Intel recently demoed a new bit of technology that is poised to get rid of many of the connectors and cables that computers use to connect to a plethora of peripherals and other devices. Known as WiGig, the tech has been in development since 2009 and looks to replace cables by using a high-bandwidth, high frequency wireless data system.
According to President of WiGig Alliance and Director of Millimeter Wave Technology at Intel Ali Sadri, “Since inception of the WiGig alliance back in 2009, we always had the vision that we need to develop a very high-throughput wireless technology that is capable of doing things beyond what WiFi can do.”
While speaking during a keynote address at Intel’s Developer Forum, Sadri gave examples of what WiGig could be used for. Among those examples, Sadri noted video connections to monitors and TVs, PCI Express and SDIO as possible interfaces that could be replaced by WiGig.
The technology runs on spectrum in the 60GHz band, frequencies that are considerably higher than today’s WiFi and ones that are also suitable for short-range communications. However, these are also highly susceptible to interference or blocking over long ranges.
During his demonstration, Sadri showed a WiGig link between a hard-disk, laptop computer and two monitors. The laptop, running solely on battery power, was streaming video from the hard disk and displaying it on the computer desktop, which was then being displayed across two monitors.
Even though other similar technologies have failed to catch on or even get off the ground, and despite the fact that WiGig was promised back in 2010 but never came about, Sadri states that WiGig is “very close to reality”, especially with backing from Intel and a host of other big name computer companies.
A certification program for the technology is expected to start in the middle of 2013 with actual, physical technology coming to the market later that same year. WiGig also gained a recent boost when Marvell Technology Group announced that it plans to offer chips with WiGig support along with chip maker Atheros announcing the same.
Source: PC World – Look, no wires! Intel demos wireless docking for Ultrabook
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