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SPOTLIGHT: Home, sweet home
TechAssist will provide free wireless Internet access in the Dupont Circle are of Washington, DC, starting Friday. The wireless access will work inside the area and may work on surrounding blocks. The project will cost approximately $10,000. TechAssist does not have plans to make up that cost by using advertising on its website. The company considered other parts of the city but eventually settled on Dupont Circle. TechAssist will consider installing wireless access in Adams Morgan and McPherson Square in the future. Story
ALSO NOTED: Ixia acquires CMC; Dublin airport Ireland's largest hotspot; and much more...
> Cinram and Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D) have jointly implemented an RFID solution in the UHF range. Report
> Calabasas, California-based Ixia acquires CMC and shows IxWLAN. Story
> Dublin Airport is now Ireland's largest wireless hotspot. …
FierceWiFi July 13, 2005
- Editor's Corner
- Skype, Boingo to bring VoIP to hotspots
- AirMagnet shows multi-tasking sensored headline
- Trend: Growing interest in 57-64 GHz band
- New solution eases WiFi interference problems
- WiFi hotspot locator on a key chain
- SPOTLIGHT: New cell services put on hold
- ALSO NOTED: First also noted headline; second headline
Editor's Corner
I want to remind FierceWiFi readers that the Early Bird discount for our upcoming executive summit, wVoIP 2005, ends on Friday. I am proud to say that our event is shaping up nicely. In the last few days we have added new speakers from In-Stat, Meru Networks (one of the 2005 FierceWiFi Fierce 15 winners), GigaBeam, the Burton Group, Zultys Technologies, and CallWave. …
Skype, Boingo to bring VoIP to hotspots
In a move as siginficant as it was inevitable, Boingo and Skype will collaborate in creating Skype Zones, Boingo-operated hotspots where customers will be able to use Skype VoIP. More than 45 million users of Skype will be able to access IP telephony in any of Boingo's 18,000 hotspots around the world. The companies are offering unlimited WiFi access for Skype Internet telephony calls for $7.95 per month (users may also choose a two-hour fee option for $2.95). The $7.95 and …
AirMagnet shows multi-tasking sensored headline
AirMagnet is enhancing its support for Cisco APs in AirMagnet Enterprise 6. It is also offering multi-tasking sensors, simplifying set-up, and adding intelligence to spot new attacks. "You can now use Cisco APs as scanners," AirMagnet's Rich Mironov told Techworld. "That's a little less than a sensor, it is not a full-function analytical device, but the AP can become a full-time dedicated scanner on all channels." The company's probes are also integreated in other multi-radio APs, …
Trend: Growing interest in 57-64 GHz band
Five years ago the FCC allocated 7 GHz in the 57-64 GHz band for unlicensed use. The opening of that spectrum and advances in processing and wireless communication technology now make this portion of the spectrum, hitherto perceived as the domain of expensive point-to-point links, of interest for next-generation WPANs and backbone nets. As Patrick Mannion writes, it is not immediately obvious why yet another IEEE standard should be developed and why more bandwidth for WPANs would be …
New solution eases WiFi interference problems
The major concerns about WiFi are security and interference-causing crowded airways. A new technology may well ease the latter anxiety. Scottsdale, Arizona-based Rotani says that its patented AirReferee technology (which the company emphasizes is not a MIMO technology) will allow performance similar to that offered by pre-802.11n/MIMO products already on the market. The technology is especially effective for video and does very well in dense environments in which high interference is a …
WiFi hotspot locator on a key chain
Schaumburg, Illinois-based First International Digital, already famous for its popular irock!, Beamit, and MusiCase series of digital audio devices and iPod accessories, has just launched its WiFi Sentry (Model 240WS). WiFi Sentry allows users to find hotspots with one push of a button. The device locates both 802.11b and 802.11g networks within 300 feet in less than one-half second. Four bright LEDs indicate relative signal strength and direction. WiFi Sentry is small and light enough to …
SPOTLIGHT: New cell services put on hold
The largest mobile operators in Europe have seen their market becoming more crowded, squeezing sales and profits. According to financial data from the carriers, the average European consumer is now spending just about half what he or she spent in the late 1990s for mobile service. Equally worrisome for the opeators, these consumers appear uninterested in doing much more with their cell phones than talk and send text messages. Analysis
ALSO NOTED: First also noted headline; second headline
> David Burstein on the futre of DSL, cable, and everything in between. Interview
> SINE Networks selects Strix Systems for indoor/outdoor WiFi mesh access. Release
> PRISMIQ shows the PRISMIQ Mini-Fi, a WiFi compliant wireless USB2.0 adapter. …
FierceWiFi July 6, 2005
- 802.11n compromise in sight
- New technology promises broadband in sub-GHz
- Wi-LAN receives $2M in orders for Libra MX
- US military to adopt extra secure UWB system
- Japan Telecom tests Flarion's roaming technology
- SPOTLIGHT: Courting disaster
- ALSO NOTED: Man charged with WiFi theft; ArrayComm joins WiMax Forum; and much more...
802.11n compromise in sight
In what may well be a significant breakthrough for 802.11n, the leaders of the two groups advancing competing proposals for the standard's sepcifications have agreed to submit a joint proposal at the next meeting of the working group tasked with elaborating the standard. The meeting will be held in two weeks. In the March meeting of the task group, one of the leading contenders, TGn Sync, won a simple majority over rival WWiSE but fell short of the 75 percent majority required to carry …
New technology promises broadband in sub-GHz
A new technology holds the promise of cheaper broadband wireless base stations and of phones with talk-time measured in days, not hours. xG Technologies says that its xMax, which will be publicaly demonstrated in September, will deliver 40 Mbps over 15 miles, using less than one watt of power at sub-GHz frequencies. The key: Such low frequencies have so far been considered unsuitable for broadband. "Our unique benefit is we can use narrow channels [at low frequencies] where you get better …
Wi-LAN receives $2M in orders for Libra MX
Calgary, Canada-based Wi-LAN said it has received $2 million in orders for its broadband wireless solutions, of which more than $1 million is initial orders for its Libra MX systems. Libra MX is Wi-LAN's WiMax platform with the company's guaranteed seamless upgrade path to WiMax Forum Certified systems. The products are used for large-scale data, voice, and video surveillance networks in the countries ordering them. Note that the orders appear to come mostly from Middle Eastern …
US military to adopt extra secure UWB system
Scientists at the Sandia National Laboratories have combined UWB radio signals with advanced encryption techniques to develop a secure sensor and communications network for the US military. This secure UWB communication system holds the promise of better protection of troops in the field by enabling better detection of enemy positions and by making it much harder for adversaries to eavesdrop or jam military communications.
…
Japan Telecom tests Flarion's roaming technology
Japan Telecom, together with Tohoku University's Research Center for 21st-Century Information Technology (the IT-21 Center) and Flarion Technologies, announced a trial in Sendai, Japan, of Flarion's technology for seamless roaming and handoff between fixed WiFi access areas and a mobile broadband network using Flarion's FLASH-OFDM technology. The mobile broadband aspect of the trial will use of the 2 GHz frequency band recently given to Japan Telecom by the …
SPOTLIGHT: Courting disaster
The adoption of WiFi by corporations has many benefits, but the downside is that making corporate data accessible through WiFi networks means intruders and other unwanted visitors may easily access such networks if proper precautions and tools are not used to protect them. Analysis
ALSO NOTED: Man charged with WiFi theft; ArrayComm joins WiMax Forum; and much more...
> St. Petersburg's, Florida, man charged with felony for WiFi theft. Story
> ArrayComm joins WiMax Forum. Story
> Sprint, Motorola team up to work on 802.16e. Story
> How to combat interference and achieve …
FierceWiFi June 29, 2005
- Houston to use parking meters in muni-WiFi
- Pakistan first country to face Internet blackout
- WGRA pushing for WiMax roaming standard
- iPass opens client-side connectivity
- NASA deploys mesh network at space center
- SPOTLIGHT: 243 Mbps WiFi chipset
- ALSO NOTED: Extreme's new WLAN switches, APs; Newbury releases Watchdog 5.0; and much more...
Houston to use parking meters in muni-WiFi
The city of Houston is planning to begin using its parking meters for more than regulating parking and collecting revenue for the city. The first step in the plan is to make the city's parking meters able to be "fed" not by coins, but by the driver's credit card information, with each meter connected to a central system through WiFi in order to verify the creaidt card information. The next step is to turn these WiFi-enabled meters into elements in a city-wide WiFi hotzone. The WiFi …
WGRA pushing for WiMax roaming standard
They sure move quickly: The WiMax Global Roaming Alliance (WGRA) was formed only a few weeks ago, and its leading member, RemotePipes, is already pushing for the creation of a system which will make it possible for WiMax users to roam among different WISPs. The WGRA is not a standards-developing organization, but rather a lose fedration of companies interested in developing a consensus around the preferred emerging standard. The organization may offer modifications to these emerging …
iPass opens client-side connectivity
Pressured by corporate clients to allow employess to connect to enterprise networks through free WiFi hotspots, iPass this week has opened its client-side connectivity software to allow users to connect to the Internet through wireless and fixed networks which are not part of the company's aggregate system. Corporations would still benefit from having their employees connect to the corporate networks through aggregated iPass APs, as such a conenction would be free, but the new …
NASA deploys mesh network at space center
The Space Shuttle program will resume next month, and Nortel will offer important service to enable NASA's critical information and data sharing among the Space Shuttle Discovery, the International Space Station, and NASA operations centers on the ground. Nortel's backbone routers already support the Mars Rover, the Hubble Telescope, and other NASA programs.
Nortel and Pronto are also making life easier for the many journalists covering NASA events. Nortel deploys a Nortel …