It seems that Brits favor WiFi more than WiMax. So as not to leave you in the dark, these two are very different from each other -- WiMax stands for Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access by the WiMAX Forum, formed in April 2001 to promote conformance and interoperability of the standard IEEE 802.16, also known as WirelessMAN. The Forum describes WiMAX as "a standards-based technology enabling the delivery of last mile wireless broadband access as an alternative to cable and DSL."

On the other hand, WiFi is a brand originally licensed by the Wi-Fi Alliance to describe the underlying technology of wireless local area networks (WLAN) based on the IEEE 802.11 specifications. A person with a WiFi device, be it a computer, telephone, or PDA, can connect to the Internet when in proximity of an access point. The region covered by one or several access points is called a hotspot. Hotspots can range from a single room to many square miles of overlapping hotspots. Wi-Fi can also be used to create a Wireless mesh network.

The usual problems of Wi-Fi won't be seen in WiMax. In WiMax, networks can grow but users could still maintain usable bandwidth, and interference just doesn't occur. So from that alone, you'd think that WiMax is better than WiFi. But according to some educated opinions, WiMax just won't work in the UK. The reason? Issues in spectrum allocations. There is no uniform global licensed spectrum for WiMAX which equates to the fact that WiMAX has no in-built interference protection. It will assume any other network it comes across is part of the same network and, if it isn't, the network is likely to die, resulting in horrendous data loss.

That isn't the case for WiFi since WiFi networks are friendly towards each other, in the sense that if there is interference from another WiFi network, each will try and ignore the other or at least minimize the interference they cause each other. With that, even if British WiMax players such as PCCW and Pipex have spectrum that could power WiMax, it is most likely that when the two companies will launch services, they'll be delivering "private" networks and WiMAX for the masses is unlikely to happen, unless more spectrum is released.