Brian O'Rourke, Principal Analyst for the Scottsdale, AZ-based research firm, In-Stat, predicts that 802.11n Wi-Fi will dominate the wireless HD video market "at least for the next several years."

That would be bad news for the three other technologies competing for wireless delivery of HD signals: Wireless Home Digital Interface (WHDI), WirelessHD, and Ultrawideband (UWB).

"802.11n ... promises data rates above 100Mbps and is backwards compatible," says O'Rourke. "The installed base of Wi-Fi is immense, and effectively includes all mobile PCs, many mobile phones and a wide variety of CE devices."

This ubiquity is the main reason why O'Rourke feels 802.11n has the inside track. He does concede that expense is a serious drawback. This newest incarnation of Wi-Fi requires codec technology on both ends to transmit HD video: neither WHDI nor WirelessHD require codecs. But WHDI and WirelessHD are expensive in their own right, and worse, they're power-hungry, "which is generally not a recipe for quick market success."

As for the third contender, In-Stat says it has research suggesting that many chip companies are leaving the UWB market in late 2008 and 2009, and that it will not be a major factor in the consumer electronics market.

The stakes are high: nearly 24 million digital TVs will ship with some type of Wireless HD video technology in 2013. "WHDI and WirelessHD will see a slow start, with fewer than eight million devices with those technologies shipped in 2013," predicts In-Stat.

The research, "Wireless HD Video Technologies 2009: WHDI, WirelessHD, 802.11n, and UWB All Test the Waters" will be published shortly. For more information, visit: www.instat.com.

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