The long-anticipated 1.10 version of the IEEE 802.11n draft standard was approved unanimously in an IEEE task group meeting held in London in mid-January. According to Atheros CTO Bill McFarland, who attended the meeting, all of the 3,000-plus technical comments to the 11n draft 1.0 were resolved, and that in turn resulted in the successful agreement to draft 1.10. According to McFarland"s written statement, provided to eWEEK, this is a significant step forward in achieving the next stage of the approval process to an accepted 802.11n draft standard.
Last fall, the Wi-Fi Alliance announced that it would publish an interim standard in March so that companies could begin work on 11n products, while giving customers some reason to believe that those products would continue to work when the standard became finalized. "Now, the organization will begin a 15-day (short) letter ballot to determine whether a 2.0 version based on the 1.10 draft should be created and submitted for technical review," McFarland said in his prepared message. "It appears that the IEEE TGn (Task Group n) will deliver a near-to-final draft in advance of the upcoming Wi-Fi Alliance certification and thus impact the testbed." McFarland said in his comments. "This will further validate the WFA certification of draft 802.11n products and should assist consumer adoption of the new Wi-Fi technology."