WLAN :: AR9382

Atheros XSPAN® Technology

Atheros offers the industry's most innovative and complete portfolio of 802.11n wireless LAN chip solutions. This generation of Atheros’ XSPAN 802.11n technology builds upon the company’s XSPAN leadership – with enhanced performance, higher integration, smaller form factors and lower overall cost – to meet the needs of the rapidly growing 802.11n market. Like all Atheros' 11n solutions, the new fourth- generation solutions are compliant to the IEEE 802.11n specification.

Atheros fourth-generation XSPAN chips feature:

  • Leading Integration that delivers end-product cost and form factors to drive broad market adoption of 802.11n products;
  • Single- and Dual-Band, and Multiple MIMO Configurations that enable OEMs to balance product price/performance for specific applications and market segment requirements;
  • Rich Media & Peripheral Interfaces that anticipate the requirements for advanced media networking applications and allow end-product feature differentiation;
  • Easy Network Setup the industry’s simple network configuration software that supports both the PIN and push-button setup methods.

Product Overview

AR9382 is the single-chip, dual-band (2.4/5 GHz), 2-stream 11n solution with PCIe interface. It packs the breakthrough Signal-Sustain Technology (SST) technology that enhances rate-over-range performance. SST is a set of advanced technologies and features enabled by 802.11n including LDPC, TxBF and MLD. The end result is an impressive increase in rate-over-range of ~+100% at short range, ~+50% at mid range and ~+25% at long range.

To reduce the manufacturing cost, the AR9382 has successfully integrated external components such as both the 2.4/5 GHz LNA and PA, switching regulators and EEPROMs. It has dramatically reduced the RBOM and has made the board manufacturing easy and simple.

Despite its mighty performance and high degree of integration, AR9382 consumes even less power in every operation mode – active TX, active RX, idle associated and sleep than the previous generation solution. It keeps the notebook and other computing platforms running much longer on a single battery-charge, while providing TCP throughput of more than 200 Mbps when used in 2x2 mode.

AR9382 is also optimized for Atheros Direct ConnectTM P2P applications. With its Fast Channel Switch (FCS) feature, the channel switching time between the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands is reduced from 10 ms to as little as 1 ms.

Solution Highlights

  • Single-chip, 802.11n-certified wireless LAN client solution with integrated MAC, baseband and 2.4/5 GHz radios
  • Based on Atheros' fourth-generation 802.11n technology
  • Support for 2-stream MIMO
  • Conserves power with 1x1 downshift, using Dynamic MIMO Power Save
  • Enables PHY rates of up to 300 Mbps
  • Compliant with IEEE 802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11d, 802.11e, 802.11i, and 802.11n
  • Lead-free RoHS compliant
  • Signal-Sustain Technology (SST) rate-over-range enhancements: LDPC, MLD, TxBF

Download
Product
Bulletin