Broadcom Corp., Irvine, Calif. is apparently about to take home wireless to new heights of speed and operability with chips that enable routers to reach 125 Mbps throughput over the 802.11g standard. While Broadcom isnt talking yet, one of its licensees has already announced plans to release a four-port model at Januarys Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

As the first major player to go public, Buffalo Technology Inc., Austin, Texas, announced Thursday that it will demo its wireless CATV/DSL router with 4-port switch on the CES showfloor. At 125 Mbps, the router would be the fastest 802.11g model on the market. The current speed leader, the Super-G technology from Atheros Communications Inc., Sunnyvale, Calif. is capable of 108Mbps, according to the manufacturer.

The spokeswoman for Buffalo also said that Linksys, Irvine, Calif. and Belkin Corp., Compton, Calif. use Broadcoms 11g chipset technology. She went on to say that routers and wireless cards based on the Broadcom 125 Mbps technology should be interoperable.

Thats good news for home networkers; barring any proprietary hurdles, they should be able to mix and match products from the three companies in the same network with full interoperability and speed.

Linksys declined to comment on any plans for wireless routers based on Broadcom technology. Broadcom also declined to comment. Belkin representatives did not immediately respond to requests for information.