Wireless Home Networking - Index of

Chapter 2: From a to n and b-yond
costs $50 to $75. The least expensive 802.11n gear available as we write
is about $100 for a router. You can expect these prices to drop rapidly as
802.11n becomes more mainstream, but 802.11n will still have a price
premium for the next year or so.
As you shop for new wireless networking equipment, you’ll have to make a
decision between 802.11g and 802.11n. In general, we recommend that you
strongly consider the 802.11n gear (the speed improvements are well worth
the additional expense, in our minds), but also keep in mind that 802.11n is a
draft standard. It’s unlikely, but not impossible, that some changes in the final
standard will make equipment you buy today not entirely compliant with the
final standard in 2009. If you can find a manufacturer who guarantees that
your equipment will be final-standard compliant (by means of a firmware
upgrade, for example), that (in the words of Martha Stewart) is a good thing.
Regardless of the choice you make between 802.11g and n for your wireless
infrastructure (routers and access points), we highly recommend that you
select the 802.11n option when you’re buying new computers (particularly
laptops). There’s not a big price difference here, and changing the internal
networking cards on many computers (especially many laptops) isn’t always
a walk in the park — if you can get 802.11n put inside at the factory, so much
the better.
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