With the 802.11n draft standard complete, 802.11n based products have been showing up on the market from all the major players. According to the version 1.0 of the draft standard, 802.11n supports link speeds of 150 Mbps and 300 Mbps -- the devices tested by eWeek offered as much as 112.17 Mbps of real-world full-duplex traffic.

But while the performance gains over 802.11g products are quite remarkable, there are many caveats to this performance. For one thing, with the current draft standard, compatibility with legacy networks is a problem. eWeek's testing showed that performance of the Linksys 802.11n gear dropped to below 40 Mbps when legacy wireless devices were detected. The Linksys router tested also caused performance issues with legacy 802.11g devices even causing one router to drop its clients. And to top things off, 802.11n draft standard products are well over $200 for a router and accompanying client adapter -- that's a pretty penny for a product that is not even guaranteed to be upgradeable to the final 802.11n spec. From eWeek:

With this uncertainty in mind, it is not advisable to invest in these products lock, stock and barrel. Enterprise-grade WLAN manufacturers continue to wait for the standard to fully bake, and enterprise customers should do the same. Like the Airgo MIMO-based products we've tested during the last year and a half, draft 11n products should be considered only for highly specific needs requiring a fast wireless connection. And buyers should not yet expect the products to support the standard down the road.