Along with super-fast connection speeds, the new wireless router will come with other features like simple installation, advanced security and superior over-all design, according to the report. Priced at £90, the new version of Home Hub wireless router will be free for the customers of BT Total Broadband Option 3, while the other BT customers can buy the new router at half price (£45).

John, MD of BT Retail said:
“The new Hub will give you up to twice the wireless range of our competitors – giving our customers much more coverage in the home, even in those ‘difficult-to-reach’ areas, and more freedom to use their broadband wirelessly from wherever they want – whether in the living room, bedroom or even in a garden.

The ‘N’ standard technology also helps to prevent your wireless connection from annoyingly disappearing by providing a much more efficient wireless signal. Put simply, our new Home Hub reaches the parts other hubs cannot reach.”

As for details, the new Hub wireless router will use the latest WPA security feature to provide better security to the users. The advanced security settings will help the BT customers to protect themselves from hackers and unauthorized access.

Likewise, the new Power Save feature that comes with this router will switch off the wireless internet access while the router is not in use, thus saving more than one-fifths of power consumption.

According to the report, the majority of the broadband users (59 %) in the households use wi-fi home networking while it is interesting to note that most of the respondents (96 %) have a PC of their own and use it for their computing needs.

Among the respondents who have adopted to wi-fi network, one-thirds of them have connected the printers and one-fifths of them included the game consoles using the wi-fi networking hardware, according to the survey. However, only six percent of the respondents connected their music players to the wireless network.

As for using wireless networking to access the contents from their homes, significant part of the respondents (37 %) felt that the complexity of the technical information has been an issue and prevented them from taking advantages of the wireless technology. However, one-fourths of the respondents felt that the higher cost has prevented them from setting up wi-fi networking in their homes.

Chris Dobrec, Director of Linksys Strategy and Business Development commented:
The research shows that wireless networking is now a mass market technology – and not only for the tech savvy consumer. That very same consumer is the owner of their network and tools like our Linksys EasyLink Advisor help the consumer make sure that the network fulfils their expectations.

The consumer is by no means a computer network administrator – he or she is purely interested in the application of the network for tasks like accessing the internet wirelessly or printing wirelessly. It is the application that counts and we enable this through the network as the platform.

Currently, 802.11g which can offer up to 54 Mbps speeds, has been widely used by the wireless customers. The new wireless standard ‘n’ is yet to be approved by the IEE body as the manufacturers have not arrived at any consensus so far. However, the ‘n’ spec which can offer speeds up to 100 Mbps has been considered as the more reliable wireless technology by many users. It is believed that 802.11n will be approved in 2009 and is expected to replace the ‘g’ spec and become the next generation wireless standard in the coming years.

Meanwhile, some manufacturers offer wireless ‘n’ products which are not approved by the IEE standard. The consumers who buy these products may face compatibility issues when the final version of 802.11g hits the market.

Stan Schatt, the vice president of ABI Research commented:

“802.11n will become the default Wi-Fi technology of choice as equipment vendors include it in their new products. The real market growth will kick in when sufficient numbers of consumers have 802.11n capabilities embedded in their new laptop and desktop computers. We anticipate the greatest adoption to take place in the 2009-2010 timeframe.

While some larger organizations remain initially wary because ‘n’ is still a draft with ratification of the final standard expected next year, companies with workgroups that need 802.11n’s extra speed, range, and robustness may push ahead in a piecemeal fashion.”

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Some of the users of BT Home Hub wireless routers seemed to have such security problems regularly that made BT broadband provider to issue a statement on how to protect their wirless network efficiently by taking some precautions.

The statement which is featured in digital-lifestyles.info seems to reassure the BT customers that BT Home Hub comes with security features that can provide secured internet connection for majoirty of the customers. However, BT has given a few instrutions to its customers that can foolproof their Hub when any such problem arises.

BT statement on Home Hub wireless security

“Customers with enquiries on how to further protect their network will be directed to www.bt.com/help/hub, which gives detail of a number of precautionary actions that can be taken to help increase their on-line security. These include:
Changing the default wireless key and the encryption type from WEP to WPA.
Changing the admin login password of the Hub Manager. Leaving the Hub switched-on at all times, including overnight to benefit from firmware updates as they become available.
Having AV and firewall software installed on all computers.
Being wary of unknown web sites and e-mails from unknown sources, including invalid security certificates.”

However, the customers will be able send and receive business data using a separate connection with prioritized traffic. To enable the Office Hub and separate connection for transfer of business data, BT will bring out new version of BT Office Hub in the next few months.

When the new service is launched, the business broadband customers can use their BT Openzone free minutes which are included in their business broadband packages. The service will also enable BT Total broadband customers and who have subscribed to BT FON wi-fi service to access wi-fi using BT Hub wireless router turned to wi-fi hotspot.

The statement from BT shows that there are over 170,000 customers who have subscribed to their broadband services which come with three options and provide free wi-fi access with up to 500 BT Openzone free wi-fi minutes. Currently, BT broadband customers get wi-fi access via BT Openzone wi-fi hotspots which are estimated to be over 2,500 in the UK. With the number of BT FON wireless broadband subscribers crossing over 70,000, BT Openzone expects that the new service will boost the sales of wi-fi vouchers as well as help expand its reach to many areas in the UK.