Connect: Wi-Fi test lab tour
- Interoperability testing against +230 access points, during 12 hours of connecting, running multiple use cases
- Robustness and stability tests to ensure consistent resiliency in congested environments
- Wi-Fi Alliance (WFA) pre-certification tests
Resources
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Hello. Welcome to the TI facility here in Israel. I'm Naomi Heller. I manage the Wi-Fi business line for TI Wi-Fi connectivity. I have with me Yael Oz, who manages our testing. Yael, can you tell us a bit about where we are and what do we do here?
Hi, Naomi. We are in our main testing and interoperability lab. This is a big chamber where we test our performance of our Wi-Fi products against hundreds of different worldwide access points.
So what is the goal of this test? Why do we perform them?
Our goal is to provide the most reliable Wi-Fi connectivity experience on all our smart products that uses TI Wi-Fi solution. Given our decades of experience with Wi-Fi connectivity, we understand that interoperability is a key factor in our customers' product decision since it directly influences the end-user experience. We set a goal for all our devices to work in any environment in any place in the world. If you purchase a Wi-Fi product, you would expect it to work smoothly at your home, right?
Yeah.
So we want to assure our customers will have a robust and stable connection that will withstand the test of time. An interesting example here is power consumption. One of the key differences between access points can be how much power a connected Wi-Fi station uses. We optimized our parameters and embedded a proprietary learning algorithm in our device in order to save power and enable years of battery life in our Wi-Fi solutions.
Interesting. So the expertise in Wi-Fi access point behavior brings both network reliability and also optimization to the best user experience that we can possibly have. So what types of testing do we do here?
Our Wi-Fi devices go through an extensive suite of tests beyond hardware validation and hardware performance. For instance, here in this IOP lab, we run interoperability tests with more than 230 access points. During 12 hours of connection, we are running multiple use cases that mimic real-life scenarios and unexpected events.
Also, we run robustness and stability tests to ensure a consistent resiliency, even in congested environment for long periods of time. We're talking about days or weeks. And also, let's not forget the Wi-Fi Alliance Pre-Certification Test. WFA Certification provides added confidence of reliable interoperability between Wi-Fi solutions, even when the standard evolves.
We have many tests covered in our testing documentation, but the question was what is running in here, in this chamber, so I would like to focus on two things. The first one is research. Connection time improvement, power optimization, analysis of differences between access points, and adapt our solution to those. And the second one is user experience, connection, data traffic, power, long duration tests, and work in loaded environments.
Hmm. Definitely an extensive test suite. So why is reliability important to connectivity, specifically Wi-Fi connectivity?
To put it simply, we want our Wi-Fi-based products to stay connected with a dependable, consistent performance. While it's one thing to design a Wi-Fi device, but we also want to think about the old environment it will operate within. People might not be aware, but each access point behaves differently. If adaptations are not made within the Wi-Fi solution, the end user will experience frequent disconnections. We want to make sure our Wi-Fi devices can handle any irregular behavior. By testing our Wi-Fi devices with so many access points, we aim to anticipate and address the majority of all potential issues.
Hmm. So thank you, Yael. Is there anything else to add?
Yes. I invite you to take a look in our testing documentation on the link on the screen. There, you can find the full coverage of our testing effort and have confidence in TI Wi-Fi products.
Thank you, Yael. And thank you for joining.
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