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Alrighty! will this is a big subject, so were do I begin.

WiMAX or HypeMAX as it is starting to be called before it ever see the light of day. Currently there is no WiMAX ready equipment at this point. The closest and what maybe the standard used for WiMAX is Wi-Lan's Libra MX 3000 series. Which uses the Licensed 3.5GHZ Frequency. Its a good product if you can afford, which few can.

How is WiMAX going to affect current and future Wireless? Currently 80% of WISP operate in rural areas of the country. Most were excited when the first few rounds of marketing propangda came out about WiMAX. It promises higher speeds over long distances with better non line of site coverage. Plus each radio(Access Point) is suppose to handle multiple channels where as the current 802.11a/b/g handles one. This is pretty cool in that you can then setup a Virtual Lan for each channel and partition bandwidth for each VLan. But some downsides are already becoming apparent. WiMAX equipment is going to be very expensive. To expensive in fact for most WISP to implement. If they do it will be for replacing 802.11a 5.8GHZ backhauls. This is the reason why WiMAX Manufacturers are heavily marketing Cellular companies.

Cellular companies are already looking for a 4G service to implement. 3G just didn't live up to its hype. Everthing is going to an IP based network. So Cellular companies are looking to switch to WiMAX and combine different services. So most likely the current and future WISP will be left out in the cold. If you want to start your own WISP today. It would cost you around $10,000 to $25,000. Depending on what exactly you are doing. With WiMAX you can expect to need a lot more and get the "you do not have enough sales to qualify buying our product" mentality from the manufacturers.

But the good news is that by the time that WiMAX becomes certified WiFi will have new standards that could possibly void anything WiMAX promises to do. Airgo's MIMO will most likely be used for the 802.11n standard which will allow for the first time to have multiple channels on one radio. Belkin already uses this in their Pre-N AP. I could go on, but there is to much to cover. WiMAX at best may not come out until begining of 2006 along with 802.11n. From the reports of WISPs testing WiMAX out, it doesn't look good. So time for product maturing is going to be needed. This will give WiFi some more life since it is a mature product and is already adapting most of the features of WiMAX.