Kickstarter currently has a project for the "Portal", a router advertising "turbocharged" wifi.

If I'm reading it right, I think it is just able to utilise some of the mid-range channels/frequencies in the 5Ghz range that you can only use if DFS (dynamic frequency selection) is used - channels 50 through 140-ish. Through some cleverness, the Portal can switch between these relatively under-used frequencies. According to the FAQ, "Even the most expensive enterprise-class routers are only able to provide access to ONE channel that can be shared with radar", whereas "Portal is able to provide access to ALL of the channels that can be shared with radar. Channels are monitored for WiFi and LTE traffic, as well as radar, and can move back and forth to avoid radar and interference whenever necessary".

I'm curious as to (a) whether I've read this right and (b) whether you would need special hardware at the PC/tablet/phone/other client to make full use of this? Or do standard 5GHz cards include the ability to utilise such bits of the spectrum and it's just the routers that haven't been?

Any real world benefits in NZ? Certainly we've got no issues at our place in the 5Ghz (and even 2.4 isn't that bad).

It seems to be based on OpenWRT, so if it's clever software instead of hardware might feed back into the open source community.

I'm not a buyer/backer. Even if I wanted to play fun and games with freight forwarders (it only ships to North America) I'm well aware that RSM might come knocking if I'm using some funky non-certified device. Just curious as to how it works.