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What is the Current Status of WiMAX?
PalletBoy asks: "I live in BFE (read 'remote') Pennsylvania where BroadBand is not available in any form save satellite, which is no good for price and latency reasons (curse my MMO addiction!). My big question is: what is the -actual- current status of WiMAX technology? Different sites have me believing different things and I can't find an exact answer to the question 'When will I be able to buy a WiMAX router and cards so I can remotely receive broadband?' When will WiMAX (802.16) be solidly standardized, out, and affordable? Or is it already there?"
Until two regional companies started offering radio-link internet. I get 256Kb/sec up/down and am eyeballing another provider who will offer better transfer rates for the same price. The only problem is the price. Both ISPs charge $60/month. I am able to justify the price because I can telecommute a few days a month and save gas in my car. My dial-up was $15/month with a $17/month second telephone line. I looked into Hughes' and Echostar's systems, but their Fair Access Policies looked like bandwidth restrictions on what you were already paying for. I was going to stay with dial-up until radio-links came along.
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
The ISP I work for which is in Williamsport will be deploying Wi-Max Alvarion gear shortly. However, I don't know that that's really going to help you in remote PA. The problem being remote is even Wi-Max probably will not hit you here in the hilly areas. We use some 900mhz stuff and it works well through trees... but hit a mountain and you don't have a chance. Plus in most areas like that it just isn't cost effective to build out to hit 1 or 4 people.
Back in the early days of DSL in the Bay Area (SFO/OAK/SJC) there was a guide in the now-defunct MicroTimes outlining about 40 vendors and what they offered. It was a bit exasperating trying to figure out which to buy into. Sounds like WiMAX is going to have a shaking out period, too.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
It's not just a matter of getting WiMax cards as the person asking the question seems to think. It's a matter of getting the cards and routers *AND* having a service provider cover your area. If you don't currently have a provider offering terresterial wireless or DSL/cable, WiMax isn't going to change that at all.
;-/
You do have a few options though. Move, of course... Or, if there's demand in your area, start up an ISP or cooperative. If there isn't demand for at least 10 people, you now know why nobody is offering it in your area.
Sean
Now I know I'm going to get smacked down for this... But seriously... some of the Ask Slashdot sounds like Ask Google.
It is solidly standardized in fixed mode in IEEE 802.16-2004. Products are in the pipeline from a number of manufacturers.
What is at issue is whether service providers will set up in your area. This is a very complex issue where spectrum policy and licensing collide with equipment availability, local permits (for towers etc), the cost of the technology and competition from DSL and cable. I don't pretend to know how it will pan out, but 2006 will be the year that the market gets effectively tested.
The current work is around mobility which relates more to handsets and laptops. This not only in the unfinished 802.16e spec, but in Wimax and the IETF, since for mobility, the backhaul networks need to be standardized and this is outside the realm of the 802.16 working group. Mobility will take some time.
Evil people are out to get you.
It's 1xRTT and EV-DO, not WiMax.
As I understand, the promises about the speed of WiMax are based on top speed (i.e. 1 user). Multiple users will have to share the same radio frequency and their connection speed will be lower.
I remember reading that 4G cell phone network will (with much lower connection speeds) will require on the order of 500MHz of radio spectrum. To put this number in prospective FCC actions slices of 10MHz for billions of $.
I'm not an expert in radio communications, but I don't see how the numbers (promised connection bandwidth and available radio spectrum) would ever add up. Could someone explain?
Our small town has been a testbed for WiMax for the past year or so. So far everything seems to be working well and the price hasn't been bad either. 29.99 for standard bandwidth. So far the only limitation I've seen is ling of sight. But, that should be remedied soon, as the operator is moving his towers to the mountain tops. (Why they didn't do this to begin with, I'll never know.) Verizon is the one providing the testing and everything. www.verizonavenue.com is the webpage (I *think*)
My office in NYC uses WiMax. We upgraded earlier this year and we've had great uptime, and good speed. The cool thing is that the transmitter we connect to is on the Empire State Building. When I connect to the VPN from home, I can look out the window at the ESB and see my data flying through the air...
There is no equipment *today* that is certified to be WiMax. Everything we're seeing right now is "Pre-WiMax". This is equipment that will probably pass certification, but hasn't yet. The certification lab just started accepting equipment for test a couple months back. The belief is that by the end of the year we'll see some actual certified hardware available. See wimaxforum.org - the official wimax site.
One thing to keep in mind when considering this is the huge difference between a fixed high-gain antenna and a mobile device. I did some work for a company that deployed MANs via 30Ghz point-to-multipoint systems using a proprietary QPSK physical layer. It had very similar performance to what WiMax seems to be talking about, but when you think wireless these days, you think of toting your laptop around anywhere and getting connected. Although our system was a very different protocol and modulation method, the laws of physics dictate that your reliable speed is going to depend on the energy per bit transmitted and the combined gain of the two antenna systems. In other words, a mobile device isn't going to have the kind of range and speed people are hearing about WRT WiMax.
Also, there is really no unity on spectrum for WiMax stuff yet. For 802.11b, for instance, most devices today work in that 2.4Ghz band, so devices are all compatible. Not so much for 802.16, last I saw there were lots of frequencies that could be used, in both licensed and unlicensed spectrum spaces. And it's unlikely that a device you'll get will have antenna systems designed for every possible allowed 802.16 frequency... which I'd wager means that you will likely need to buy hardware that matches your vendor.
I think for the near term, you should see if you have either WCDMA or CDMA 1xEV-DO rev A data coverage in your area. EV-DO has decent bandwith, and DO rev A really reduces latency and increases reverse link bandwith. As a bonus, you should be able to use the service in most major populated areas... You might have to shell out bucks though. For DO rev A, Sprint and Verizon already own the spectrum, and are starting to roll out these services. The GSM folks are switching to WCDMA, but I don't know the state of their data services. My experience is that GPRS/EDGE doesn't have very good data rates in real life... youll want to stick with the 3G data standards.
Or, if you are lucky, you might find a smaller service provider that uses directional 802.11 in your area.. that might work reasonably well.
-- Erich
Slashdot reader since 1997
WiMax is pretty well standardized from the perspective of protocols and modulations, but unlike WiFi which is developed for use in unlicensed bands, WiMax is primarily intended for use by network operators who will have licensed bands. (There will be some gear available for use in the 5.8GHz unlicensed band, but that is a small fraction of the market.
In North America, the main deployments are expected to be in the 2.5GHz "wireless cable" bands, which are mostly licensed to Sprint, the IFTS (educational TV bands) mostly licensed to Catholic Archdioceses but now authorized for subleasing) and a band around 3.5GHz. Various bands around 3.2, 3.5 and 3.6GHz is also where other parts of the world are expected to deploy these services.
If you are a large provider, like Sprint, you had better get field trials underway by now, or your licenses may be in danger of expiring. And you will be negotiating with a handful of equipment manufacturers for a wholesale deal on equipment working on your licensed frequencies.
If you are a small ISP, you will probably have to look to the unlicensed 5.8GHz, and talk to Alvarion. I have not looked much at who else has equipment for that band. Be aware that the higher frequencies do not travel as far as 2.4GHz, so you may in fact be better off with high-end WiFi kit built from the ground up for outdoor use.
If you are a user, you need to shop around for a service provider, and let them worry about the right equipment.
(I work for a small wireless equipment house that makes low-bandwidth wireless systems for very long range, especially targeted to underdeveloped areas of the world. http://www.afar.net/)
Security is just a side benefit to the solution requested. The user asked for a way to split up an adress in order to avoid paying $60 per computer at his site. I figure they hadn't heard of NAT so I gave him my $0.02.
NAT alone does improve security. It is far better than a direct connection. NAT alone will stop a lot of port scan worms and door knob testers(the bulk of the crud that attacks simple users like myself). It's like having a cheap U-Lock on your bike, sure you can pick it with a BIC, but most people don't know that and it keeps mooks from riding off on it. THis is why most broadband routers & modems these days have NAT, it's a good first step.
Double NAT, however, is a different story. Double NAT is more difficult to breach. I am not going to say it is foolproof but it takes some serious effort to get across and for the networks that I have set up with this solution the end users have seen a dramatic drop in successful attacks. The only thing that I have seen succeed are trojans.
Still, if you want to be secure, I did suggested http://www.ipcop.org/, a linux distro that uses ipchains/tables and is a fairly sophisticated firewall and I have found to be a reliable and cost effective alternative to PIX or Checkpoint. Sites I have installed this solution in conjunction with good AV have had no breaches and they still run 98.
Security is not just one thing. Like the bike example above, security is many things: not just locking the front wheel, but locking the frame and both wheels; locking it in a well lit and visible place; bringing it indoors when possible... security is a matter of practicing many layers of secure procedures across the board -- it's using a secure OS, strong passwords, using virus/spyware protection, using firewalls, intrusion detection, logging, etc.
For the average enduser, most of this doesn't make any sense and you can't expect them to get it right even some of the time. But you put an unpatched Win98 box behind double NAT, even single NAT, and you will see a dramatic reduction in exploitation.
That qualifies as an improvement in security.