Wireless Mesh Network and form a single IP Subnet. 

Why do we need a WiFi System?


 The answers is simple, to increase the WiFi coverage in your premises. We have Range-Extenders to do this job? Yes..They are available for far lesser prices than the WiFi Systems . But a WiFi System is more than the Repeater or Range-Extender. 
  • With Range-Extender a separate WiFi network is created. For every change (For e.g change keys) you make at the Main Router, you will have to make those changes at Range-Extenders also. 
  • All information like clients statistics (if at all) is maintained separately for each Range Extender.
  • WiFi Systems can be managed using a centralized common interface typically through Mobile Apps or  browser. Using this centralized interface one can configure Network Names, Keys and features like Parental control. With single click the settings will be applied for all Routers in the Network. .
  • Some WiFi Systems provide seamless roaming across the Network. Meaning, your skype call does n't disconnect when you move from one corner of house to another.
  • Range-Extenders are not that easy to configure, whereas with WiFi System , the configuration is very simple and network can be scaled-up very easily.

Typically a Router can cover around 1000 square feet (Use Google to convert into other units :)) . More the number of Routers, better the coverage. There are some limitations for this. I will try to write more on this in a separate post.

Price

A typical WiFi System consist of 2 or 3 Routers.  The price varies from $300 to $450 based on the number of Routers  and vendor. Too much... is n't it? :)

A typical range extender costs around  $30. So a combination of a reasonably good WiFi Router + 2 Range extenders will not cost more than $100. 

Throughput

WiFi Systems typically have 2 radios with  one operating  in 2.4Ghz (11N) band and the other in 5Ghz band (11AC).  You may see an effective throughput of 60Mbps to 400+Mbps.  Please see this page for throughput numbers and comparison.

Throughput of upto 60Mbps to 90Mbps is achievable with a single 11N radio also. Also not every application needs 100+Mbps throughput.

However please note that the effective throughput is limited by your ISP speeds. So the effective throughput that you get is the minimum of your Internet Speed and throughput of WiFi System. With a 40Mbps connection you can have 16 simultaneous HD videos streams (from Youtube) and more than 30 simultaneous normal video streams (from Youtube).

So for typical usage, 60Mbps to 90Mbps of throughput provide an excellent Quality of Service.

Future WiFi  System

From the above discussion, we can see that  WiFi Systems have the advantage of easy to setup and use. However the price is too high when compared to the value addition that they bring.

On the other hand, a Range-Extender is not that easy to setup and lacks features like Parental control, bandwidth monitoring etc. However the price is very low when compared with that of WiFi Systems.


So the ideal combination is a WiFi System at the price of Range-Extenders.  Nearhop has addressed this and developed an alternate WiFi System, "Bana - a WiFi System and a perfect platform for IoT".   It is not just a WiFi System, but something  beyond that with never seen features. I will blog more about these exciting features in the coming days. The product will be available in the market very soon. We are trying to bring down the price below $100 for a 3-unit WiFi System.We will start selling the Routers very soon. Share you email id  here, http://www.nearhop.com/#mc_embed_signup  to get your BANA.





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