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60GHz Uber-WiFi Proposed By New WiGig Group

Posted by timothy on from the wire-ask-wire dept.

judgecorp writes "A new vendor group has promised a Gigabit wireless specification by the end of this year. The Wireless Gigabit (WiGig) spec is apparently 80 percent done and, since it is aimed at high-definition TV, it has to go at more than 3Gbps. There's around 7GHz of spectrum freely available in the 60GHz band, so it's technically feasible, and with all the major Wi-Fi silicon vendors on board (as well as Microsoft, Dell, Nokia and others) WiGig looks to have the political muscle too. They should be aware of the Sibeam-led WirelessHD group, though, already in the 60GHz space, and Ultrawideband (UWB) is not dead, as there are actual, real UWB products."

127 comments

  1. I'm confused... by Max+Romantschuk · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Having work experience with HD streams, I can verify that with modern h.264 compression you can easily fit a 720p HD stream in under 10Mbps, with acceptable quality.

    Aimed at HD video? Can't we just call it faster? ;)

    --
    .: Max Romantschuk :: http://max.romantschuk.fi/
    1. Re:I'm confused... by cymen · · Score: 1

      My thoughts exactly -- I suspect this is purely for marketing purposes to convince those not aware of the details to upgrade the home wifi. On the flip side, maybe we'll see better default security.

    2. Re:I'm confused... by Aladrin · · Score: 1

      At least they didn't measure it in Libraries of Congress per second.

      --
      "If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
    3. Re:I'm confused... by nine-times · · Score: 1

      Maybe they're looking for uncompressed (as in lossless) 1080p instead of compressed 720p? I don't have numbers, but offhand 3Gbps sounds like it could be right for that.

    4. Re:I'm confused... by wjh31 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      accptable quality at 720p is one thing, but excellent quality at 1080p is another

    5. Re:I'm confused... by JamesVI · · Score: 1

      What about 1080p? Knowing nothing about the internal workings of a modern telly, I have to ask can my Sony LCD extract a compressed stream? The 3Gbps number is about the same as the 4.2Gpbs datarate that you can get off BlueRay implying that this technology would be a suitable replacement for the HDMI cable carrying an uncompressed stream between player and TV.

    6. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The boils down to copy protection. To win the support of HD content publishers and providers, an HD interface must support HDCP (high-bandwidth digital copy protection), which operates on uncompressed streams. That's why these wireless HD solutions typically bill themselves providing a wireless HDMI cable, as HDMI supports HDCP. Content providers get nervous at the idea of transmitting a compressed HD stream from a source to a display.

    7. Re:I'm confused... by Brian+Gordon · · Score: 1

      I have no idea what I'm talking about here but what is "7GHz of spectrum" supposed to mean? Isn't 7GHz a particular frequency on the spectrum? It sounds like they see a free space between, say, 1GHz and 8GHz and call that 7GHz of spectrum as if you sell spectrum by the GHz.. but can't you transmit more information in the 7-14 GHz range than in the 0-7GHz range? Can someone who knows what they're talking about confirm this? It seems to make sense; you can transmit more information on a 1KHz carrier than on a 1Hz carrier, right?

    8. Re:I'm confused... by nine-times · · Score: 1

      ...implying that this technology would be a suitable replacement for the HDMI cable carrying an uncompressed stream between player and TV

      Or for streaming a full 1080p signal from one player to another. Consider people who have multiple TVs and computers in the same house and therefore multiple devices capable of playing HD movies. You have a movie on one device and want to play it on another. Your options right now would be to compress the video, run cable (not use wireless networking), or wait for it to buffer/copy over from one machine to another. Actually running cable might not even quite be fast enough, if it's true that you need 3Gbps, considering most consumer hardware doesn't support faster than 1Gbps ethernet.

    9. Re:I'm confused... by something_wicked_thi · · Score: 1

      Yes, it's a range. Think about it. 14 GHz - 7 GHz is still 7 GHz, so it can be a particular frequency, but the range of frequencies uses the same unit. It's like how you can say something is 10 feet away or how something is 10 feet long, between 10 feet away and 20 feet away.

    10. Re:I'm confused... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Security for the user, probably no more than ordinary wi-fi. Security against the user? Well, if this is designed to transport "premium content" you don't even have to guess.

    11. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You have a rather low threshold on "acceptable quality". You shouldn't be using H.264 on 720p at all, it's the wrong codec for the job. It's designed to squeeze video streams into low bandwidth connections by lowering the bitrate, and it looks horrible. Definitely not suitable for commercial broadcast.

    12. Re:I'm confused... by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It means that there is a 7 GHz wide range of frequencies that is free somewhere around 60 GHz.

      e.g. 60-67 might be a possibility, or it might be 57-64.

      It's easier to use 7 GHz of spectrum at 60 GHz than 7 GHz of spectrum centered at 10, because the range is a lower percentage of the center frequency of the range.

      That said, the range at 60 GHz is going to be insanely short.

      --
      retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
    13. Re:I'm confused... by Aqualung812 · · Score: 1
      It is a range of frequencies:

      there's around 7GHz of spectrum freely available in the 60GHz band

      So, I take that as something like 56.5 GHz to 63.49999GHz. I didn't see anywhere in TFA what the actual range is.
      By comparison, 802.11 devices use the 2.450 GHz band, from 2.4 GHz to 2.49999 GHz, or only 1 MHz of spectrum, to use the same terms as the summary.

      --
      Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
    14. Re:I'm confused... by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 1

      Keep in mind that there's a limitation of source content. If your source content is compressed, that's the limit on quality. Right now the best source content generally available to consumers is Blu-Ray. 1x Blu-Ray is 36 megabits/sec.

      Redcode RAW (used by the RED ONE) maxes at 288 megabits/sec for 4K cinema video.

      --
      retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
    15. Re:I'm confused... by hclewk · · Score: 1

      Just a note, it would be 100 MHz of spectrum.

    16. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not quite.

      Right now, it's the best codec for every job provided enough processing power.

      I'd like to see what you think has a better quality/bitrate ratio.

    17. Re:I'm confused... by wjh31 · · Score: 1

      as one grows, the other will follow

    18. Re:I'm confused... by Fuzzums · · Score: 1

      Wait for this : http://www.cinema.philips.com/

      56 inch screen 21:9 screenratio and 2560 x 1080p
      I saw one last weekend and it's COOL!

      Widescreen is SO last year ;)

      Of course a beamer is a whole lot cheaper.

      --
      Privacy is terrorism.
    19. Re:I'm confused... by Ibiwan · · Score: 1

      You are correct: you have no idea what you're talking about here. As other people have already mentioned, GHz can refer both to the frequency on the spectrum and to a range of frequencies. As you say, 7GHz is the range of frequencies available to send data in.

      However, the carrier frequency does NOT matter in this -- assuming no interference, atmosphere, etc., exactly the same amount of information can be carried in the frequencies from 0-7GHz as from 7-14GHz.

      If it helps you to picture it, picture a signal that is consistent over time, made up of sub-signals at 1-Hz intervals. Each of these signals can be turned on or off, and count as 1 bit of information. Therefore, you can be transmitting 7*10^3 bits of data whether your list of frequencies is centered at 3.5GHz or at 10.5 GHz.

      Other less naive transmission techniques all follow this same pattern -- the shape of the frequency graph contains all the information; the center point contains none.

      --
      -- //no comment
    20. Re:I'm confused... by Aqualung812 · · Score: 1

      DOH! Thank you. I'm ready to go home.

      --
      Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
    21. Re:I'm confused... by tlhIngan · · Score: 1

      Keep in mind that there's a limitation of source content. If your source content is compressed, that's the limit on quality. Right now the best source content generally available to consumers is Blu-Ray. 1x Blu-Ray is 36 megabits/sec.

      Redcode RAW (used by the RED ONE) maxes at 288 megabits/sec for 4K cinema video.

      Yeah, but you want an excess of bandwidth to prevent dropping bits in the first place. Plus, even though it's short range, it's conceivable that your neighbour sets the exact same thing up on the other side of the wall.

      It's the reason why Bluetooth A2DP, despite having 3Mbps available (more than the 1.4Mbps you need for CD quality audio), re-compresses the audio down to a sub-768kbps stream. There'a always a chance some overhead or interference will come along and disrupt the stream. Offer enough bandwidth and there's a chance you can recover without the end user noticing.

      I believe Blu-Ray actually can go up to 50Mbps peak. Fast Ethernet will probably just be good enough if you put it on a somewhat normal network with other computers (where will bits be dropped? most likely during the brief bandwidth spikes). And that's one stream. It's a shared medium, so you may have two or heck, four (neighbour has two TVs, you have 2 TVs nearby) streams sharing the same bandwidth.

      Suddenly, Gigabit WiFi doesn't have that much capacity. Especially since you're probably going to get around half that in the real world - say 500Mbps (because of overheads and everything else). And since the encoder probably runs far less efficiently than one on Blu-Ray, unless you want resampled video, you're going to have to run at a higher bitrate normal for realtime encoding. Suddenly, there does't seem to be a lot of bandwidth left over.

    22. Re:I'm confused... by digitalchinky · · Score: 1

      Plus, even though it's short range, it's conceivable that your neighbour sets the exact same thing up on the other side of the wall.

      At 60GHz it doesn't really matter if your neighbours walls are made out of paper. Not much interference is going to happen here. About the only noisy stuff you might come across is RADAR, and you don't often see that above 40GHz (Source: Me, former ELINT drone)

    23. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      1080p please.

      GREAT quality, not just acceptable please.
      Multiple audio streams please.
      Multiple captioning/subtitle streams (not that these add size worth mentioning, I just want it).

    24. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Shit. Forgot to mention, 10 Mbps average is fine, 10 Mbps peak (or constant) is SHIT.

    25. Re:I'm confused... by Areyoukiddingme · · Score: 0

      Bingo. That's what 'aimed at HD video' really means. It will be loaded down with bullshit DRM that makes it totally inoperable most of the time. With Microsoft in on the deal, you can be certain that only Windows 7 will get support for it, too. Then the vendors will wonder why it fails in the market place because we won't buy it. Forget it. Nothing to see here, move along.

    26. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Carrier frequency doesn't matter?

      Sir, I'll have you know that

      ************CARRIER LOST **************

    27. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Please stop referencing the RED ONE. There are plenty of other cameras in use. Many of them are far superior, and many are as good or better, for the same price.

      Why is everyone on the RED ONE's cock?

    28. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Retarded.
      People already bitch about having pillar boxes on 4:3 content. Now they'll get pillar boxes on 16:9 content, while 4:3 content fills up just what, 57% of the screen (I'm estimating here)?

    29. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      MPEG 5?

    30. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      No, dipshit, that's MPEG 7!

    31. Re:I'm confused... by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Dammit I forgot to post my self-response as AC for lulz.

    32. Re:I'm confused... by Brian+Gordon · · Score: 1

      But if your carrier frequency is 1GHz the "shape of the frequency graph" can go both above and below the center point, and if your carrier frequency is 1Hz you can't realistically go very far below..

    33. Re:I'm confused... by soupforare · · Score: 1

      It's the Apple of the digital cine camera world.

      --
      --- Do you believe in the day?
    34. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They want to run uncompressed video as in a wired HDMI link. This allows all codec hardware to reside in the set-top box/game console/media player, not in the TV, and supports present wired HDMI usage modes. The same goal is being pursued by companies like Amimon, who uses a phy based on draft 802.11n in the 5GHz UNII band.

    35. Re:I'm confused... by bemymonkey · · Score: 1

      Wow. This series of comments has seriously made me contemplate never visiting Slashdot again, before I end up talking to myself over the internet... :|

    36. Re:I'm confused... by SlashWombat · · Score: 1

      This info is old hat ... IBM proposed a 60 GHz system several years ago. 60 GHz does not penetrate walls, so each room that requred coverage had a transceiver in the ceiling.

    37. Re:I'm confused... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      H.264 compression might work for some types of HD streams, but definitely not for all.

      Imagine playing a game on your top-of-the-line console with a lag of 1 second to your brand new wireless HD TV.
      Or watching a soccer game and hearing the goals being scored from the shouts of your neighbors instead of seeing realtime in your TV.

      There IS a need for uncompressed video, latency being one requirement, quality another.

    38. Re:I'm confused... by Ibiwan · · Score: 1

      The math actually supports negative frequencies fairly easily. No, I can't give a convenient physical example for that -- if only because I never wrapped my mind around it intuitively myself. Still, bandwidth centered at zero (raw data, no carrier frequency) takes up as much of a frequency range as the same signal modulated to ride a higher frequency.

      --
      -- //no comment
  2. Scary energy levels? by DavidR1991 · · Score: -1, Redundant

    Anyone else worried by the potential adverse effects of a 60GHz Wi-Fi versus the current 2.4GHz - 5GHz range? There's just something that makes me uneasy in such a huge jump...

    1. Re:Scary energy levels? by Brian+Gordon · · Score: 5, Funny

      Energy levels? Better go crawl under a rock to protect yourself from 600THz blue light.

    2. Re:Scary energy levels? by Burkin · · Score: 5, Funny

      Just add a few extra layers of foil to your tinfoil hat and you'll be fine.

    3. Re:Scary energy levels? by 644bd346996 · · Score: 2, Informative

      What are you worried about? It's not like we're talking about ionizing radiation, since 60Ghz is well below even visible wavelengths. And for LAN use, the necessary wattage will be far below the levels needed to cook somebody. (Consider that the Active Denial System at 95Ghz requires megawatts just to make you feel hot, and it concentrates it's energy in one direction, unlike a wlan.)

      Generating dangerous amounts of omnidirectional microwave radiation requires the use of components that couldn't fit inside a laptop, let alone be powered by one.

    4. Re:Scary energy levels? by Florian+Weimer · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Anyone else worried by the potential adverse effects of a 60GHz Wi-Fi versus the current 2.4GHz - 5GHz range?

      Car radar typically operates in the 60 GHz range, too, so you can be quite sure that the waves won't propagate through walls and other barriers.

      In fact, those frequencies are a poor choice for comms applications because you need a repeater in every room, and outdoor applications will suffer when it's raining.

    5. Re:Scary energy levels? by Burkin · · Score: 1

      What are you worried about?

      The boogeyman. You better not tell this guy that the light coming out of his light fixtures is coming at him at hundreds of terahertz. He might just have a heart attack.

    6. Re:Scary energy levels? by Burkin · · Score: 1

      What is scary about the energy level of a 60ghz signal? We're talking about energy levels in the 1/100,000 of an electronVolt range. For comparison visible light falls between around 2-3 electronvolts.

    7. Re:Scary energy levels? by Five+Bucks! · · Score: 1

      He'd soil himself if he knew that the rays cast from his monitor are traveling at 299,792,458 m/s!

      --
      52 52'23" W 47 32'07" N
    8. Re:Scary energy levels? by Gabbermatt · · Score: 1

      No?

    9. Re:Scary energy levels? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Blue is closer to 750THz. Green is 600THz.

    10. Re:Scary energy levels? by EchaniDrgn · · Score: 1

      Maybe I'm wrong but I was always of the understanding that the frequency of a signal was not necessarily related to the power of that signal. I think we're confusing frequency (Hz) with wattage (W). Now in practice it might be that in order to traverse a usable distance these transmitters would have to have a very high power output, but I don't see how we can say that just because it's a large jump we should be scared.

      Radio stations are in the MHz range, going from 100 MHz to 2.4 GHz is a 24 fold jump, going from 2.4 GHz to 60 GHz is about the same (25 fold)

    11. Re:Scary energy levels? by Burkin · · Score: 1

      Radio stations are in the MHz range, going from 100 MHz to 2.4 GHz is a 24 fold jump, going from 2.4 GHz to 60 GHz is about the same (25 fold)

      And visible light starts at around 660 THz which is a 275000 fold jump from 2.4 GHz. Oh my god we better start panicking!

  3. Buget post??? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Wasn't there just an Obama budget post??? what the heck happened to it?

  4. 60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This will be a VERY short range technology. Oxygen absorbed everything at 60GHz. This was actually classified secret for a long time - in the pre-encryption days, all sensitive wireless communication occurred at this frequency because even a very high powered antenna only has a range of a couple miles. You combine that with a directional antenna, and you can be almost certain no one is listening in.

    1. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by MobyDisk · · Score: 5, Funny

      There's a way around that. If you place another material between the transmitter and the receiver, so that there is a path with no oxygen on it, then there will be very little signal degradation. I recommend something like a thin strip of aluminum or copper, insulated with some non-conductive material (which can also act as a ground between the transmitter and receiver).

    2. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Brian+Gordon · · Score: 0

      You mean like... an antenna? :)

    3. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Very short range" is relative. Line-of-sight 60 GHz links over ranges of 100 m or more are possible, which is higher range than some competing wireless technologies. The real issue is it doesn't penetrate walls or bodies very well. So links are mostly relegated to line-of-sight within a single room.

    4. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      I think he means a wire...

    5. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whoosh. He meant a wire.

    6. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by pleappleappleap · · Score: 1

      That's not an antenna he's describing. It's a length of co-ax cable.

    7. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Oh, no. It's far worse than that: It hardly works at all.

      At work, we recently tried, and failed, to properly align a 58GHz wireless gigabit link. Looked like a good installation; clear Fresnel zone, no obviously destructive reflective surfaces, good mounting at one end (we substantially improved the mount at the other). The hardware looked good (made by Gigalink, now Proxim). Very short range - literally, across the street, which (since the radios were made for short haul) was right near the middle of the specifications on the radios. Simple antenna; looked like it was just a feedhorn covered by a radome.

      As far as I can tell, it's nearly impossible to properly align these things. The wavelength is so bloody short that a misalignment of less than 1MM seems to fuck up the whole works. And it's not sufficient to just have the antennas pointed toward eachother; they have to be aligned on exactly parallel planes.

      So anyway, we'd align it. And then it'd get cold out. And then it wouldn't work. Presumably, the buildings and steel mounts change shape sufficiently with the difference in temperature to just ruin everything.

      Several more service calls later, and we'd given up on it.

      I'm not exactly unskilled at these sorts of things. Back in the day, I used to install Primestar. I got good enough at alignment that I could set a pole in concrete, good and plumb. I'd pre-set the elevation and and the polarity of the LNB. After having a glance at my compass, I'd just put the dish on the pole and tighten it down, and then go on inside the house without ever checking the satellite meter. Chances were good that by the time I got inside, the receiver was all sync'd up and ready to go, with good RSSI values...and with no adjustment needed.

      This 58GHz shit, at least as implemented by Gigalink, though: What a fucking abomination. If what WiGig proposes is anything similar in terms of pain, I can easily wait the rest of my life without it and never, ever miss it.

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
    8. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Five+Bucks! · · Score: 2, Funny

      That's no antenna...

      --
      52 52'23" W 47 32'07" N
    9. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by braindrainbahrain · · Score: 1

      Roger that. This fact has been known in microwave circles for decades, if not longer. For a classic absorption curve see: http://www.rfcafe.com/references/electrical/atm-absorption.htm Note where 60 GHz lies on the oxygen absorption curve. Though I have not worked in the area for a while, I presume that by now it is a lot easier to make transistors, amplifiers, receivers, etc at 60 GHz?

    10. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So top secret that some scientists at MIT published it PhysRev in 1948... i.e. shortly after they had the apparatus to do the experiment!

      Still, that is truly a stonking absorption band in the 54-66GHz range.

      http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRev.75.1524

    11. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by drmofe · · Score: 2, Funny

      You must be incompetent. I have a 60GHz Bridgewave unit working in my network with 100% uptime over 18 months at 100Mbps. Alignment is not easy - you are trying to get two 1 degree beamwidths lined up, so you do need to know what you are doing. In my case, the alignment is over 800m, it took 30 minutes to dial it in and once locked down, performance is flawless. Don't try operating one of these in a high rainfall environment though, the absorption will kill performance over anything but very short range.

    12. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by curunir · · Score: 1

      Almost useless isn't useless.

      Something like this has the ability to replace wires in situations where bandwidth is important and range isn't. As mentioned in the summary, A/V stuff seems like a prime candidate. Home theaters in the future may end up being as simple as plugging in a power cord for each piece of equipment and then configuring the system in software. No more worrying about how many HDMI ports a TV has, how to run speaker wire from the receiver to the speakers and other similar situations where the physical connections matter to the usage of the system. Components could even implement zeroconf or something like it to eliminate the software setup and allow individual components to adapt to the other components in the system (i.e. the TV would ignore the audio when there is a surround sound speaker setup.)

      HD video and audio require a lot of bandwidth but rarely require transmission over a distance of 10-20 feet. And for this type of setup, short range may actually be a benefit since there would be no need for the kind of channels that Wi-Fi uses to account for interference from others using the same technology.

      I'm pretty sure this is different from the wireless HDMI efforts that are further along, but if they can offer added benefits, it could still end up being a useful technology.

      --
      "Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!"
    13. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by batteryman · · Score: 1

      I remember a fellow worker back in 1984 saying that 60GHz was used for military satellite to satellite communications. Why not use another Amateur Radio band at 76 to 81GHz.

    14. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by NixieBunny · · Score: 1

      Sounds to me like you could have used a different antenna with a wider beam for your short haul application. Or better mounts. By the way, the parallel plane thing is nonsense - the polarization makes the signal drop off as the cosine of the angle, so a 10 degree misalignment will give about 1dB of loss. [Disclaimer: Where I work, 60 GHz is the lowest frequency we use. 700 GHz is the high end of our operating range.]

      --
      The determined Real Programmer can write Fortran programs in any language.
    15. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by et764 · · Score: 1

      If the problem is the oxygen, clearly we need to produce a vacuum between the transmitter and the receiver. I propose a long cylinder of some rigid material, with a smaller cylinder bored out through the middle. Once this long pipe, or "tube," if you will, is connected to the transmitter and receiver, you could suck the air out of the inside of the tube and extend the wireless range. Several such transmitting and listening stations could be combined to form a series of tubes.

    16. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by bugs2squash · · Score: 2, Funny

      Indeed. I am able to line up my ~300THz link by eye. It prevents my garage door crushing people.

      --
      Nullius in verba
    17. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 1

      It was an integrated unit: radio, feedhorn, antenna, and enough fancy-welded aluminum hardware to mount to a pipe, with power, fiber, and Cat 5 on industrial weatherproof connectors on the bottom. The pipe itself was hot-dipped 3" schedule 80 steel, secured to an old-school 3-bricks-thick wall with some very heavy steel hardware from Andrew, and was probably the most overbuilt thing in the entire building.

      10 degrees would've meant the whole world to these things -- think the difference between "ticking along nicely" and "what signal?". It really was the pickiest fucking thing I've ever laid my hands on. The pattern exhibited by these units had a number of strong sidelobes, all rather near eachother, and with nulls like the Grand Canyon in between.

      I want to believe that the parallel plane thing is nonsense, too, but I just can't. I began the project with similar theories to what you describe, and was totally confounded by the time I'd given up on it.

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
    18. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 1

      I do know what I'm doing.

      The people who installed it originally, apparently, also knew what they were doing. The folks who followed up my failed efforts, who came from two states away at the behest of Proxim, I'd guess they probably knew what they were doing too.

      We all failed. Therefore, by your logic, we're all just well-qualified morons.

      Glad your link works well for you. But please don't assume that your good experience is universal, because it simply is not.

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
    19. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by drmofe · · Score: 2, Informative

      "Competence" = "practised by a certified engineer". We did extensive testing before lighting the link up. We even threw a faulty unit back at Bridgewave due to a fault in a $1.70 part (in a $40K unit) that our testing picked up. (Hey, we still managed to line it up when the voltmeter was reading 0.3V instead of 3.3V) The point is that you probably had a duff unit, but also that engineering is more than just point and click - it also involves selecting, testing and verifying that your equipment is doing sane things. It doesn't imply that 60GHz is somehow unusable as a data transmission frequency. Quite the contrary, as others have pointed out.

    20. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 5, Informative

      Uh-huh. Thanks, Captain Obvious.

      Wake me up after you've either failed similarly, or found something that I've done incompetently. K?

      Your inane suffrage from the typical alpha-geek doctrine which prescribes that the first thing to do when told of the failure of others is best countered with the assertion that operator is at least incompetent is, at best, a positively useless behavioral pattern.

      You didn't get the whole story, anyway - I was pissing and moaning on Slashdot, not trying to write a fucking novel.

      Here's the sequence of events:

      1. Customer hires Company A to install several Gigalink spans. Company A is certified to do so. Links all work at gigabit speeds with low latency and no significant packet loss. Everything works fine for several months.
      2. It gets cold out.
      3. 2 of 3 links stop working most of the time, especially at night, unless it's warm out.
      4. Company A turns out to be clueless and unhelpful, despite their paper "competence."
      5. Customer asks Company B, who they've used for radio work for tens of years, including other WWAN projects, if they can help.
      6. Company B (that's us, by the way) says "Sure, we'll give it a shot. No promises."
      7. Try. Realigning appears to succeed.
      8. Fail. Cold out again.
      9. Try again when it is cold out, like -5F. Replace non-penetrating roof mount on bouncy snow-covered roof at one end of link with 3" sch. 80 pipe securely fastened to solid brick wall of elevator house on roof. Appear to succeed.
      10. Fail. After a couple of heat cycles, things don't work anymore. Just like before.
      11. Try. Let's line this thing up right, once and for all. Inspect radio's hardware for signs that thermal expansion might be somehow altering the alignment in a meaningful way, and grasp at all other available straws. Inspect other buildings for possible interference sources. Concoct and shoot down different scenarios including ice formation from flue gas condensation to power issues when furnace is running extensively. Find nothing.
      12. Fail.
      13. Customer calls manufacturer. Manufacturer suggests Company C to align things better.
      14. Company C tries. Spends all day. Moves the pipe mount up as high as possible on wall. Manages insignificantly improved peak numbers vs. what we were getting.
      15. Company C goes back to Chicago.
      16. Company C fails. As soon as it gets cold out, link stops working.
      17. Customer calls manufacturer. Manufacturer says "OK, send a pair of them to us and we'll test it here."
      18. We install a temporary 5.8GHz link (at substantially lower speed) for Customer to use in the interim.
      19. Customer sends a pair of Gigalink units back to Manufacturer.
      20. Manufacturer calls customer. Says units work fine in their lab without any particular difficulty and are performing to specification.
      21. ??? (nothing's budged since then, 5.8GHz link is still working fine, remaining 2 installed Gigalink spans also working fine now that the weather is nice and warm)
      22. I conclude that 60GHz-ish stuff doesn't fucking work. It may be counter to a world of differing opinion, but this one is mine.

      So, Oh Wise and Competent One, please tell me where I've gone wrong, other than the fact that I accepted the job to begin with. I beg this of you. Show me the error of my ways, oh great and powerful -- oops, I meant "competent" -- Oz!

      Thanks! (And I promise not to look behind the curtain.)

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
    21. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by drmofe · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      Sure. Step 6 is where you went wrong. And your conclusion at step 22 is incorrect. And if you continue to work in areas where you aren't certified, you will continue to be wrong. No charge for the diagnosis.

    22. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You've answered your own question. You are attempting use in an environment that is not conducive to that technology. Simply put, your environmental ranges are far too great.

      Whereas your environment experiences 90 degree Fahrenheit temperature variations, more than enough to warp any building several inches, drmofe is in an environment that only has a 20-30 degree temperature variation. Hence it won't work for you but, it works great for drmofe.

      Furthermore, I'm guessing that drmofe is in Australia and in an area of low precipitation. Your installation in the northern U.S. would suffer not only extreme temperature variation but also much higher precipitation with rain in summer and snow/ice in winter.

    23. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      just make sure you use oxygen free copper

    24. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh, right. Ted Stevens wasn't wrong, he was just ahead of his time

    25. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by PalmKiller · · Score: 1

      Whoosh, here let me help you out...I got out of this, its obvious to all but you it seems, that the proxim units have way too narrow a feed. In a nutshell, Bridgewave works, Proxim don't, 60Ghz has nothing to do with the failure. The other thing I get out of this is that you do NOT know what you are doing or you would have figured this out already.

    26. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by PalmKiller · · Score: 1

      Um, could be, perhaps (I suspect the feedhorn is too narrow on the proxim unit to begin with). At any rate if it is indeed the temperature changes, why don't they just have two links for each, one aligned for winter, and go into a good switch on each end that can thrash out the link redundancy issues. Oh wait, nevermind, the technology must be flawed...forget about making it work, just say its bad.

    27. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you would think for the money there would be automatic alignment / realignment. Or some sort of multi dish shape that gives it more wiggle room.

    28. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 1

      The other thing I get out of this is that you do NOT know what you are doing or you would have figured this out already.

      How? Through osmosis? Paper certificates? Which part of Proxim certification includes the bit about that says "our product DOESN'T FUCKING WORK"?

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
    29. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 1

      Heh. Yeah. Let's use the shotgun approach - after all, it's the most scholarly and learned method of problem solving. Why not add another for mid-spring, just in case? (Have you priced this stuff?)

      http://www.orinocowireless.com/downloads/products/gigalink/DS_0708_GIGALINK_US.pdf

      -30C to 60C operating. IIRC, that's not quite up spec for a Mars mission, but it should be adequate for any place on Earth's surface.

      It just doesn't fucking work.

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
    30. Re:60GHz is available because its almost useless by adolf · · Score: 1

      Hey, kid: Stay in school. It sounds like you need it.

      --
      Kid-proof tablet..
  5. WiGigroup? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I've been to that meeting and took a picture of the WiGig steering committee. Good times.

  6. ABC? by DarthVain · · Score: 1

    A) Will it cook an egg?
    B) Will it make me Sterile?
    C) Will it be short range?

    1. Re:ABC? by curtix7 · · Score: 1

      but more importantly will it blend?

    2. Re:ABC? by Burkin · · Score: 1

      No; No; Extremely.

    3. Re:ABC? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, no, and yes, respectively.

    4. Re:ABC? by denis-The-menace · · Score: 1

      Will it go through ordinary walls?

      --
      Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
    5. Re:ABC? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In no particular order, Yes, No, and No. You figure out the rest.

    6. Re:ABC? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Aren't A and B the same thing?

  7. "80% done?" by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 4, Funny

    The Wireless Gigabit (WiGig) spec is apparently 80 percent done and, since it is aimed at . . .

    . . . Duke Nukem Forever players, it will never see the light of day.

    --
    Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
  8. Gigabit wireless specification: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wireless transmissions shall be delivered at no less than 1 gigabit.

    There,

    1. Re:Gigabit wireless specification: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not specific enough. Microsoft will figure out a way to be "compliant" with this.

  9. Good luck with that by bzzfzz · · Score: 2, Informative

    Great if you don't want to go more than a few feet. The problems with walls, floors, and roofs, bad enough for WiFi at 2.4Ghz, are far more serious in the higher bands. Practical in-home, wireless HDTV video distribution will remain elusive for years. It's not just a matter of bandwidth. The performance of the network has to be consistent regardless of whether someone opens a door or stands in the hallway or you drop frames. And it has to be able to actually achieve HDTV rates consistently in most homes or buyers will get frustrated from bringing home stuff that doesn't work for them.

    1. Re:Good luck with that by Kohath · · Score: 1

      MIMO schemes are somewhat resilient to the problem with someone standing in the signal path.

      Anyway, this seems to be aimed at allowing your PS3 or your laptop to display on the wall-mounted flat-screen 8 feet away without running a cable. I think they had room-to-room transmission in mind only with directional antennas.

  10. Proper frequency for the purpose by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 4, Interesting

    60 GHz is a great frequency for local communications. It is attenuated by passage through the air, in addition to the usual square-law attenuation over distance, and thus your LAN won't be interfering with everyone else's LAN and with long-distance wireless users in the band. Although the ISM band currently used for 802.11b, g, and n is sort of a garbage band, with microwave ovens and so on sharing the frequencies, it has long-range potential (wifi links in the hundreds of miles are possible by line of sight and big dishes) and thus should really be used for what it's suited for.

    --
    Bruce Perens.
    1. Re:Proper frequency for the purpose by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      Plus the high-directional antennas for this should be very compact, if I understand it correctly.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    2. Re:Proper frequency for the purpose by Qubit · · Score: 1

      n is sort of a garbage band, with microwave ovens and so on

      For some reason I'm imagining "Garbage Band" as something that Psystar would bundle with their hackintoshes.

      --

      coding is life /* the rest is */
    3. Re:Proper frequency for the purpose by RazzleDazzle · · Score: 2, Informative

      So maybe not full gigabit but there are wireless products that support higher bandwidth links at higher than 802.11 frequencies. For example check out Dragon Wave products. With directional antennas and line of sight you can go for miles and get decent bandwidth.

      --
      ZERO ZERO ONE ZERO ONE ZERO ONE ONE! Just brushing up for my next big invention: Ethernet over Voice (EoV)
  11. Uber-Wifi? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Don't get too excited.

    Tomorrow's Uber-Wifi is next year's Marconi Wireless.

    Ironic that my captcha would be a WWI relic: Phosgene

  12. Classic chicken and egg problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Having worked with some really compelling UWB projects only to see them shelved, I predict a similar fate for WiGig devices. Chipset manufacturers will always be one dieshrink away from perfecting an awesome single chip MAC/PHY device which won't get built until device manufacturers sign contracts purchase devices in mass production quantities. Device manufacturers will sit on their hands not wanting to take such a huge risk. Meanwhile very compelling devices which could greatly improve the quality of the healthcare you receive never get built because they do not represent a substantial enough market to be of interest to the chipset vendors.

  13. Sure you can by LanMan04 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Sure you can. A good quality (not insane quality, but good) movie at 720p is typically encoded to fill a DVD5 (4.37GB)

    4.37GB = 4474.88MB = 35799.04Mb

    So we need to stuff 35799 megabits down a pipe in 2 hours or so.

    2 hours = 120 minutes = 7200 seconds

    35799/7200 = 4.97208 Mb/sec

    So you need a sustained transfer rate of about 5 megabits per second to stream a 4.37GB movie in 2 hours.

    --
    With the first link, the chain is forged.
    1. Re:Sure you can by Arthur+Grumbine · · Score: 1

      Sure you can. A good quality (not insane quality, but good) movie at 720p is typically encoded to fill a DVD5 (4.37GB)

      4.37GB = 4474.88MB = 35799.04Mb

      So we need to stuff 35799 megabits down a pipe in 2 hours or so.

      2 hours = 120 minutes = 7200 seconds

      35799/7200 = 4.97208 Mb/sec

      So you need a sustained transfer rate of about 5 megabits per second to stream a 4.37GB movie in 2 hours.

      Methinks you've got the bits and bytes a bit mixed up there...
      Fortunately, 802.11g would (theoretically) be able to handle ~40Mbit/s required for your example. 802.11n should be able to handle even top quality 720p.

      --
      Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
    2. Re:Sure you can by sjames · · Score: 1

      His figures look right from here +/- packet overhead.

    3. Re:Sure you can by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Um.
      His math is correct.

      The reasoning, is not, since we have to handle PEAK bitrates. (Or are they streaming/playing app combos out there that buffer well, let you pick your own codecs, and DON'T suck ass?)

    4. Re:Sure you can by LanMan04 · · Score: 1

      Nope, check the big Bs and the little bs. :)

      --
      With the first link, the chain is forged.
    5. Re:Sure you can by Arthur+Grumbine · · Score: 1

      Ye gods! I'm an idiot... /facepalm

      --
      Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
  14. Ultra-wideband IS dead by maclizard · · Score: 1

    Despite the undeniable fact that there are in fact devices that use or are capable of using UWB, it is no more alive than dial-up.

    1. Re:Ultra-wideband IS dead by JesseMcDonald · · Score: 1

      What about Wireless USB, which will be coming to mass-market shortly? It's based on UWB. The UWB brand might be dead, but the technology isn't.

      --
      "The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
    2. Re:Ultra-wideband IS dead by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I could be wrong, but my money says wireless USB will end up using wifi or a newer technology.

    3. Re:Ultra-wideband IS dead by JesseMcDonald · · Score: 1

      The RF protocol for Wireless USB has already been decided, and it's definitely UWB. From the Wikipedia article on Wireless USB:

      Wireless USB is based on the WiMedia Alliance's Ultra-WideBand (UWB) common radio platform, which is capable of sending 480 Mbit/s at distances up to 3 meters and 110 Mbit/s at up to 10 meters.

      Also, from the official USB Implementer's Forum page on Wireless USB:

      Wireless USB will support robust high-speed wireless connectivity by utilizing the common WiMedia MB-OFDM Ultra-wideband (UWB) radio platform as developed by the WiMedia Alliance.

      One has to look around a bit to find them, but there are devices on the market right now which implement the UWB-based Wireless USB interface, e.g. the IOGear Wireless USB Hub and Adapter. It is highly unlikely that the USB-IF would switch to WiFi (or anything else) so late into the development process.

      --
      "The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
  15. e4! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    Users With Lar6e yes, I work for new core is going

  16. what about IEEE? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Hopefully this will be rolled into IEEE 802.11 at some point. Otherwise things could become a mess (even if this consortium has major backing).

  17. moD up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    to make surE the

  18. Trademark infringement by bcilfone · · Score: 1

    Uber-WiFi? I'll sue your friggin' asses.

    --

    A choice of masters is not freedom
  19. 80/20 rule by Mal-2 · · Score: 1

    How long did it take to develop it this far? A good estimate of the time remaining would be four times that long (in man-hours, not calendar time). The general rule is that the last 20% of a job takes 80% of the time.

    Mal-2

    --
    How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
  20. Uncompressed video is 3 Gbps, you need it for HDMI by George_Ou · · Score: 1

    Uncompressed video is 3 Gbps, you need it for wireless HDMI.

  21. frist pso)t by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    fucking confirmed: I 3on't want to About bylaws unpleasant

  22. Missed Opportunity by DrPeper · · Score: 0

    See they should have called it...

    WiiGii (WeeGee)

    Oh, nevermind the domain name has already been registered.

  23. f a6orz by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    clearly become Had at lunchtime whIch a7lows Gains market share

  24. Re:Uncompressed video is 3 Gbps, you need it for H by sexconker · · Score: 1

    24 (bits per pixel)
    1920 (pixels per frame width)
    1080 (pixels per frame height)
    60 (frames per second)
    -----
    2985984000

    Add in your audio/other crap.
    You've got damn near 3 Gbps, son!

  25. HDMI 1.3 supports 10 Gbps I believe by George_Ou · · Score: 1

    HDMI 1.3 supports 10 Gbps I believe. That might not be enough for 2160-60P and you'll need 12 Gbps. If we have to support 48 bits per pixel, then make that 24 Gbps.

    1. Re:HDMI 1.3 supports 10 Gbps I believe by sexconker · · Score: 2, Funny

      Believe me, I want to support 48 bpp!
      I'm so sick of fucking 16777216 colors. I need more, lots more, and a display that can actually render them!

    2. Re:HDMI 1.3 supports 10 Gbps I believe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not all the bits are used for display. It's useful to have those extra bits when you want some flexibility.

  26. Not useless by XNormal · · Score: 1

    Oxygen absorption in the 60 GHz band is 10-15db per km. Not a big issue for typical links of up to a few hundred meters. This reduces the chances of interference and improves frequency reuse which is important in an unlicensed band. In fact, it is the reason this band was designated as unlicensed in the first place!

    --
    Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
  27. Re: by clint999 · · Score: -1

    It means that there is a 7 GHz wide range of frequencies that is free somewhere around 60 GHz.e.g. 60-67 might be a possibility, or it might be 57-64.It's easier to use 7 GHz of spectrum at 60 GHz than 7 GHz of spectrum centered at 10, because the range is a lower percentage of the center frequency of the range.That said, the range at 60 GHz is going to be insanely short.

    --
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