February 23, 2006

London City to be Wi-Fi-enabled

The City of London Corporation is all set to have Wi-Fi network in place covering the entire city. The project is being undertaken by the corporation in partnership with a private Wi-Fi firm, The Cloud. It is expected to be implemented in full in the next few months.

The Cloud, which will install the hardware and equipment, will make use of street furniture like the lamp posts and street signs for the purpose.

The network will make the city Wi-Fi-enabled and workers as well as visitors within the square mile will be able to make use of wireless devices to access the internet on streets and in open spaces.

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February 22, 2006

GigaBeam WiFiber

"WiFiber" from GigaBeam, a Virginia-based telecommunications startup operates in the 71-76 GHz and 81-86 GHz radio spectrum bands. This portion of the radio frequency spectrum has been authorized by the Federal Communications Commission for wireless point-to-point commercial use.

GigaBeam's technology, utilizing these large blocks of authorized contiguous spectrum, enables multi-Gigabit-per-second communications through use of Gigabit Ethernet and other standard protocols. The current speed achieved by GigaBeam's WiFiber product lines is one Gigabit-per-second - equivalent to 647 T1 lines or 1,000 DSL connections. GigaBeam also plans deployment of future products capable of 10 Gigabits-per-second utilizing either the 10 Gigabit Ethernet or OC-192 protocol standards.

GigaBeam's WiFiber technology is similar to terrestrial fiber in terms of speed and reliability for deployment in Metropolitan Area Networks (MANS). However, WiFiber has a substantial advantage over terrestrial fiber because WiFiber can be deployed in a day and costs less to deploy than terrestrial fiber. Terrestrial fiber can take months to deploy and also require significant regulatory and environmental approvals prior to installation.

February 10, 2006

Cell Phones to Make WiFi Calls

Chipmaker Royal Philips Electronics confirmed that a U.S. cellular carrier will launch voice-over-Wi-Fi technology this year, based on Philips' new Nexperia 6120 chipset. Callers should be able to make calls on their home Wi-Fi networks for "a couple of bucks a month, flat rate," according to Philips' Carsten Schimanke writes pcmag