- The transceiver reaches 15 GB/s, far exceeding the bandwidth of existing consumer wireless systems.
- Analog signal processing dramatically reduces power consumption and maintains extreme data rates.
- Three synchronized sub-transmitters replace conventional DACs and consume only 230 milliwatts.
A new wireless transceiver has achieved data rates exceeding those of current consumer wireless systems under practical operating conditions.
Researchers at the University of California, Irvine, have reported a wireless transceiver that operates in the 140 GHz range and can move data at approximately 120 Gbps.
That transfer rate translates to approximately 15 GB/s, far exceeding consumers’ current wireless limits.
Taking data speeds beyond traditional limits
Wi-Fi 7 is theoretically limited to about 3.75 GB/s (30 Gbps), while 5G mmWave reaches about 0.625 GB/s (5 Gbps).
This puts the new transceiver’s 15GB/s (120Gbps) performance at about 300% better than Wi-Fi 7 and about 2,300% better than 5G mmWave.
A central issue addressed by the researchers is the large power demands associated with the digital-to-analog converters used in traditional transmitters.
At extremely high frequencies, these components become complex, inefficient, and difficult to scale for mobile devices.
The team describes this limitation as a DAC bottleneck that limits further speed increases.
Its alternative design replaces a single high-speed converter with three synchronized sub-transmitters that operate together and consume only 230 mW.
A digital converter capable of similar performance would consume several watts, making it impractical for battery-powered hardware.
If traditional methods were used, the battery life of next-generation devices could be reduced to minutes.
Instead of introducing more calculations into digital circuitry, the system performs key signal operations in the analog domain.
This approach reduces power usage while supporting very high data rates. The future may favor analog methods, at least in the sense that analog computing offers a practical solution.
This transceiver is designed as a single integrated chip rather than a collection of discrete components.
The chip is fabricated in silicon using a 22nm fully depleted silicon-on-insulator process, avoiding the manufacturing complexity associated with edge nodes.
This approach is simpler than the 2nm or 18A nodes used by TSMC and Samsung.
It reduces manufacturing difficulty and can facilitate large-scale production compared to experimental technologies linked to smaller geometries.
The reported speeds are close to those of fiber links commonly deployed in data centers, opening the possibility of short-range wireless replacements for extensive cabling.
Reducing cabling could reduce installation costs and improve flexibility in very compact server environments.
However, physics still imposes limits. Current 5G millimeter wave systems, which can reach up to 71 GHz, already suffer from short transmission ranges of about 300 meters.
Operation at even higher frequencies is likely to further reduce coverage, so any widespread deployment would require dense infrastructure and careful planning.
This demonstration shows what can be achieved technically, but practical adoption will depend on range extension, interference management and integration into existing networks.
Through Tom Hardware
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