Intel haven't launched the 6Ghz compatible drivers yet for the AX210, notice they mention "with the borrowed-from-Killer 22.30.0.11 driver".
I also don't trust anyone who "let the router auto-select channels".
I've always been a bit wary of SNB as in the past I've had better speeds than they tested on the same hardware.
There’s a chap there Beta testing the NG E router and has the same results and that chap knows his networking.
That site has some hidden surprises if you know the people behind the post names, some are the best in the game and work for various companies as well as the well known third party coders.
He’s now posted more info which you may or may not find interesting.
Broadcom announced that coverage would not be far off that of 5Ghz but they marketed that but that client at the edge is going to suffer and slow down everything.
I expect to see driver updates and that’s the same with the routers once Broadcom push them out as that’s what’s being used within the routers at the moment.
I’m expecting to see 6Ghz with less coverage meaning devices at the edge will start hogging the airtime as they do with all standards considering all management code is sent via the primary channel still.
So while they may not have the correct drivers is does indicate what to expect.
There’s a lot of people jumping onto wifi6 unifi stuff yet no one knows if it’s draft or what is running behind it and that’s half the problem with this standard. Ubiquiti just say OFDMA on their new WiFi 6 APs but is the UL and DL, does it have full BSS colouring as well as other standards and as it stands it’s only on the 5Ghz channel so it’s not something I’m rushing into yet.
A classic example is my RAX120 which is draft 3 so does not have UL OFDMA, TwT or full BSS colouring and the stat page for rx and tx retries is clearly not working correctly. I’ve moved back to the UDM at the moment and I expect wifi6 to be short lived compared to other standards due to recent announcements.
I’ve a feeling like all standards it will be half baked and most of the selling will be marketing. OFCOM indicated that 6Ghz would help VR and AR and so you need to be fairly close and with correct power levels to gain the best out of that. I would imagine a 17db would be the match from a router to such device to keep the retries down to a min which is why a single all singing router set at max output is not the best solution when matching up with clients that are based on a 17db measurement ie I could be 40ft on my rax120 and still connect to 5Ghz but the device which is an iPad is based on 17db so I was just getting thousands of retransmissions that in turn slowed down the network as it hogged the airtime and all those management protocols are still sent on the primary channel alone regardless of width setting. A router set to 29db with a client close to it will also increase rx and tx retransmissions.
I was also surprised with battery performance on a mobile device with the 120, it was poor and I believe they aimed at lower latency as I bet the DTIM was set low where as Some manufactures like Apple recommend a setting for improved battery life but with the cost of increase latency.
So while 6E may offer less interference which may or may not be applicable to the individual the problem is what will be supported in the long run, will we see appliance make use of it and what benefit does it provide to a said client. We may end up seeing very few devices supporting it and those that do it may provide very little over a 5Ghz connection and with 2024 comes WiFi 7 another standard that offers more throughput but behind all that is the poor implementation of inner standards but great marketing to produce sales.
It will be interesting to see what’s supported by clients as time rolls forward. I’m a tad worried the fall off is so quick but that’s the nature of the beast. It’s looking like a good chose fore close range rather than thinking it will cope with a typical brick build we have as those testers on SNB could be testing in a different environment. 50db is going to be shortish for clients though.
The biggest flaw however is the end user, I can bet those with the bigger bad boy routers from the likes of Asus, NG, TP and so on set transmit power firmly stuck on 100 little knowing just what effect it has let along picking all that lovely interference up from other neighbour channels and showing your channels too so in the end it’s just a giant competition and no one wins.