Metalink Announces 802.11n Concurrent Dual-Band System-On-Chip Products

Taipei, Taiwan -- Metalink Ltd., a provider of high-performance wireless and wireline broadband communication silicon solutions, introduced its new SoC (system-on-chip) product line. Metalink's WLANPlus SoC is an 802.11n-compliant concurrent dual-band solution with integrated host network processor. By supporting operation on both the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands at the same time, Metalink's SoC enhances the transmission capacity and quality of wireless home networks, especially for networking and multimedia applications.

The use of systems that offer concurrent support for both the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands enables a network to concurrently transmit HD multimedia content which requires the 5 GHz band, while also supporting data networking and other legacy applications that utilize the 2.4 GHz band. For this reason, a worldwide trend toward dual-band support is on the rise, with dual-band solutions being offered increasingly in consumer laptops, network interface cards (NICs), and other devices designed for wireless video distribution.

Metalink's WLANPlus 802.11n SoC product family includes the MtW8200, a concurrent dual-band 2x3 SoC, the MtW8201, a single-band 2.4 GHz 2x3 SoC, and the MtW8202, a single-band 5GHz 2x3 SoC. All support data rates of up to 300 Mbps throughout the home. In line with the IEEE's draft 2.0 specification for 802.11n (Wi-Fi) certification, the SoC product family is fully compliant with IEEE 802.11a/b/g-based legacy devices.

All of Metalink's SoCs include a MIPS-based processor core with CPU clock rate of 200 MHz, a high performance multi service bus architecture at 4.25 Gbps, ethernet ports for LAN and WAN connectivity, a high-speed SDRAM memory controller, and on-chip cache and scratchpad memory. They also offer a variety of host interfaces, including cardbus, mPCI, and PCI 2.3, and support Linux 2.4, Linux 2.6, and Windows CE.

MAC efficiency is enhanced through frame aggregation and block acknowledge. The SoC product line also supports 802.11n optional features to enhance performance, including a full ML detector, advanced FEC scheme, optimization for low latency applications, space time block coding (STBC), enhanced quality of service through implementation of EDCA plus admission control, and optimized bandwidth exploitation through implementation of fast link adaptation.

"5 GHz is emerging as the band of choice for wireless set-top boxes, digital media adaptors and other video client devices, giving rise to a need for dual-band routers that can simultaneously support new and legacy applications," said Barry Volinskey, Metalink's Vice President of Wireless LAN Marketing. "We are proud to bring to market a cost-effective, cutting edge solution for creating dual-band concurrent access points and routers, enabling our customers to address these evolving market needs."

SOURCE: Metalink Ltd.