A 5G revolution is coming, delivering faster speeds than even the NBN can deliver, so how will you get those speeds at home? D-Link might have an answer.
As the rollout of a fifth generation mobile network gets underway in places beyond a handful of spots in Queensland, it becomes pretty clear that Australian telcos will be talking 5G this year. It’s hardly no surprise, mind you, as this is the next step in Australian mobile connections, offering unparalleled speed that transcends the 2Gbps mark.
At that point, we’re well and truly beyond what the current wired network of the National Broadband Network — the NBN — can offer, but there aren’t any devices to push those speeds at home.
There isn’t actually an available 5G network plan, but that’s not the point: when the devices come out, the plans will follow.
So we need devices, and that means phones, tablets, wireless hotspots, and more.
In that last category, D-Link is showing something at CES made for the home, building a 5G WiFi router made to leave in a home or office.
D-Link is calling it the DWR-2010, but if you excuse the model number’s ambiguity, you’ll find it’s a 802.11ac/n WiFi access point with 5G support inside, meaning it can access the internet using 5G and spread that across to other devices at home.
D-Link’s DWR-2010 also has a Gigabit Ethernet port for even faster connections if you need to go wired, and it also supports D-Link’s WiFi Mesh technology as seen in the Covr models from last year, meaning it should be able to slip right into an already established D-Link mesh network and bolster the speed of that network, or even downright switch.
You will need a 5G plan to take advantage of this, which means support of the telcos that have 5G, so this is likely a concept that will be coming in the distance, and one that might cost you more than you bargained for. Not necessarily for the DWR-2010 5G router itself, mind you, though D-Link hasn’t provided price or availability options. Rather, the heavy price might be due to the amount and cost of 5G data at least in the beginning.
As to its release, however, we’ll check with D-Link’s local arm to find out whether the DWR-2010 is slated for release in Australia, which could also provide an indication as to when the 5G revolution is due to really kick off locally.
