eWeek reports that Intel's new desktop CPU system won't have Wi-Fi at launch: Intel had been talking up its "Grantsdale" chipset's ability to act as a Wi-Fi software access point for months, but now won't be able to include Wi-Fi at all in the shipping version. They expect to provide a separate PCI card late in the year to enable Wi-Fi and this function. The idea that purchasers of a desktop system will have to return to the trough and then install an internal PCI card is, of course, ludicrous for most consumers--including business IT professionals who don't want to buy a system that lacks a critical function.
Intel's gap leaves the door wide open for competitors like Broadcom, which already ate Intel's lunch on the laptop side, and has been a serious provider of integrated modules that include gigabit Ethernet, a 56K modem, and 802.11g Wi-Fi. Will Dell and others who turned to Broadcom for laptop Wi-Fi turn to them for the desktop version, too? At least there will be a flurry of competition among the several chipmakers who can supply the market.
This delay is another major stumble for Intel, which came late to the Wi-Fi party with Centrino, shipping 802.11b-only radios a year ago spring with that laptop system, after having promised 802.11a options. Then, with 802.11a, and a/g radios scheduled for 2003, was unable to provide them. At this writing, the Centrino successor Dothan still hasn't appeared on the market in a big way, with manufacturers shipping their first models based on it just this week with 802.11g only.