TRENDnet outs first 450Mbps wireless router

Wireless-N routers with the ceiling speed of 450Mbps (as opposed to the existing 300Mbps) were first talked about at CES 2009. Trendnet announced Tuesday that it's set to ship the TEW-691GR, the very first 450Mbps Wireless-N Gigabit router on the market.

The TEW-691GR comes with three antennas; each broadcasts in three spatial streams and produces a ceiling throughput speed of 450Mbps, which is 50 percent faster than exciting dual-stream Wireless-N routers.

The TEW-691GR, however, is just a single-band router, supporting only the 2.4GHz band. It also shares a similar set of networking features as other Trendnet routers, such as the TrendNet TEW-673GRU and the Trendnet TEW-639GR .

To totally take advantage of the new speed, users need adapters that support the same three-stream standard. Currently, only Intel's integrated 5300 wireless chip (used in laptops) offers this. Nonetheless, the router is compatible with all existing 2.4 GHz WI-FI clients.

Trendnet says it will also launch new USB and PCIe-based three-stream Wireless-N adapters by the end of the year. The company claims, however, that the new TEW-691GR also helps in maintaining high throughput speeds when used with multiple dual-stream wireless-N and legacy Wireless-G clients.

The TEW-691GR router will be available for purchase shorty for an estimated price of $199.