W hile it’s very clear that the core objective for wireless overall is to duplicate the
capabilities and performance of wire, such also serves to highlight the essential
differences between these two as interconnect and access technologies. Wire and
cable (and especially fiber) represent a nice, neat, contained electromagnetic domain that,
when properly deployed, is (a) resistant if not immune to externalities like RF interference and
electromagnetic-wave propagation challenges, and (b) has a high likelihood that a signal
placed on one end will appear at the other. Radio, on the other hand, is fundamentally statistical
in nature, and is consequently much more challenging - signal fading, interference, limitations
on transmit power, ever-greater application requirements for higher throughput and network
capacity, noise (as measured by the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at any given moment in
time), and client motion all affect how well wireless can in fac