In order to make your Internet more enjoyable, what have routers experienced over the years?

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It has to be said that the development of the Internet is really rapid. When I was in junior high school, I was still using Tencent 3G version to "watch online" text broadcasts of events such as the NBA. Now, as long as the broadband at home is strong, online 4K is not a problem (although the bit rate of many online videos is far from the level of true 4K). This also indirectly confirms the substantial improvement of the Internet.

Between broadband operators and people who actually use the Internet, routers can be said to be one of the most important roles. Of course, optical modems are also one of them. As a dedicated intelligent network device that reads the address in each data packet and then decides how to transmit it, routers play the role of network gateways. By forwarding and exchanging a lot of information on the network, that is, routing technology, it meets the general public's comprehensive application of data, voice and images, and promotes and promotes the development of the entire Internet and network technology.

It can be said that routers form the backbone of the Internet. Its processing speed is one of the main bottlenecks of network communication, and its reliability directly affects the quality of network interconnection. Therefore, in the field of campus networks, regional networks, and even the entire Internet research, router technology has always been at the core, and its development history and direction have become a microcosm of the entire Internet research.

As the nominal first-generation router, AGS, officially launched by Cisco in 1986, was mainly responsible for connecting incompatible computer networks in universities before its launch. Even after its official release, it was mainly used to connect scientific research and educational institutions as well as enterprises to the Internet. The function of a router can be realized by connecting multiple network cards to one computer, and the CPU is responsible for routing mobile phones, forwarding processing, device management, etc.

The second generation of routers emerged with the increase in network traffic, mainly to solve the increasing burden on the CPU and bus. Due to the significant improvement in forwarding performance, they can also provide a variety of connection methods and interface density based on the specific network environment, and have been widely used in the Internet and enterprise networks.

In the 1990s, the emergence of Web technology led to the rapid development of IP networks, and the content that users accessed online was greatly enriched. In order to cope with this situation, a fully distributed structure, that is, the third-generation router with a technology that separates routing and forwarding, was developed. The third-generation router is responsible for the management of the entire device and the collection and calculation of routes through the main control board. The data forwarding between the bus and service boards is completely independent of the main control board, achieving parallel high-speed processing, which doubles the processing performance of the router.

In the mid-to-late 1990s, with the commercialization of IP networks, routers implemented using ASICs also emerged, which included complex operations such as QoS assurance, route lookup, and stripping/adding of layer 2 frame headers. These were also early gigabit switching routers.

After the millennium, various new technologies such as network management, user management, service management, MPLS, VPN, controllable multicast, IP-QoS and traffic engineering have been added to routers. Programmable network processor technology designed specifically for IP networks is used to process key IP business processes, making routers more powerful.

Along with the progress of routers, Wi-Fi technology has also been developed. Since the godfather of Wi-Fi, Michael Marcus, proposed to the FCC to open up the unlicensed spectrum to the industry and increase the transmission power of unlicensed spectrum devices, manufacturers have begun to formulate relevant standards. In 1991, NCR's engineering team and its joint venture partner AT&T developed WaveLAN technology in the Netherlands. This technology is considered to be the prototype of Wi-Fi. Later, the standard versions of IEEE 802.11, 802.11b and 802.11a, were approved, and WECA also named this technology "Wi-Fi". In addition, Apple introduced Wi-Fi function for the first time in its new generation of iBook laptops, allowing this technology to be displayed to the public.

Since then, Wi-Fi technology has become a new technology that all major manufacturers are eager to adopt, and has entered the lives of everyone from individuals to families, from homes to public places. WECA has also launched standards such as 802.11n, 802.11ac, and 802.11ax, which are the Wi-Fi 4, Wi-Fi 5, and Wi-Fi 6 that we are familiar with later.

Today, after more than 20 years of development, the transmission speed of Wi-Fi 6 is 873 times that of the first generation of Wi-Fi. Compared with the most popular Wi-Fi 6, Wi-Fi 6 is faster, supports more concurrent devices, has lower latency, and consumes less power. Wi-Fi 6 uses OFDMA technology, which is the same as 5G. Combined with 1024-QAM high-order modulation, it can support a maximum bandwidth of 160MHz, which is nearly three times faster than WiFi 5. Intelligent frequency division technology can support more devices concurrently and increase the access device capacity by 4 times. Multiple concurrent access devices can reduce queuing, actively avoid interference coloring, and reduce latency by two-thirds. When the terminal device is on standby, it supports on-demand wake-up function, which reduces terminal power consumption by 30%.

Compared with Wi-Fi 5, Wi-Fi 6 has all-round technological advancement. Laptops, smartphones, tablets and other products launched in the second half of 2019 are already equipped with Wi-Fi 6 wireless network cards. If users upgrade their home routers to Wi-Fi routers, they can enjoy a faster Wi-Fi Internet experience.

So the question is, have you used a Wi-Fi 6 router in front of the screen?