Subject: [6gip] Wi-Fi 6E

From: Behcet Sarikaya <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2021 10:48:20 -0600

Hi all,

6G came to Wi-Fi :) now it is time for smart phones.
It is weird why they call it 6E?

2020 has ended on a great note for the Wi-Fi community. Wi-Fi 6E momentum
has certainly taken hold. Following the approval of BCM4389 as the first
Wi-Fi device to operate in the 6 GHz, FCC has approved an access point
powered by Broadcom's Wi-Fi 6E silicon. ROG Rapture GT-AXE11000 - the first
Wi-Fi 6E Low Power Indoor AP - is powered by Broadcom's BCM43684 chip.

Happy New Year everyone.

Behcet & Dirk

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From: Alexandre Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2021 22:34:35 +0100

> It is weird why they call it 6E?

I suspect '6' as using a band somewhere at 6GHz.  But I dont know which 
band more precisely would that be.  Is it the band typically used for 
802.11-OCB which is 5.875MHz-5.925MHz?

E in '6E' might mean 'Extended', or some band that is beyond that 
hypothetical 6GHz band.  But I dont know which one.  It could be towards 
27GHz and why not somewhere at 70GHz.

But I think these bands will continue to stay separated from the bands 
planned for the 6G '6th Generation', which might be in the Terahertz range.

I terms of timeline: WiFi 6E might be on the consumer market maybe in a 
year or two whereas with 6G we look at first trials in 8 years time.

> 
> 2020 has ended on a great note for the Wi-Fi community. Wi-Fi 6E 
> momentum has certainly taken hold. Following the approval of BCM4389 as 
> the first Wi-Fi device to operate in the 6 GHz, FCC has approved an 
> access point powered by Broadcom's Wi-Fi 6E silicon. ROG Rapture 
> GT-AXE11000 - the first Wi-Fi 6E Low Power Indoor AP - is powered by 
> Broadcom's BCM43684 chip.

Thanks for the references.  It's the next WiFi thing to expect.

Alex

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From: Simon Leinen <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2021 10:47:26 +0100

> I suspect '6' as using a band somewhere at 6GHz.  But I dont know
> which band more precisely would that be.  Is it the band typically
> used for 802.11-OCB which is 5.875MHz-5.925MHz?

> hypothetical 6GHz band.  But I dont know which one.  It could be
> towards 27GHz and why not somewhere at 70GHz.

No, it's slightly different:

"Wi-Fi 6" is the marketing name for IEEE 802.11ax, i.e. the latest
currently available generation of Wifi technology.  No relation to 6G or
6GHz! (The spectral efficiency of Wi-Fi 6/802.11ax is similar to 5G NR,
thanks to high-level QAM and (MU-)MIMO.)  The generation-based "Wi-Fi N"
nomenclature is fairly new.  I think it was introduced with Wi-Fi 5
(IEEE 802.11ac) and was "backported" to earlier Wi-Fi generations.

Early last year, the FCC in the US made a large band of spectrum in the
6GHz band available for unlicensed use.  This is quite significant,
because the new frequency range is significantly larger than both old
Wifi bands (2.4/5GHz) combined(*)!

So people are now building products that support this new frequency
range.  The MAC will be the same as for IEEE 802.11ax/Wifi 6, and the
Wi-Fi Alliance decided to call this new standard "Wi-Fi 6E".

> I terms of timeline: WiFi 6E might be on the consumer market maybe in
> a year or two whereas with 6G we look at first trials in 8 years time.

Right, actually I think we will see Wi-Fi 6E products quite a bit before
the end of the current year.

Cheers,
-- 
Simon.

* In the US, this new "6GHz" band is actually the range from 5.925 GHz
  to 7.125 GHz.  Let's see what happens in other regions - for Europe,
  it looks like the band will be smaller (5.945-6.425 GHz?), which is a
  pity because people live more densely in Europe than in the US, so a
  larger band would be quite useful to avoid collisions between
  neighbors.  Oh well.

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From: Behcet Sarikaya <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2021 09:59:56 -0600

Thanks for the comments.

I found this link on Wi-Fi Alliance web site:

https://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-certified-6

which says that Wi-Fi 6E extends Wi-Fi Certified 6 into 6Ghz all based on
802.11ax.

The article also describes the features of 6E.
Check it out.

Behcet

On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 3:48 AM Simon Leinen <[email-masked]> wrote:

> 6gip mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/6gip
>

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From: Alexandre Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2021 13:03:46 +0100

Le 05/01/2021 à 16:59, Behcet Sarikaya a écrit :
> <https://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-certified-6>
> 
> which says that Wi-Fi 6E extends Wi-Fi Certified 6 into 6Ghz all based 
> on 802.11ax.

So the 6 in WiFi 6E is a coincidence between being a next version after 
WiFi 5 and being at 6GHz.

I still wonder what precisely is that 6GHz band where WiFi 6E is 
presumed to be running?

Alex

> On Tue, Jan 5, 2021 at 3:48 AM Simon Leinen <[email-masked] 
> <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
> 
>     [email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>
>     <https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/6gip>
>

---

From: Simon Leinen <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2021 15:19:22 +0100

Alexandre Petrescu writes:
>> which says that Wi-Fi 6E extends Wi-Fi Certified 6 into 6Ghz all
>> based on 802.11ax.

> So the 6 in WiFi 6E is a coincidence between being a next version
> after WiFi 5 and being at 6GHz.

Right.

> I still wonder what precisely is that 6GHz band where WiFi 6E is

In the US (since July 2020 I think):

5.925 GHz to 7.125 GHz

In the EU (should be ratified this month(?) and passed into member state
law over the subsequent six months):

5.925 GHz to 6.425 GHz

...so, at least initially, only half the amount of spectrum (the "lower
half").  Maybe more later, who knows.

Sorry for the US/EU-centricism.  I'm not quite sure what's happening in
other countries, except that the Ofcom in the UK already stated their
support for Wi-Fi 6E, also in the "lower half" range.  "Ask your local
regulator", or look for information on the Internet.

There's an excellent video explaining Wi-Fi 6E here, including
spectrum regulation status, again in particular in the US and (EU/CEPT)
Europe, and some technical differences between Wi-Fi 6 and 6E beyond the
additional spectrum:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fHrKaEB_fk

(Kudos to Anders Nilsson from SUNET for pointing me to it.)
-- 
Simon.

---

From: Alexandre Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2021 10:29:26 +0100

Le 06/01/2021 à 15:19, Simon Leinen a écrit :
>>> Thanks for the comments. I found this link on Wi-Fi Alliance web 
>>> site: https://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-certified-6 
>>> <https://www.wi-fi.org/discover-wi-fi/wi-fi-certified-6> which 
>>> says that Wi-Fi 6E extends Wi-Fi Certified 6 into 6Ghz all based 
>>> on 802.11ax.
> 
> In the EU (should be ratified this month(?) and passed into member 
> state law over the subsequent six months):
> 
> 5.925 GHz to 6.425 GHz

5.925MHz?

Wouldn't that would overstep the ITS spectrum which was recently
extended up to 5.935MHz as per
> Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2020/1426 of 7 October 2020 on 
> the harmonised use of radio spectrum in the 5 875-5 935 MHz
> frequency band for safety-related applications of intelligent
> transport systems (ITS) and repealing Decision 2008/671/EC (notified
> under document C(2020) 6773) (Text with EEA relevance)

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1602230223168&uri=CELEX:32020D1426

ITS spectrum is for a WiFi used in OCB mode which stands for Outside the
Context of a BSSID; this means, for example, in that WiFi there is no
Association Req or Resp messages.  It was typically done in the
5.875-5.925MHz range, but now up to 5.935MHz.

Of maybe WiFi 6E wants to cover ITS as well.

Alex

> 
> ...so, at least initially, only half the amount of spectrum (the 
> "lower half").  Maybe more later, who knows.
> 
> Sorry for the US/EU-centricism.  I'm not quite sure what's happening 
> in other countries, except that the Ofcom in the UK already stated 
> their support for Wi-Fi 6E, also in the "lower half" range.  "Ask 
> your local regulator", or look for information on the Internet.
> 
> spectrum regulation status, again in particular in the US and 
> (EU/CEPT) Europe, and some technical differences between Wi-Fi 6 and 
> 6E beyond the additional spectrum:
>

---

From: Simon Leinen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2021 11:22:26 +0100

> https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1602230223168&uri=CELEX:32020D1426

Interesting, I was unaware of this ITS assignment.

The diagrams in Chuck Lukaszewski's presentation show that both the US
and the EU versions of the Wi-Fi 6E ranges start with 20MHz of "guard
band", so this assignemnt should be safe; and the frequencies actually
usable for Wi-Fi 6E communications only start at 5.945 GHz.  Sorry for
the confusion.
-- 
Simon.

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2021 15:08:03 +0000

Dear all,
on the other hand there are nearly almost multiple services and applications allocated to a frequency band as can be seen at https://efis.cept.org/sitecontent.jsp?sitecontent=ecatable for Europe (again)
https://www.6gworld.com/exclusives/wi-fi-to-symbiotically-share-wireless-ecosystem-with-5g-6g/
Viele Grüße / Best Regards
Dirk 

-----Original Message-----
From: 6gip <[email-masked]> On Behalf Of Simon Leinen
Sent: Donnerstag, 7. Januar 2021 11:22
To: Alexandre Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Cc: [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [6gip] Wi-Fi 6E

>> the harmonised use of radio spectrum in the 5 875-5 935 MHz frequency 
>> band for safety-related applications of intelligent transport systems 
>> (ITS) and repealing Decision 2008/671/EC (notified under document 
>> C(2020) 6773) (Text with EEA relevance)

The diagrams in Chuck Lukaszewski's presentation show that both the US and the EU versions of the Wi-Fi 6E ranges start with 20MHz of "guard band", so this assignemnt should be safe; and the frequencies actually usable for Wi-Fi 6E communications only start at 5.945 GHz.  Sorry for the confusion.
--
Simon.

> ITS spectrum is for a WiFi used in OCB mode which stands for Outside 
> the Context of a BSSID; this means, for example, in that WiFi there is 
> no Association Req or Resp messages.  It was typically done in the

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2021 15:17:37 +0000

Sorry for too early submission: What I wanted to write is
Dear all,
on the other hand there are nearly almost multiple services and applications allocated to a frequency band as can be seen at https://efis.cept.org/sitecontent.jsp?sitecontent=ecatable for Europe (again) and corresponding studies on  
harmonization and interference mitigation are under way as can be seen e.g. in ETSI TR https://www.etsi.org/deliver/etsi_tr/103600_103699/103631/01.01.01_60/tr_103631v010101p.pdf
and BTW there is an interesting article on 6G and 6E to be found here:
https://www.6gworld.com/exclusives/wi-fi-to-symbiotically-share-wireless-ecosystem-with-5g-6g/
My 2 cents
Best Regards
Dirk
-----Original Message-----
From: 6gip <[email-masked]> On Behalf Of von Hugo, Dirk
Sent: Donnerstag, 7. Januar 2021 16:08
To: [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Cc: [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [6gip] Wi-Fi 6E

Dear all,
on the other hand there are nearly almost multiple services and applications allocated to a frequency band as can be seen at https://efis.cept.org/sitecontent.jsp?sitecontent=ecatable for Europe (again) https://www.6gworld.com/exclusives/wi-fi-to-symbiotically-share-wireless-ecosystem-with-5g-6g/
Viele Grüße / Best Regards
Dirk

---

From: Alexandre Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2021 18:41:40 +0100

> on the other hand there are nearly almost multiple services and applications allocated to a frequency band as can be seen at https://efis.cept.org/sitecontent.jsp?sitecontent=ecatable for Europe (a…

It is very interesting to see how that EU document considers
5.925MHz-6.700MHz range to be allocated for satellite EN 301 447.  Not 
only it contradicts another document considering ITS to be up to 
5.935MHz but it also covers something that WiFi 6E considers to be for 
itself.

I think this is subject to debate and could be solved.

Without a clean and agreed spectrum allocation scheme we can not dream 
about 5Gb/s WiFi with 160MHz channel widths without tresspassing some 
law.  Without that scheme we can not further dream about putting IP on 
it and IP-enabled applications and the future of networking with 
instantant 3D holograms transmitted across the Internet.

Right spectrum maps are a pre-requisite for the networking layer to 
function properly.

Then we could also think about an IP based mechanism that could exchange 
IP messages on a largely agreed 2.4GHz channel to negotiate dynamically 
that spectrum map.  Maybe some work at IETF already addressed this?

Alex

and corresponding studies on