FireWire Gets Ready to Go Wireless

mindless4210 writes "The 1394 Trade Association has approved a specification for the development of wireless FireWire applications, which will let 1394-enabled devices, both wired and unwired, to connect with each other. The new spec will enable communication between a variety of devices, such as set-top boxes, HDTVs, tuners, and DVD players, all of which will be able to interoperate in home networks. Officials speculated that in the future there could be plug-in cards for set-top boxes enabling wireless connection to DVD players and hard-disk drives. The trade association also said it will work with the WiMedia Alliance to jointly develop collaborative products."

Comments

HDTV Wardriving

[aardwolf204]

Great! Now that I've got this awesome free internet connection from my neighbors I can look forward to getting HBO without cables too! The future looks bright!

Good name.

[aghorne]

They need to get away from the 1394 name. It's confusing for people. They should call it FireWireless!!!

Yes but can it charge my ipod?

[aardwolf204]

Wireless FireWire

Yes but can it charge my ipod?

Re:Yes but can it charge my ipod?

[scrod]

Heh, they're called microwaves. Ever wonder why aluminum foil and CDs spark when you put them in a microwave oven? You're inducing a current through them--they're acting as wave guides. It's the same principle as a radio or TV antenna. Passive RFID chips could essentially be said to be powered by wirelessly transmitted energy.

Gonna keep my porn in the attic

[Anonymous Coward]

On a hard drive of its own where the wife can't find it!

It shall be called....

[Anonymous Coward]

Wireless Firewire, aka Fire.

New name?

[worst_name_ever]

Wireless Firewire... wouldn't that just be called "Fire"?

A future without cables and wires

[Infonaut]

While it's a ways off, and there are glitches (Bluetooth security concerns, etc.), I for one will be happy as hell when I can go behind my entertainment center and not have to spend 15 minutes untangling cords and cables just to move something. Ditto for the computer setup. Imagine a truly wireless office, where nothing (keyboard, external monitor, network) is connected by wires or cables. Sure, there are some folks who will doubtless brag about how they already have such a setup, but I'm talking about widespread adoption.

Extending FireWire is one piece of the puzzle, and I for one am anxious to see the products that will result.

Re:A future without cables and wires

[hackman]

This stinks of a future where you can't easily control which system your device is connected to? I have already had trouble with keyboards in neighboring areas fighting occasionally and getting some very strange behavior when batteries get too low.

I can't imagine (!!) how much harder it would be to setup your stereo with no wires.. i.e. does the video from the cablemodem go to the TiVO, VCR, Stereo, or TV first? The tv audio wants to automatically be grabbed by the stereo input, but dammit I want the TiVO to go to the stereo and the TV to go to the TiVO! It could be insane.. will we have to tweak 10 different bios interfaces to get this all connected right? Do I have to push buttons on the corresponding devices (like the wireless mouse) every time the house power surges?

I don't think this will solve the worlds problems, or even the ones you propose it will solve.

Re:A future without cables and wires

[mhesseltine]

I for one will be happy as hell when I can go behind my entertainment center and not have to spend 15 minutes untangling cords and cables just to move something. Ditto for the computer setup. Imagine a truly wireless office, where nothing (keyboard, external monitor, network) is connected by wires or cables.

As others have mentioned, that's a great vision for signal cables. However, all of those devices still need a power supply of some sort. So, either you

1. Have a universal battery pack/charger and run all those things off battery power
2. Implement solar cells and let them store/use power from radiated light in the room
3. Setup a Tesla coil and have wireless power
4. Build the products with fuel cells that can be run from butane/propane/etc. and keep them filled.
5. or
6. Some other, as of yet undiscovered, power source.

I agree, I'd love to be able to move my computer stuff around without worrying about pulling the speaker/monitor/mouse/keyboard/network/etc. cables. However, until power is taken care of, you're still going to have one cable for each appliance.

WiFi?

[thedillybar]

Why so many wireless protocols/systems?

Can't we refine one and use it for all these different applications? Or are these different protocols content-specific? (i.e. some protocols are good with video, others are better with raw data?) I haven't seen anything showing this.

Re:WiFi?

[Raindance]

Basically, yes, some are good for some things; others, for other things, and this usually centers around error tolerance- of the data you want transferred, and of your connection method.

Firewire, for instance, has error-checking and error-correction built into its spec (it'd be smarter about errors than, say, WIFI). You can build in the same with other protocols but you take a bigger performance and output hit and firewire might end up as more fundamentally reliable regardless. Some protocols do better with broadcast mediums as well.

Someday perhaps we'll standardize on one wireless protocol when we've enough over-the-air bandwidth and processing power as to make tradeoffs trivial, but that day has not yet come.

RD

Build it and they will come...

[j3ll0]

Really, Ethernet has achieved dominance over the wired infrastructure.

The 802.11 (x) standard has achieved pretty much dominance over the wireless infrastructure.

It seems to me that this may be just another competing standard that will introduce incompatibilities and vendor lockin down the track. How is this magically different to bluetooth, wap, etc????

Kewl....all the early adopters can run off and buy this kit....I'll try and find a cost-effective consumer solution that is secure.

Wireless (fill in the blank)

[gumpish]

Can someone explain how "Wireless Firewire" is related to wired 1394, or how "Wireless USB" is related to USB, other than they are schemes approved by the same organizations? Is it all just marketing or do the technologies really have something in common?

Re:Wireless (fill in the blank)

[LostCluster]

It means that the standard came from the same standard organization that set the original, so you can be pretty sure that they didn't do anything stupid that'd lock out the wired-generation devices from using a wired-to-wireless bridge.

In short, basing on an existing wired standard means all the wireless standard needs to do is to define a radio link that emulates a wired link. Only the radio bridges need to be aware that wireless is being used, the other end of the bridge can just claim to be a typical powered or unpowered hub. There'd likely be some sort of way to issue an "Are you wireless?" query to hubs so that appications that can't tolerate the small delay wireless creates can scream about not having a good enough connection, and things like that... but most of the heavy lift operations can just lean on the wired standard.

Worthless

[macbot3000]

Since the MPAA and RIAA will ensure that no hardware will ship that can transmit content to anything else.

Maybe it will be useful for high speed channel changing.

Range?

[mrdrivel]

While the article kindly reminds us that Firewire runs at 400 Mbps, there is no mention of range. How much data can you transfer through the air before you start to cook things?

Having everything on your desk talk via wireless Firewire seems feasible. But is it possible to have an entire house run at 400 Mbps, walls, RF sources, and all?

Seems like this might be an 802.11g type deal with 54MB on paper and a much lower real life value.

All lies

[Anonymous Coward]

Liar liar wireless bra and panties on fire.

Its not fireWIRE at all. Better names would be:

FireFi
WiFire
Fireless
FiFi
FireTooth
NAWP (not another wireless protocol)

This is a hacker's dream come true!

Can't they all just get along?

[jshindl]

Why are there two standards that seemingly do the same thing? Firewire and USB are both industry standards, yet they seemingly are designed to connect peripherals to PCs. They both do a great job, but it doesn't make sense to have two competeing industry standards. After all, the point of a "standard" is to get everyone on board. Time for everyone to start working together! :)

Re:Can't they all just get along?

[pHDNgell]

Imagine if everyone settled on FireWire for the high-speed peripheral bus, and USB never got a chance? We wouldn't have the benifits of USB, namely bus-powered devices, lower cost, support for many devices on the same bus; and then much later, high-speed USB which can finally compete with FireWire regarding bandwidth.

This makes no sense. One of the benefits of USB is bus-powered devices? Like my iPod?

Lower cost? What makes USB lower cost than firewire (cost != price)?

Many devices on the same bus? Like my video camera being controlled by my powerbook as it spools video off onto an external disk (or two)?

High-speed USB that's theoretically similar in speed to firewire being developed while the new firewire standards were being developed is a benefit? That makes the latest USB (theoretically) a little more than half the speed of the latest firewire.

I mean, I'm all for competition and stuff, but USB never seemed to be in the same space as firewire.

Re:Can't they all just get along?

[dgatwood]

Why are there two standards that seemingly do the same thing? Firewire and USB are both industry standards, yet they seemingly are designed to connect peripherals to PCs.

Simple. The two busses have little in common.

Firewire:

• peer-to-peer design (all devices are created equal)
• low CPU overhead due to an intelligent controller with DMA
• requires smarter hardware due to peer-to-peer design
• heavily standardized protocols for storage, audio, video.

USB:

• host-device design - devices can only talk to host, not each other
• higher CPU overhead since the host controller is relatively dumb
• really inexpensive hardware (both host and device), ideal for low-cost devices
• standardized protocols for pretty much everything, but particularly human interface devices

Firewire is well-suited to audio/video applications and storage, since those applications require heavy throughput, which would severely tax the CPU when using USB.

USB is well-suited to low-speed devices like keyboards, mice, and inexpensive still cameras, scanners, and other consumer devices, since cost is the primary factor in their design.

Just my $0.02.

Firewire with no wires = no power.

[Anubis333]

One of the great things about firewire is that it can power devices.. I guess this is no longer the case. Time to break out the ol ac adapter with your new 'firewireless' adapter. Not to mention, any device I can think of would need a PS, or are they going to release external HDs with giant batteries now?

Re:Firewire with no wires = no power.

[mcrbids]

One of the great things about firewire is that it can power devices.. I guess this is no longer the case.

Actually, read the spec. Firewireless can power your devices, too. You just have to buy the optional, 4 foot tall Tesla coil, and plug it into a 480 volt commercial power adapter.

I can say "read the spec" because I'm pretty sure you haven't... this is SLASHDOT!

802.15.3 = UWB

[FreeHeel]

"Enter 802.15.3, a specification being groomed for IEEE standard status that provides ad hoc wireless PANs - short range (1-50m) and ad hoc, in other words. 802.15.3 builds on the 802.15 standard by adding QoS specifically to allow the PAN to carry digital imaging and multimedia data. It also builds in data security, implementing privacy and authentication services. 802.15.3 operates in the 2.4GHz band at 11, 22, 33, 44, and 55Mbps.

Unlike 802.11 connections, 802.15.3 is designed for peer-to-peer operation rather than routing data through an access point, whether that's a base-station or a client machine configured as one. Access points can become network bottlenecks.

The final spec. is expected to be submitted for IEEE approval in June. In the meantime, an alternative spec., 802.15.3a, is under development to create a higher data PHY to replace the 55Mbps 2.4GHz PHY in 802.15.3. It's increasingly likely that 802.15.3a will be based on ultra-wideband (UWB) technology, but it has to get through selection procedures this month and in July first. However, it has the potential to reach data rates of 100Mbps and ultimately the 400Mbps (at 5m) offered by standard 1394 wired links."

Team targets 802.15.3 for wireless video networks

Re:Because cell phones aren't bad enough

[TexVex]

I wonder if this period will be remembered as the biggest soft tissue experiment in human history. Heck, I don't even sit next to people using cell phones or near micowave ovens.

Apparently you do sit near a computer monitor. Cell phones transmit RF at under one watt. You probably get more RF energy through your skull from all the nearby radio and TV stations. Do you really think microwave ovens could be sold anywhere, if they leaked even remotely dangerous levels of radiation? Radio waves and microwaves aren't even ionizing radiation (like X-rays and Gamma rays). Visible light is radiation as well. You should just wrap a towel around your head to avoid all this potential harm in the form of electromagnetic energy.

Hey, lemme dream a bit here!

[Infonaut]

Setup a Tesla coil and have wireless power

Yeah, the power thing is a bitch. You're absolutely right about the inherent difficulties. But I can't think about something that actually happened to me in my youth. I was about 7 or 8 years old, and I was haing a conversation with my mother.

"Man, I wish you could just play whatever movie you wanted to on your TV." (This was the mid-1970s, mind you) I continued, trying to be practical. "But it'll never happen."

Mom looked over at me and said, "Do you think the settlers crossing the midwest in their covered wagons could have even imagined television? Sometimes things that seem impossible turn out not to be so impossible after all."

Of course now I can pop a DVD of practically any movie I want and watch it at my leisure. I don't claim to have the answers to making the world wireless, but I have learned not to rule things out.