I'd argue that wireless LANs are wonderful for small offices and users who
move around offices a lot. We use the Apple Airport/Oronco WaveLAN cards
here in our office (of about seven people).
For large offices, I'm not sure that wireless LAN's are the best option, to
paraphrase Howard, it depends on the problem that you are trying to solve.
wireless LAN's still have several drawbacks:
- speed (shared 11MB or less, depending on distance)
- bandwidth contention (all users share basestation bandwidth)
- scalability - wireless LAN's are generally deployed in their own VLAN, so
that users don't need to get new IP addresses when they roam around a
facility
- interoperability - newer technologies may not interoperate or be
backwards compatable
- support for VoIP - how do you power a VoIP phone in a WLAN environment?
- interference - WLAN's use unregulated spectrum, what happens when more
devices use this same spectrum?
I'd expect all of these issues to be addressed in the next year or so,
especially when new standards emerge that increase WLAN speeds.
BTW, see http://www.wirelesslan.com/ for a great resource on WLANs.
Irwin
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael Linehan [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Monday, October 30, 2000 10:32 AM
> To: CiscoStudyGroup
> Subject: OT: Wireless LANS
>
>
> As a member of the local chapter of the NPA (Network Professional
> Association) I have been tasked with an interesting assignment. I need
> to make the following argument:
>
> Anyone who uses a wired network today is stupid! or Anyone who doesn't
> use a wireless LAN is stupid! (take your pick)
>
> This is of course all in fun. I of course want to do as good a job as
> possible so my question is this.....
>
> If you had to make the argument that wireless is the only way
> to go for
> local area networking what would you say??
>
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