12.1.5 Wi-Fi 5 and Wi-Fi 6

12.1.5 Wi-Fi 5 and Wi-Fi 6 The Wi-Fi 5 (or 802.11ac) and Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) standards continue the development of Wi-Fi technologies to increase bandwidth and support modern network access patterns. Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac) Wi-Fi 5 is designed to work only in the 5 GHz band. The 2.4 GHz band can be used for legacy standards (802.11g in mixed mode. The aim for Wi-Fi 5 is to get throughput like that of Gigabit Ethernet or better. It supports more channel bonding (up to 80 or 160 MHz channels), up to eight spatial streams, rather than four, and denser modulation (at close ranges). The way Wi-Fi 5 uses the radio spectrum is designated as very high throughput (VHT).Wi-Fi 5 access points are marketed using AC values, such as AC5300. The 5300 value represents 1,000 Mbps over a 40 MHz channel in the 2.4 GHz band and two 2,167 Mbps streams over 80 MHz channels in the 5 GHz band. Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) Wi-Fi 6 uses advanced modulation and signal encoding to improve the amount of data sent per packet by about 40%. The way Wi-Fi 6 uses the radio spectrum is designated as high efficiency (HE) to reflect these improvements. The aim for Wi-Fi 6 is to approximate 10G connection speeds (AX11000). Like Wi-Fi 5, Wi-Fi 6 products are branded using the combined throughput. For example, AX6000 is nominally 1,148 Mbps on the 2.4 GHz radio and 4,804 over 5 GHz. Wi-Fi 6 also specifies use of a new 6 GHz frequency band, which is required to achieve the highest data rates.In Wi-Fi 6, the OFDM with multiple access (OFDMA) modulation scheme allows sub-carriers or tones to be allocated in groups of different sizes, referred to as resource units (RUs), each of which can communicate in parallel. Where small RUs are used, this reduces throughput but provides more opportunities for a larger number of devices to transmit. The effect is to reduce latency where numerous small data packets are being transmitted. This technology provides better support for IoT devices. Stations that require more bandwidth can be assigned larger RUs. RUs can also be assigned based on class of service parameters, such as prioritizing voice over IP (VoIP) traffic. It also allows an access point to support legacy Wi-Fi 4 stations efficiently.