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Baby Monitors Killing Urban Wi-Fi
Barence writes "Baby monitors and wireless TV transmitters are responsible for slowing down Wi-Fi connections in built-up areas, according to a report commissioned by British telecoms regulator Ofcom. The research smashes the myth that overlapping Wi-Fi networks in heavily congested towns and cities are to blame for faltering connection speeds. Instead it claims that unlicensed devices operating in the 2.4GHz band are dragging down signals. 'It only requires a single device, such as an analogue video sender, to severely affect Wi-Fi services within a short range, such that a single large building or cluster of houses can experience difficulties with using a single Wi-Fi channel,' the report claims."
Frank: A lot of people are bugging their babies these days. I guess babies can't be trusted.
Posts not to be taken literally. Almost everything is sarcasm.
They're just trying to slow down the net for their parents so they'll have time to play with them!
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
Do away with the babies, then we don't need baby monitors anymore. Voila! Better wi-fi. I'm willing to sacrifice all your babies for better wi-fi.
And it was interrupting my raiding schedule. So I hired a hitman to take out my neighbors baby, execution style. Problem fixed itself soon after.
... yet.
I had him plant some weed on the infant to make it look like a drug deal gone bad but I was still questioned at the trial. Thank god Warcraft can't be considered a motive
My work here is dung.
Why not use some awesome alternate firmware to use a channel (14, anyone?) that nobody else in the area is likely using and thus avoid interference?
Isn't it interesting how you come to recognize posters based solely on their sigs???
(or are we using code words like "baby monitor" and "urban" to mean something racist?)
Or are you just following up an otherwise interesting post with a flamebait comment?
Posts not to be taken literally. Almost everything is sarcasm.
Won't someone thing of something besides the children!?
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
I've somehow been able to run Wi-Fi with a baby monitor at home in the same general vicinity without a problem. I'm in a fairly dense suburban apartment complex with at least 10-12 WiFi hotspots when I look, it stands to reason other similar baby monitor devices, cordless cellphones, etc. are probably around. I also have a cordless landline phone, but it's on 5.8ghz and annoying everything but my WiFi there :-)
If this becomes a problem, I imagine they'll make baby monitors actually run on Wifi. Imagine your baby monitor being an internet device even if it's only relaying packets back and forth through your hub with nothing special. Maybe as a side benefit you can capture baby audio noises to Wifi network as MP3 or something for posterity, with a noise detector to catch anything significant (I envision emailing grandma 12am baby babble heard through the monitor).
...in bed
Wireless telephones work around the same frequencies. Not true mobile phones, but the house ones that need a basestation. Ours used to interrupt the network when a call came in, or ring when there was a large transfer going on. Until we ditched it.
Isn't that what being part of the unlicensed, open, free spectrum means though? Anyone can use it for anything?
that children do not belong on the internet!
Many leave their baby monitors open and unencrypted.
I've found many open baby monitors being leeched by a dozen on more losers. The stolen bandwidth really lagged out the pictures and caused little Johnny to stew in his own poo longer than necessary.
And just try to get one of these leeches to do even a single changing. The second little Johhny finishes an upload the leeches scatter without the courtesy of seeding.
If the cause isn't network-traffic-related, then why aren't those same interfering devices causing problems in rural areas? Even people in rural areas these days have microwaves and baby monitors.
The research smashes the myth that overlapping Wi-Fi networks in heavily congested towns and cities are to blame for faltering connection speeds. Instead it claims that unlicensed devices operating in the 2.4GHz band are dragging down signals.
Since WiFi is yet another one of those "unlicensed devices" that operates in the 2.4GHz frequency range, how exactly does this smash the myth? We all knew that all these various devices operating in the same frequency range would stomp all over each other once there were enough of them.
So which baby is it that's monitoring the killing of urban WiFi? If he/she weren't monitoring it, would it still be happening?
This guy's the limit!
No. I'm genuinely curious.
I don't see a correlation between "urban" and "baby monitor" to be racist. All it is making a point of is that in more urban environments it is closer contact with other people, therefore rather than in a rural environment like you pointed out where the baby monitor being used to bug a child is a half mile away, it is only several yards and is within range of your average 802.11x device.
Posts not to be taken literally. Almost everything is sarcasm.
A friend was having trouble with a TV signal repeater he was using to send his TV signal from his aerial to the screen in his kitchen as his DVB-T signal was poor in that room. He couldn't figure out why it was experiencing intermittent interference but he had noticed it was worse when his PC was turned on.
I guessed straight away it was probably due to his wi-fi and moving his network over to channel 1 (reggae ftw!) sorted the problem out. I'm sure it still happens occasionally though, most likely do to someone else in his building having a network on the default channel 11.
Nick
2.4GHz is known "garbage" band, precisely because it is the frequency for microwave cooking ovens.
Consequently, due to obviously low channel availability, licensing was and is unnecessary. Wi-Fi was intentionally designed to use this unlicensed band to avoid over-regulation. Wi-Fi was never meant to be a Metropolitan Area Network technology it now tries to be, but to achieve some kind of "no pigtail" LAN connectivity inside single room/office instead, just a little bit more then Bluetooth. It's main competitor at the time was IrDA!
All devices in the 2.4GHz ISM band are unlicensed devices. Baby monitors and wireless TV bridges are just as legitimate users of the bandwidth as Wifi networks. You can use the relatively free 5Ghz band, but it's only a matter of time until other applications also start to crowd that frequency. That's why the ISM bands have power limits, so that interference is limited to the vicinity of the device.
Does the article not realize that "Wi-Fi" devices are also unlicensed? By definition any device operating in the 2.4GHZ UNLICENSED BAND is an unlicensed device! Wi-Fi devices have the exact same priority as any other device using this frequency band. And really, there's nothing wrong with this. Since this frequency band is unlicensed the FCC is basically saying "use at your own risk, anyone can use this frequency for any purpose they like, and there is no guarantee of any quality of service". If you want something that's more reliable and guaranteed to work shell out the $$$$ for some spectrum and equipment that works on a licensed piece of spectrum that you own.
It kind of annoys me to see big rollouts using 802.11.
First there's the snowjob the ISPs give the cities to get the municipal monopoly, then there's snowjob the eager, wannabe-techno-savvy politicians give their constituents for giving away the farm to yet another municipal monopoly (where I live it was a sweetheart contract to provide in-care wireless to cops and city workers to prop up the ultimately unprofitable sale of wifi to end-users), and then there's the inevitable whining from users about why it doesn't work like the access point within 25 feet of them everywhere else they use 802.11, which they inaccurately call "wireless" and lump the in same category as cell phones, FM radio, etc.
Then we get to the point where providers using a technology not designed for lighting up whole cities start bitching about everyone else using "their" unlicensed spectrum....
I moved ½ a year ago from a apartment to a house. I moved from a place where I could se 20x SIDS to a place where I could see 2-3.
I had some connectivity problems with my different devices + a lot of bluetooth dropouts on mouse and keyboards.
When I was done moving in I got around to setup Wi-Spy to monitor for an entire day.
Channels 6 and 11 was populated with 2-3 access points that did not really make much traffic and I had placed my on channel 1. But all channels from 1 to 11 has a lot of signals that you need at tool like wi-spy to see, signal that looked like cordless phones, baby monitors etc and then cell phones with bluetooth enabled(on top of my wireless keyboard and mouse)
And since I can use channel 13, I moved my AP up there even though it had a bit overlaps with the APs on channel 11.
I got much better sustained throughput because of much less background noise.
I also monitored the 5 GHz band and it was dead quiet compared to 2,4. So I would move everything there if only my stupid airport extreme(old version) could run both channels at the same time, but I have 2 devices that does not support 5 GHz.
This is how rumors get started, Beavis!
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
So after reading the article, I can't really agree on this. I have "lots of EE friends in high places" and they also disagree to a large extent.
Back in 03 when I was deploying my company's first wireless networks, this article explained a lot.
And further reading here...funny how this has already been covered this year.
And remember, the ISM band *was allocated because of microwave ovens* as in...it wouldnt be fair to license out this band because it is interference prone, so they made it a sort of free for all...if a baby monitor is interfering with your cordless phone or WiFi, that is probably the least of your problems!
The story of wifi is an excellent demonstration of the virtues of a technology that, while sucky, is cheap, fairly easy to use, and freely usable without any sort of licensing hassle(beyond that undergone by the manufacturer, of course). The fact that just anybody can set a system up has made wifi ubiquitous. Unfortunately, this only works because wifi uses a rather nasty bit of unlicensed spectrum, which isn't all that great in physics terms, and is shared with all sorts of sources of noise.
Perhaps, with subsequent spectrum allocations, we should (rather than selling it off to the phone company) create blocks of "semi-licensed" spectrum. Like the unlicensed spectrum, anybody would be able to set up a device anywhere, without legal interference; but, unlike the 2.4GHz band, only devices compliant with a wifi-like open industry standard would be allowed to use it, preventing interference from arc welders and microwaves and horrendous super-noisy legacy designs and things. Since RF devices have to be tested and licensed anyway(to prevent interference with licensed bands) the additional regulatory overhead on the manufacturers of these wifi-like modules would be fairly small. It seems to me that this would preserve the virtues of wifi, while simultaneously protecting that slice of spectrum from severe interference.
I have a Summer Best View baby monitor http://www.summerinfant.com/categories_products_view.php?id=322 that I found at Target and as much as I love this little device, it brought my wireless G network to a crawl. I could no more longer stream movies across my wireless. The camera end does let you choose between two frequencies and I found that if I change the channel on my router to 1 from the default 6 and changed the channel on my baby monitor, I have the speeds almost back to normal. I did have a problem with my wireless devices reconnecting and had to reconfigure most of them. I was really surprised that these devices were permitted to use the 2.4GHz frequencies, but at least I found a way to cope with it.
I just heard the police saying that they discovered a paedophile ring on Slashdot who were conspiring with a baby sitter to kill a baby called Wifi, purple monkey dishwasher!
It's no secret that 2.4G and 5GH devices screw with wireless networks... heck, I bet they also found that in dense areas, WIRELESS NETWORKS EFFECT THE PERFORMANCE OF WIRELESS NETWORKS! Guess what, so do microwaves!
Network and other data devices should 1) be relegated to dedicated frequencies, like TVs, radio, and phones already are. Restrict only data systems to that band. 2) narrower band restrictions should be employed (or expanded ranges) to allow more chanels to agregate in the same space. 11 chanels, including the crossover which really leaves us with 5-6 viable chanels, is not NEARLY enough... 3) Portable household devices (like phones, monitors, etc) and other wireless systems (home theatre speakers, game remotes, etc) should be relegated to their own bands not used for network/data.
I just moved into a new house. I bought a lot of new equipment to go in it. My new wireless phones are 8.2GHz. My HT rear speakers run on line-of-sight, not 2.4GHz like most. My Wifi runs on 5GHz (and also 2.4, but that's reserved for the guest network SSIDs which are disabled completely unless I have a guest). My baby monitors run in the 900MHz range. Everything that COULD be wired IS wired. As a coutesy, on the devices I can, I have turned down the gain so the signal is only clear to the distances required. (my wifi penatrates all my rooms at 4 or 5 bars at only 60% signal strenght, i have no need to be on wifi 250 feet from my house...).
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
> Why the heck are baby monitors on 2.4GHz anyway?
It is an unlicensed band. Anyone can use it, and no one can (legally) complain, since they "knew" that it was a free-for-all (it is hidden in the fine print in your router directions, probably).
> Why can't they operate on lower frequencies, like
> the 900MHz bands? 900MHz goes through walls better, too.
Because those are all licensed bands, with only the selected providers allowed to operate their (your cell phone can use it only to connect to a licensed provider) equipment in your area.
I know that my household wifi drops like an anchor whenever I start using a typical 2.4GHz hobby remote-control. The RC transmitters and receivers in that band usually work with a digital encoded "sub-channel" and communicate in a broadband fashion, unlike the older 72MHz analog schemes that had specific narrowband sub-channels. I empathize with the wifi users who get blasted offline when an RC conflicts, but I'd be more concerned if my RC helicopter can't communicate due to wifi interference: a comms drop-out at 100ft can cost a lot of money and repair time, unlike a wifi connection.
[
My old 915MHz WaveLAN network I still have set up at home hasn't been bothered at all by the baby monitors. Last I checked, 902 to 928 MHz is still open for unlicensed ISM use in Region 2.
> Because those are all licensed bands, with only the selected
> providers allowed to operate their (your cell phone can use
> it only to connect to a licensed provider) equipment in your area.
> Instead it claims that unlicensed devices operating in the 2.4GHz band are dragging down
> signals.
Um, WiFi devices _are_ unlicensed devices. They use the 2.4GHz band on the condition that they do not interfere with authorized uses of the band and accept any interference with their operation. Baby monitors have just as much right to use the band as do your WiFi devices and both must yield to authorized uses.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
"US Navy SEALs, armed with baby monitors, successfully attacked and destroyed the North Korean Iranian Al Qaida scary nuclear weapons plant, by disrupting their communications command and control systems . . . by using the baby monitors."
"A Pentagon spokesman declined to comment that a Defense Department Special Warfare Squad was being trained exclusively with RC toy equipment obtained from 'Toys R Us.'"
"Although an anonymous comment from a person familiar with the situation, stated 'That truck that can flip over is real cool.'"
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
I would have got first post if it wasn't for those goddamn BREEDERS and their filthy RUGRATS JAMMING my wifi.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
I don't buy 2.4GHz wireless phones any more. Not worth the trouble.
I don't call the RV park across the street and ask them to change channels on any of the 6 Aps I can receive. I set up a cantenna and blasted their nearest AP until they changed the channel. ps- their 'Internet Guy' is the owner's brain-damaged nephew. He means well.
I don't bug my neighbors about their changing channels almost weekly. I just rig the cantenna again and blast 'em. They change. Life is good. ps- they do NOT understand that the RV park has 9 APs, and we can easily get 6 of them. They don't know it's me trying to use a channel they chose. pps- they moved in 3 months ago, and just got their AP running. They barely know what to do, and I profess ignorance - I'm not into unpaid support any more. Their 9-year old son is handling the admin duties, I think.
My niece has a baby monitor, but it's probably a 27MHz one, never hurt their WiFi.
WiFi has its limitations. At least here in the US, we let the NSA handle the surveillance, and thyey usually don't interfere with the signal. Nice guys there. Kinda wierd, but nice.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
How is it inaccurate to call it "wireless" if, in fact, no wires are used to transmit signals? What in the world do you propose?
I had similar problems with my Wi-Fi connection dropping and was finally fed up, so I did some research and found the MetaGeek Wi-Spy spectrum analyzer (ONLY $99-$199). http://www.metageek.net/ I ordered the $99 Wi-Spy v1, haven't received it yet, but I suspect that I have a neighbor that is using a 2.4ghz phone (in the Ch 1 range) that is causing my dropped connections.
My parents' cordless telephone kills the wireless every time it rings, and for as long as it's in use.
Sometimes.
I think it depends on the channel the router was using... it was set to automatically pick the "best" channel. Well, until the phone rang.
Changing the channel to a fixed value solved the problem, I think. Apparently the phone was only interfering on some of the channels' frequencies.
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
I love how the article makes it sound as if these devices are not "supposed" to be on the same spectrum as the Wi-Fi devices, which are also "Unlicensed" devices.
The ISM band is an unlicensed band that anyone can use, and you can't complain if someone interferes with you.
If I found a baby monitor feed broadcast where I live, I think my first reaction would be to override it with a stronger goatse/tubgirl feed.
Forget that, just override the audio with prerecorded sounds of a baby crying. Send that 4 times a night at random times and I'm sure it won't be very long before you don't have to worry about any interference.
If you have a problem with collisions on a protocol newer 802.11a/b, then it's a problem with your equipment, not the channels your neighbors select. g and n get along fine with other devices sharing frequencies. Anyway, base stations channel hop all on their own.