Cisco jumps in to 802.11n

U-turn on 'not ready' verdict

Cisco has released wireless products for the IEEE 802.11n fast Wi-Fi, despite stating in May that the draft standard was not up to business use.

It would appear that the flood of 802.11n products from rival vendors has pushed Cisco into action.

The products include a modular wireless access point, the Aironet 1250 Series, a 48Gbps wireless local-area network controller, the Catalyst 6500, and wired and wireless services with the Unified Wireless Network Release 4.2.

Cisco said that the Aironet 1250 Series is the industry's first Wi-Fi certified 802.11n draft 2.0 access point, and the only commercially available product to have participated in the Wi-Fi Alliance 802.11n draft 2.0 test-bed with Intel.

"Ensuring compatibility and performance are foremost in the adoption of next-generation wireless technologies," said Randy Nickel, director of wireless marketing at Intel's mobile platforms group.

"Cisco and Intel have worked together closely to ensure that adoption of 802.11n technologies is as seamless as possible for enterprise customers."

Duke University in North Carolina is one of the first users of Cisco's Aironet 1250 Series access point. Cisco and Duke engineers worked together to configure an 802.11n wireless network in a residence hall.

"[Students] use the wireless network for diverse applications such as video, streaming media and other data-intensive technologies," said Duke University chief information officer Tracy Futhey.

"Our early experience with Cisco's 802.11n technology has been that it can reliably deliver the wireless bandwidth our highly mobile population requires."