What's up with 802.11n?

[RyanN]

Not many people (at least that I know) use it.

I think that's the main reason... not much traffic. Plus, more bandwidth, faster transmission of data... just all sorts of good stuff.

[GGCO]

That might be it, but it seems so counter-intuitive. I would think that you should use the protocol that most team's computers would be compatible with.

So, do you think that it is possible to change the way it is broadcasting in?

[cabbagekid2]

If you don't have wireless n, what our team has done is connect it to the driver station through an ethernet cable to download the code. There is no need to have your laptop have wireless n. It's not much of an inconvenience to plug your computer to the driver station since both are usually near each other when testing your robot.

Not sure about the effects of changing it to g/h.

[GGCO]

Yeah, it really is not a problem but I would like to have the capabilities of connecting to the network remotely simply for convenience.

[Jon Stratis]

a, b, g, and now n are the various revisions of the IEEE 802.11 spec - basically, each new version is an upgrade over the previous one. All the letters in between there were lost in the shuffle - they didn't differentiate themselves enough to make ti worth while to put in consumer products.

That being said, N has been out for a while now - it was ratified in January '06, if memory serves. Prior to that, most major computer manufacturers and wireless router companies had what were called "draft n" cards available - basically, they were faster than G, but not guaranteed to be compatible with official N devices after the revision was ratified. Most routers and wireless cards have no problem connecting to b/g networks, and anything you've bought in the past year or so should have an n card in it.

n provides many benefits to end consumers (and FIRST robots) - longer range and increased data bandwidth being the two big ones. For FIRST, this means a single router has a much better chance of avoiding interference from robot frames and materials than a g router would. Further, providing teams with a g router now would be providing them with older technology, something that they would have to update in the next year or two as the availability of g routers became scarce (If you can even find them today).

So, hopefully that provides some insight into why FIRST probably decided on the router they did.

Now to answer your question...

It *should* be fine to set your router to utilize b/g/n instead of only n. Best case, you won't notice a difference. In the middle there might be some interference introduced. And worst case, it simply won't work and you'll have to set it back to n only. And in the least likely scenario, you'll set it to b/g/n and the world will explode. I doubt that will happen though

As for the gaming adapter (the part that sits on the robot) - make sure that is set up like FIRST instructs. You definitely don't want that acting anyway other than the way it should work at the competition, just to save the possible headache of your robot not working.

[GGCO]

Originally Posted by eagle33199

a, b, g, and now n are the various revisions of the IEEE 802.11 spec - basically, each new version is an upgrade over the previous one. All the letters in between there were lost in the shuffle - they didn't differentiate themselves enough to make ti worth while to put in consumer products.

That being said, N has been out for a while now - it was ratified in January '06, if memory serves. Prior to that, most major computer manufacturers and wireless router companies had what were called "draft n" cards available - basically, they were faster than G, but not guaranteed to be compatible with official N devices after the revision was ratified. Most routers and wireless cards have no problem connecting to b/g networks, and anything you've bought in the past year or so should have an n card in it.

n provides many benefits to end consumers (and FIRST robots) - longer range and increased data bandwidth being the two big ones. For FIRST, this means a single router has a much better chance of avoiding interference from robot frames and materials than a g router would. Further, providing teams with a g router now would be providing them with older technology, something that they would have to update in the next year or two as the availability of g routers became scarce (If you can even find them today).

So, hopefully that provides some insight into why FIRST probably decided on the router they did.

Now to answer your question...

It *should* be fine to set your router to utilize b/g/n instead of only n. Best case, you won't notice a difference. In the middle there might be some interference introduced. And worst case, it simply won't work and you'll have to set it back to n only. And in the least likely scenario, you'll set it to b/g/n and the world will explode. I doubt that will happen though

As for the gaming adapter (the part that sits on the robot) - make sure that is set up like FIRST instructs. You definitely don't want that acting anyway other than the way it should work at the competition, just to save the possible headache of your robot not working.

Thanks much! I'll let you know what happens!