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WiMax Landscape Taking Shape
geekee writes "A front page article in EETimes describes some of the goals, as well as some of the issues, involved in WiMax (802.16a) development. The main goal is to deliver 74Mb/s up to 50 km. One big issue is the tighter specs required when compared with WiFi. "It's a big train wreck, and much more complicated than 802.11a design, especially in terms of dynamic range, spectral range and phase noise in RF," said Colin Howlett, a senior RF engineer at VCom Inc. There are at least 4 known companies working on the RF portion and 4 known companies working on the baseband processing. These companies include Intel, Fujitsu, and Maxim. Another issue is in getting governments to agree on regulation standards for the systems, particularly in the 2.5, 3.5, and 5.8 GHz bands, Inconsistancies exist in the requirements for dynamic frequency selection and transmit power control, as well as spectrum allocation. Cost is also an important factor, since WiMax is positioning itself as an alternative to DSL and Cable, and therefore, companies must be able to offer competitve prices to gain market share."
Here is another good article on Wimax.
I could see using this for a backbone to get the signal out to fringe areas, but for the last-mile to the consumer, 802.11b(g) is more than sufficient. When they start making noise about "replacement for DSL" - well...does enough bandwidth _exist_ that it makes sense to have 50Mb/second to your house? If the internet ever gets _that_ bloated that you need that fat of a pipe, it's time to turn off the computers and go outside.
lets just hope the gear can handle that kind of bandwidth, my netgear access point says 54mbit/s, but i only get 10mbit/s sustained bandwidth. quite frankly i think they're cheating their customers putting a bandwidth label on the box when it doesnt even reach one third of it. The D-Link AP we got later wasn't much better either, only 10mbit again. I have doubts if we will see that kind of bandwidth.
WiMax is not a replacement for WiFi, it's a backbone protocol for long-haul RF connections. It'll take place on licensed bandwidth which will be illegal to try to jam, as opposed to WiFi where there's nothing stoping your neighbor from using the same frequencies...
create a wireless power standard, and I finally throw away all external cables!
It'd be pretty cool to have automatic control/readouts of things like wind/precipitation/dish aerials etc. from the weather monitors, most of which are in the middle of nowhere. With this sort of range, you can do a lot more :-)
:-)))
If the RSPB are trying to make sure no-one nicks the eggs, they just get a Tini or similar linked up to a webcam and one of these networks, and you have yourself a remote monitoring station for those rare eggs without some poor sod having to sit there for 10 weeks...
Not to mention the more normal uses, of course
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
The FCC is supposed to license on behalf of the people... not to get big money from corporations to limit the public's use. The public should be given all the bandwidth they need... not what is left over after the corporate landgrab (like the useless 2.4ghz spectrum... microwave ovens). The FCC is overstepping its duty and should be dealt with accordingly.
I want to share 74Mb/s with everyone within a 50km radius?
Sounds like a pretty crappy, easily oversold service, with crappy ping times. We already have that and it's called satellite.
Wires are the future. Wireless is for sock thumpers.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
companies include Intel, Fujitsu, and Maxim
And here I thought it was just a Playboy wanna-be with out the wit or boobs...
"Failure is not an option, it's part of the standard package"
No, 802.11 anything is not sufficient. Unless using specialized antennas at both ends, 802.11 would not even be adequate from the utility pole to the house in many circumstances. Anyone who has any experience with wireless ethernet knows that the range is never as good as it's hyped up to be, especially through walls and such.
I am feeling fat and sassy
I wouldn't have to worry about minutes
How do you know they wont charge per minute or per kilobyte?
Cells will get cheaper, and more unlimited plans will show up, because the infrastructure is there and practically paid for, they need only make up maintanaince costs..
Think how much it cost to use a cell phone in the 80s for a guesstimate at your WiMax service bill.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
First of all, This will probably not substantially increase bandwidth to target users. Though it might have a higher theoretical maximum, they simply cannot afford to offer more bandwidth than your average cable ISP already provides.
Second of all, I don't think this will necessarily have a lower cost than existing connections. Cable and telephone infrastructure already exists necessarily because of other technologies; that means that cable and dsl providers really don't have much overhead on those technologies (beyond the bandwidth and the routers, which they would need anyway).
Finally, I don't think we have to "hope" that Intel gets sufficient funding; I mean, feel free to donate, but they have enough funding to develop wimax or any other technology for the next millenium.
Beyond all that, this could be a very nice innovation for one reason; Convenience.
and 2006 to have the key mobility and roaming capabilities? If it's enough of a deal-breaker that large and small businesses are keeping their proprietary plans in play, then perhaps it's good reason to do the extra work and get (at least some of) it in now.
I wouldnt do that quite yet, especially for internal LAN use.
Network cables offer some sense of security, you cant look at the data on a network cable without physically hooking up to the cable. If you secure your cable, you secure your communication.
For wireless, you cant very well secure the sky, so it is a lot less secure.
Obviously there is encryption, but moving from wired to wireless gives the spy just one less thing to worry about.
It really doesn't matter to much in a home network, I suppose, but it's just something to think about.
*This is not backbone technology*
802.11b is not a viable access solution
802.11b does not have enough reach or capacity to service a city. Limited bandwitdh, 11 MB/sec makes deployment in highly populated areas an un-reality. Each node can realisticly support 10 or 11 households. To support densly populated areas, hundreds of nodes would be required. In addition there is no real "roaming" available with 802.11b. The G simply ups your limited bandwidth to something higher, at the cost of range. That's not really a viable solution. Finally the limited range makes deployment in rural and suburban areas an impossibility.
The way of the future
A *SINGLE* 802.16 node would be capable of hosting about 1100 64K voice over IP channels. The same bandwitdh could be used to provide appx. 140 "broadband wireless" subscribers with 512K channels. That's pretty impressive. Stack 10 Nodes and you have 1440 broadband subscribers. Not only that, 802.16 was designed as a solution for Metropolitan Area Networks. 802.16 is simply an evolution of the 802.11 technology, scaled for carrier grade deployment, and the servicing of a large number of end users.
The real last mile solution
In rural areas, and even some city suburbs the reality of "broadband" isn't coming to fruition. The primary reason is cost. It costs too much to deploy cable systems and becuause of the distance from a central office, DSL is not feasible. Satellite isn't really all that great as on of it's "Features" is the very high latency.
A new age
802.16 will begin a new wireless age. In the coming years we will find that there is no Data and Voice usage with our cellphones, as the notion of a "Data Channel" and "Voice Channel" will go away, all calls will be just data. Instead of an 802.11b card, you will have an 802.x chip built into your laptop or handheld device, you will gain access to the same network that your phone uses and the protocol to do so will be the same. We will all have access, uniquitous access to data from any place that currently has cellphone coverage. 802.16, and it's future generations will be "The way" that data networks are accessed wirelessly.
Well, say goodbye to any form of high definition content streaming to your home over IP then. Seriously, why do people even assert that more bandwidth is somehow unnecessary. There are all kinds of scenarios that exist today that can't be handled because bandwidth is such a limiting factor.
Bigger, faster, better is done in the name of progress. No one says you can't take a break from fast-paced technology by going for a hike in the woods. Hell, you can give it up entirely and live there for all I care. Just don't go around asserting that things are fine the way they are and nothing should change, it only makes you look ignorant.
-- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
No, 802.11 anything is not sufficient.
/. over the last year or two.
My personal experience differs from your statement.
Unless using specialized antennas at both ends, 802.11 would not even be adequate from the utility pole to the house in many circumstances.
The "specialized antennas" are 50 or 60 bucks each, readily available online from many sources. I've been using standard, off-the-shelf Linksys WAP11's and a couple of 24dBi directional antennas, on an 802.11b link, for the last year. I'm 1.1 miles from my source, and have full T1 speeds up and down over this link. I haven't had any outages, from wind, snow, heat, or cold (and it was -7 farenheit this morning).
802.11b is just fine, today, for last-mile solutions, without violating any FCC regulations or custom-fabricating anything. It has even been mentioned a time or 50 on
Even a pair of pringles cans could probably get you a mile.
Anyone who has any experience with wireless ethernet knows that the range is never as good as it's hyped up to be, especially through walls and such.
And yet, with a minimum of equipment, range and walls aren't relevant, for an installation which is no more complicated than installing a satellite dish.
You're not thinking big enough. I think the key word here is convergence. At really high speeds, 50 mbps for example, everything comes through the internet. Voice over ip is the first example as it requires relatively little bandwidth. Television and on demand movies are real bandwidth hogs, and will not be delivered over the internet in any meaningful fashion until bandwidth is increased greatly. When super high speed bandwidth is available, however, your telephone, radio, and tv are all going to come from the same place: the internet.
This is a very laudable goal, because democratizing the transmission medium (there will likely be lots of competition) will drive down prices on the bandwidth as well as the content. Things like customized tv packages, and niche tv offerings will take off when the internet is the transmission medium.
There is an effort to setup one of these networks in my county this year (2004). They expect to need two antennas to cover the entire county. Intel and IBM met with the public and municipal officials last week. So far, no company has offered to be the ISP, but BellSouth, Cox, and Alltel are obvious choices. Initially, service will be offered to businesses, later to residential customers. If the project goes through, Intel says this will be the first site in the United States to be covered.
Official Home Page (only looks right in IE)
Stories from the local paper
Sometimes I worry that I'll develop Alzheimer's disease, but no one will notice.
SURGEON GENERAL SUPPORTS NEW WIRE TECHNOLOGY
NEW YORK - Over the past century, the health of humans has been
increasingly endagered by the radiation in the evironment. Ever since
we have had networks, we have had radiation, and in ever
increasing amounts.
Since the high amount of radiation in our environment has been
identified as the primary cause of death in modern society (radiation
is the cause of all cancers and mutations which are responsible for
41% of all deaths today), more and more voices are taking up the
call to do something to reduce the amount of radiation.
One novel suggestion has been to replace the radio transmitters
connecting devices with wires-- a technology which was once
prevalent according to technology historians. "100 years ago not
all information was radiated, the way it is today" explains tech
historian Mono Rudy of the New York Museum of Technology,
"In fact large quantities of inormation was transmitted using wire
technology resulting in much lower amounts of radiation to the
consumer. One wire, or something called a fibre-optic cable,
could reduce radiation exposure by many body-burdens, especially
where large distances are concerned."
The Surgeon General has lent his support to investigating this
new/old technology, declaring that "where the health of this
nation's citizens is concerned, we must make every effort to
adapt technology to our needs."
--30--
Going up to 30 miles with up to 74Mb/s is not exactly the same this as going 30 miles at 74Mb/s. Even if it achieves this goal (doubtful in my book without a massive power increase), it is almost irrelevant to any purposeful application. Think about it: 8VSB, used to broadcast digital television over-the-air in the US, and a very robust scheme at that, goes about 30 miles or so but at vastly lower data rates (about 19Mb/s payload). Now, let's talk WiMax: 3X data rate jump? What's the client transmitter look like? 30-40dB gain client-side antennas? Site aquisition costs? If rural areas can't afford local TV transmitters (it's what gave rise to cable TV systems in the first place) what on earth makes everyone think that WiMax transmitters will dot the surface of the earth? And I rather doubt this is laptop stuff.
Backhaul? Telecom's are awash with capacity and cable networks too. Anyone that tries to undercut them will have to a have a mighty economical technology.
Thousands of homes? 70Mb/s? Who would hook up thousands of users to a 100TX network? And then talk about the potential for video? And throughput is 1/2 or 1/3. Ridiculous.
As for Wi-Fi range, get a clue, please. Given enough power, antenna gain and sensitivity at both sides, 802.11 could reach 'to infinity and beyond.' Except, of course, for the interframe spacing requirements of 802.11. Any link that is longer than about a mile and a half (2km) cannot ACK within specification (processing latency impacts this generalization) simply for the propagation delay of the radio transmission. Any links that are longer than that are not truly compliant with the spec. (They generally depend on an ambiguity in the spec that in practice permits delays of up to 5X that with DCS-limited MACs, or 3X that with PCS MACs). After that, you are simply testing how closely the particular MAC adheres to the ACK and DIFS/SIFS specifications. To go fartherdistances, simply modify the MAC specification and add the appropriate antenna gain (and height). But beware, throughput will suffer (simply because you now have to wait longer before giving up on a faded channel).
As frequency increases, the more difficult it is to get a terrestrial link working, for a number of reasons. Path length also complicates things, exponentially. This is why TV stations always endeavor to attain, by any means possible, to have the lowest available frequency assignments. So does everyone else who remotely knows anything about radio.
Moreover, having IT people set up wireless networking is like having a person set up and run mission-critical servers because he has twenty years experience as a ham radio operator. It's nonsense. Now, beyond any reasonable doubt, 802.11 has been dumbed way down and people still get it wrong (even basic things like polarity and near-field obstructions). WiMax will absolutley fail if it becomes an "enterprise networking" technology.
It shouldn't be "WiMax", but rather, "Why, Max?" WiMax: the latest VC pump-and-dump deal.