WiMAX, 3G, Wi-Fi battle for your business

10/06/08

The battle to woo you to a particular wireless camp has heated up in the past month. The first U.S. mobile WiMAX service went live last week, just as devices with embedded connections to worldwide High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) 3G services began being aggressively marketed by the GSM Association. In the meantime, integrated, flat-rate global Wi-Fi voice and data service packages have also become available.

Smartphones are opening - but just a crack

10/01/08

There are several definitions of "open access." One is making open source code available to a community of smart cookies who can debug and modify it using open source mechanisms. Another is offering up low-cost or free software development kits (SDK) to encourage creative applications for a given platform. Another is offering middleware that allows an application developed once to run on multiple platforms. And, finally, in mobile networks, open can mean using a phone and its applications on any carrier's compatible network.

G1, other smartphones push 3G limits

09/29/08

We call 'em phones. But the new T-Mobile G1, the Apple iPhone and other touch-enabled handsets making the nightly news are really tiny multifunction computers optimized for music, video, photos or advertising. They also happen to make over-the-air phone calls. The applications being designed for them gobble up mass quantities of bandwidth, something that isn't all that plentiful in 3G networks.

Mobilization trends aided by latest middleware

09/24/08

There is significant application mobilization afoot within large enterprises for the remainder of this year. The plans may be fueled, in part, by sophisticated mobile software-as-a-service (SaaS) availability - offerings that increasingly bundle device management and security into the mix.

New vibe in sensor networks

09/22/08

What will reign as the wireless sensor network platform of the future? To date, the ZigBee Alliance has taken it upon itself to build networking and development standards for low-power, low-memory sensor devices communicating across 802.15.4 wireless personal-area networks. However, work toward promoting the use of the more pervasive and medium-agnostic IP protocol stack heated up last week with the formation of the IP for Smart Objects (IPSO) Alliance.

Online meetings to hit smartphones

09/17/08

A service allowing multimedia online meetings directly from mobile handsets will be announced at the Interop New York 2008 conference this week.

Software defined radios and 802.11n

09/15/08

Software-defined radios, or SDRs, persevere as a lively topic of discussion. An SDR enables a given radio to tune to variable frequencies to meet the specifications of different applications and country-by-country regulations. SDR capabilities are emerging as a consideration for 802.11n, which relies heavily on the 5GHz band for optimum throughput - a band that is subject to regulation around the world.

Tricks for cellular savings

09/10/08

When mobile users are traveling, cellular roaming costs can add up. The ideal solution would be for mobile operators all over the world to reduce their roaming rates, which, admittedly, is happening to a degree in Europe. In lieu of significant widespread reductions, though, the industry has begun chipping away at the problem with a variety of approaches.

Wireless voice calls gain encryption

09/08/08

Fixed-mobile convergence (FMC) start-up Agito Networks Monday plans to announce voice-over-Wi-Fi encryption and other features for its RoamAnywhere Mobility Router.

Latest 802.11 standards: Too little too late?

09/03/08

Both 802.11k for radio resource measurement/management and 802.11r for fast handoff among wireless LAN access points have recently been ratified. Their arrival reminds me a little of the discussions surrounding IPv6 a few years ago, in that many of the problems these standards were designed to address have, in the meantime, been solved in alternative ways.

Smartphone mania

09/01/08

As the mobile user community transitions to the smartphone as a computing platform of choice, developments are heating up left and right.

Wi-Fi tools gain sophistication

08/27/08

802.11n is poised to pervade the interior of enterprise buildings. In anticipation, new tools have been emerging to help enterprises plan, manage and secure these high-speed wireless networks, which have some eccentricities.

Roaming standard ratified

08/25/08

The IEEE recently ratified the long-awaited 802.11r standard for fast handoff, officially named Fast Basic Service Set Transition. 802.11r, in development for four years, is a key component to solving the performance challenges associated with VoIP over Wi-Fi in large-scale networks.

Remaining WLAN startups resist takeover

08/20/08

HP's intent to acquire wireless LAN company Colubris is one in a series of industry-consolidation moves. So who's next? No one, if the remaining startups have their say.

HP to get 11n products with Colubris deal

08/18/08

Last week's announcement that HP intends to acquire wireless LAN company Colubris Networks gives HP a chance to become a formidable player in the enterprise WLAN market. HP has long offered its own ProCurve WLAN products integrated with its popular ProCurve Ethernet switches - a conceptually a nice idea but also a somewhat limiting one.

Living in fear of usage charges

08/13/08

The global voice and data roaming charges users incur when they travel internationally have long been a thorn in the side of multinational companies. Usage for data is particularly difficult to control for several reasons, one of which is that some of the usage gets sucked up by background housekeeping duties - such as regular automatic checks to weather, e-mail and other services. Even if there's no new data downloaded, these pings eat up some portion of the allotted kilobytes.

Global iPhone usage poses economic risk

08/11/08

I was talking to a telecom manager of a large U.S.-based multinational company recently who lamented the fact that worldwide data roaming charges are too steep and unpredictable to justify his business using the multimedia-centric iPhone as an enterprise device. Executives in his organization recently took some complimentary iPhone 3Gs overseas and returned to discover data-usage bills of $4,000 to $5,000 apiece. According to the telecom manager: "They had a cow!"

Femtocells vs. FMC

08/06/08

How do single-mode femtocell-based services, such as the forthcoming Airave service from Sprint, stack up against fixed-mobile convergence (FMC) offerings?

Sprint to debut femtocell service

08/04/08

Sprint says it will make available mid-month a nationwide femtocell-based service that allows you to buy and install a small $100 CDMA amplifier to boost signals in Sprint's licensed spectrum across about 5,000 square feet of space in your home or office. OK, addressing poor in-building coverage with a simple and relatively inexpensive device is admirable. But there are some outstanding questions about usage, frequency coordination, pricing and other issues.

Drexel installs a thousand 11n APs

07/30/08

Philadelphia's Drexel University is busy installing a thousand Draft 2.0 802.11n access points, a huge network project boasting a curious history and a cutthroat vendor evaluation process.

Plugging RF leaks

07/28/08

Have you considered wrapping your building in tinfoil or slathering the walls with metal-impregnated paint to keep RF signals from leaking out? If so, you might want to hold off till September, when a simpler alternative is expected to arrive.

DFS: Are you a good witch or a bad witch?

07/23/08

Dynamic frequency selection, or DFS, is moving onto WLAN users' radars (pun intended) as 802.11n materializes and promises to greatly increase Wi-Fi usage in the 5GHz band. The DFS channel-changing capability applies, from a U.S. regulatory standpoint, to particular 5GHz bands used occasionally by military and weather radar that have also been sanctioned by the FCC to accommodate Wi-Fi traffic when radar data isn't present. What does this mean from an implementation and performance perspective?

Clearing the air about DFS

07/21/08

The latest 802.11n topic to get its knickers in a twist revolves around a capability called dynamic frequency selection, or DFS. There are general performance issues associated with DFS as well as separate U.S. FCC regulatory compliance requirements to consider.

New risks in 802.11n

07/16/08

Along with the potential performance and coverage benefits of 802.11n come a few new security risks, says industry security guru Joshua Wright. Wright presented a Webinar last week that outlined several new vulnerabilities that high-speed 802.11n networks introduce.

Centrino 2 might sport 802.11n, but WiMAX comes later

07/14/08

Intel intends to ship its long-anticipated Centrino 2 mobile laptop platform this week. The platform will include enhanced Wi-Fi capabilities, but its dual-mode Wi-Fi 11n/WiMAX module (codenamed "Echo Peak") won't ship until "later this year," says an Intel spokeswoman.

More

Joanie Wexler is an independent networking technology writer/editor in Silicon Valley.