Wifi 6: The Future is Completely Wireless
Can you imagine your live streaming productions completely cord free? For me — I’ve never been more excited about it and for once I can say that it is actually possible. Before we dig into all of the new wifi goodness —we really need to consider why this is such a monumental accomplishment. Wifi up to this point:
For Apple devices - Can only talk or listen to 1 device at a time.
Generally had very few usable channels.
Plagued by interference.
2.4GHz is almost unusable
How and why Wifi 6 changes everything:
(Disclaimer: You must have a Wifi 6 router and Wifi 6 device in order to see any of the benefits of Wifi 6.)
8X+ Capacity for Devices
2X Range
Less Interference
But How… and why:
There are many new technologies wrapped up in how Wifi 6 improves dramatically over previous versions. I’m going to attempt to make this easy to understand as the in-depth details rabbit-holes go deep! Also - Just because a device or router is Wifi 6 capable, doesn’t mean it support all or some of the technologies listed below. Information is scarce regarding Apple devices and what they actually support, but I can say confidently that they perform night and day better than Wifi 5 only.
MU-MIMO (Multi-User Multiple Input, Multiple Output) - The main idea is that the router can talk to multiple devices simultaneously. This technically existed in Wifi 5, but very few devices actually supported it and it was only for the downlink (router -> device. Not device -> router). Wifi 6 has the ability to talk and listen to multiple devices simultaneously and when you have multiple wireless cameras sending their low-latency feed to the switcher — this could make a dramatic difference if the devices support MU-MIMO in Wifi 6.
OFDMA - This technology enables a wifi channel to be segmented into 9 segments. Analogy: Each wifi channel can be looked at like a lane on the highway. Normally your car fits comfortably with room to spare in the lane and even leaves some unused space. But what if you could fit something smaller like a motorcycle in the same lane with the car. That would enable more ‘data’ to be pumped out of each transmission from the router or device(s). This technology sounds similar to MU-MIMO, but the 2 are very different and the router chooses which one is the best to use for each device / transmission. Punchline: Both are a huge win!
BSS Coloring - There’s only so many wifi channels that can be used. Think of a wifi channel like two handheld walkie-talkies. When someone has there finger on the button transmitting, the other person cannot properly talk at the same time. The noise is made is interference. So to prevent this, routers are designed to not speak on a wifi channel while another device or router in the same area is speaking. This can cause massive delays in the data from your cameras from making to the switcher in time to go live. Added Latency is one way we can navigate around these issues - I’ll cover this later on. BSS Coloring sets out to prevent these delays by creating a wifi network that also has a color assigned to it. All devices on this new colored network only listen to the router with the same color. Enabling multiple routers to talk on the same channel at the same time and the devices listen for the color they are assigned. Confusing? Yes. Can it create interference, yes. Overall it is a great thing for us, especially when competing routers are essentially out of range, but on Wifi 5 still caused problems for our network.
Range - Wifi 6 can stretch up to 2X farther than previous versions - kinda. More so Wifi 6 works much better at max distances of the network itself. This works for both 2.4 and 5GHz and I can 100% confirm Wifi 6’s range is awesome in comparison!
So how does this change things for live streaming? From what I’ve seen so far since having all Wifi 6 devices (iPad, Mac and iPhones) — things just work a lot better than before. We almost haven’t had to worry about combating interference with other wifi networks. Range is WAY better and even using the 5GHz Wifi 6 Hotspot on the iPad itself (as the router) is night and day better. Wifi 6 is one giant leap into a turnkey solution for live streaming — turn it on and it does the rest without any additional configuration — and that is a massive win for everyone!
Cheers!
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