What is the difference between the Atheros QCA6164, QCA6174, and QCA61x4 cards?

Question

In Launchpad bug #1436940, the names QCA6164, QCA6174, and QCA61x4 are all used.

According to https://wikidevi.com/wiki/Qualcomm_Atheros, the QCA6164 has the MIMO config 1x1:1, while the QCA6174 has the MIMO config 2x2:2. What effect does this difference have?

Also, which one has the PCI ID 168c:0041? (It appears that one of them has the PCI ID 168c:003e.)

Answer 1

These are different wireless chips.

The ids are:

QCA988X   168c:003c
QCA6164   168c:0041
QCA6174   168c:003e
QCA99X0   168c:0040
QCA9377   168c:0042

The difference of 1x1 and 2x2 MIMO is off-topic here. But it can be easily found. Short answer 2x2 should be faster in most cases.

Answer 2

6164 (1x1) has maximum speed of 150Mbps for 11n and 433Mbps for 11ac and 6174 (2x2) has maximum speed of 300Mbps (150x2) for 11n, and 866Mbps (433x2) for 11ac.