Streamyx

Wireless broadband is becoming more and more of a commodity than a rarity these days, in the past households tended to have one computer usually stashed away in a box room or a corner somewhere and home internet was set up by your Internet provider to come in through the wall into one machine. Well over the past five years wireless internet has quickly brought internet access to everyone in the household not just one machine.

It's not surprising really, considering most typical households will have a main computer, then there will be the laptop that the eldest takes away to university to do work on and chances are another child will have their first computer in their room for talking to their friends online. Queuing up to use the internet used to be like queuing for the bathroom in the morning.

Wireless broadband came about when people bought Wireless routers, equipment that allows one internet connection to be shared amongst many computers in a small area, whilst it was computer enthusiasts that initially used these you can now get wireless broadband from your internet service provider as a product. An engineer will come out and fit the router and add all your devices to the internet connection.

The technology initially worked to certain strength, dubbed 802.11b it didn't have fantastic range and the strength of your connection depended on how thick the walls were between your PC and the router, invariably like most early technologies it wasn't that impressive with poor data speeds being reported, not only that but other wireless transmitting devices in the home such as TV remotes and even microwave ovens interfered with the signal.

This all changed with the next generation of wireless standards 802.11g chances are if you have any wireless devices they are probably wireless G enabled. Most home video game consoles and mobile phones will connect to a wireless G standard, it provides much faster speeds over the wireless airwaves as well as being strong enough to penetrate the thickest of house walls.

The thing is that Wireless G too is getting old and the craving for quicker speeds brought about the next generation, Wireless N. Wireless N is much more powerful and allows most remote computers to achieve speeds much more like being connected via an Ethernet cable. Whilst most people will typically choose the latest and greatest technology for some reason Wireless N routers and their equipment has not taken off and remains sat on computer store shelves.

Why is this happening especially in the ever changing nature of gadgets and electronics? Well most people put it down to being simply happy enough with wireless G, as well as this most routers for the G standard are cheap enough to be provided by home broadband suppliers for free, (being subsidised by the suppliers monthly charges). Couple that with that most devices that people use such as the Sony Playstation 3, iPhone and Apple TV all use Wireless G it makes for not much need to go faster since the speed boost wouldn't affect these devices.

Most wireless N equipment is obviously more expensive and if you have many computers and other devices sharing your broadband connection then you don't want to be spending money on unnecessarily excessive technology.

For now Wireless N seems to be on the verge of being the new standard as far as consumers are concerned and so there are some people who are buying now in anticipation but until Wireless G becomes obsolete or overburdened then for the typical broadband user, G will do just fine.

If you are looking for cheap broadband whether you have an existing provider or not then you can compare broadband deals online. Also if you are thinking about changing your supplier then check your connection using one of the various broadband speed test websites to see whether you are getting your money's worth.