First Dual-Band 802.11a+g Products Available

Be the first on your block to support both 2.4GHz 802.11g and 5GHz 802.11a networks from the same laptop. Netgear and Linksys have both announced shipment of their respective dual-band PC Card network interface cards (NICs) that do just that.

Announced earlier this week, Netgear's Dual Band 802.11a/b/g Wireless PC Card (model WAG511) carries an MSRP of $157, (compared to $79 for its 11g-only card) but is already selling the dual-band NIC for about $109 at some online retailers. The card supports 64, 128, and 152-bit wired equivalent privacy (WEP) encryption and in its 802.11a mode can go "Turbo" up to 108Mbps -- all this thanks to the Atheros AR50001X chip inside. The card comes with a three year warranty and full time tech support. (Netgear's 11g-only products used Intersil's PRISM GT chip).

According to Netgear spokesman Ken Hagihara, Netgear does plan to do an 802.11a+g access point and router for the small to medium business market for later this year.

Linksys is shipping its Wireless A+G PC Card (model WPC55AG) as of today, for an estimated street price of $99. MSRP on its 11-g only PC Card was $119.99, so it usually sells in stores for about the same price as the new product. The new dual-band version features the standard WEP up to 128-bit and regular speeds of 54Mbps in 802.11a/g, or 11Mbps fallback when used with 802.11b.

Later this month, Linksys will ship its entire line of Wireless A+G products, including a $99 PCI Card (model WMP55AG) that will ship by next week, plus an access point (WAP55AG) and router (WRT55AG) that are still awaiting FCC approval and final pricing.

The Linksys Wireless A+G client products use chips from Atheros also, but Linksys doesn't promote non-standard features, so while the Turbo-mode might be possible, it won't be supported. The Linksys access point and router will use a mix of chips from Broadcom (the 11g) and Atheros (the 11a). (Linksys's 11g-only products are based on the Broadcom AirForce 54g chip.)

All the products listed here have full support for the 802.11a specification, but only draft-level support for 802.11g, which has yet to be finalized and ratified by the IEEE . 802.11g runs at 54Mbps but is compatible with 802.11b networks at 11Mbps, thus offering full coverage