14 Wireless LAN and Evolution
Jyrki T. J. Penttinen
14.1 Introduction
Wireless LAN (Local Area Network) with a number of variants is currently one of the most popular Internet access methods. Along with the general development of wired Internet access methods and packet core networks, WLAN solutions have also gone through major enhancements. As a result, the bit rate has increased exponentially since 1990s, and the functional area of the networks grows constantly. The first-phase WLAN has been formed by the early IEEE 802.11 standards, which are being complemented constantly.
14.2 WLAN Standards
Table 14.1 presents the most utilized WLAN standards, which are defined via IEEE.
Table 14.1 The most popular WLAN IEEE 802.11 standards by IEEE as for the access method of large audience
| Version | Name | Frequency band | Bit rate(maximum theoretical) |
| IEEE 802.11 (legacy) | WLAN | 2.4 GHz | 1 Mb/s–2 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.11a | WLAN (Wi-Fi) | 5 GHz | 54 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.11b | WLAN (Wi-Fi) | 2.4 GHz | 11 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.11g | WLAN (Wi-Fi) | 2.4 GHz | 54 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.11n | WLAN (Wi-Fi) | 2.4 / 5 GHz | 300 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.11ac | WLAN (Wi-Fi) | 5 GHz | 1 Gb/s (total for area) and 500 Mb/s (single station) |
| IEEE 802.11ad | WiGig | 60 GHz (and backwards 2.4 / 5 GHz) | 7 Gb/s |
| IEEE 802.15.1 | Bluetooth | 2.4 GHz | 1 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.15.3/3a | UWB | Various bands | 10–500 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.15.4 | ZigBee | 2.4 GHz, 915 MHz (America), 868 MHz (Europe) | 250 kb/s |
| IEEE 802.16 | WiMAX | 10–66 GHz | 120 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.16a/e | WiMAX | 2–11 GHz | 70 Mb/s |
| IEEE 802.20 ... |
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