2100 achieve ahead aims appearing beyond channel codes communications cookie dead deep disaster equipment existing expected experiences feature fon fonera happen ideas implements linksys nz oreillynet paying phones politics position promises pushes quick received recommend relatively rules says ship sticks success tbody track transmission transmitter un unused violate voip waves webanno wire
- 2010-Mar-11: The Telava 3G Broadband Bullet is a 3G modem that comes without a long term contract - you can use one for a month at a time, which would be nice if you are traveling to another country and you need good data access. [9014]
- 2009-Oct-23: Could aluminum oxide paint be used to block WiFi? [8657]
- 2009-Sep-04: Engadget liked the Wi-Fire long-range WiFi adapter, but a number of the comenters were not impressed by their experiences with it. [8470]
- 2009-Jan-21: PyOBEX is a package that implements some of the Bluetooth Object Exchange (OBEX) protocol. [7469] [1]
- 2009-Jan-01: Slashdot discusses the great cell phone texting ripoff. [7402]
- 2008-Nov-20: The FCC has approved the new unlicensed use of the white-space spectrum. THey have also now published the rules for using the white space. [7150]
- 2008-Oct-16: The FCC has now approved a free wireless band. Engadget has more on this change of position. [7030]
- 2008-Oct-13: The FCC appears to be reversing its position on wireless access via the White Space. Also here on Engadget. [7013]
- 2008-Sep-26: The FCC is going to do a second test of prototypes that transmit wireless internet in the unused portions of the television spectrum. The first round of tests failed due to interference with the neighboring TV signals. Discussed here on Engadget with more links to the previous failed trial. Google claims the FCC rigged the tests to make sure they would fail. [4967]
- 2008-Jun-27: GPS signals are becoming more frequently jammed. [6448]
- 2008-Jun-13: The RF4CE consortium is attempting to develop an RF standard for entertainment center controls based on IEEE 802.15.4. [6334] [1]
- 2008-Jun-03: Starbucks and AT&T are collaborating to bring free WiFi to the coffee drinking hordes (up to 2 hours per day) in exchange for some email spam. [6271]
- 2008-Jun-03: WiMax has been called a disaster, an Australian implementation had trouble getting beyond 2km range. [5320]
- 2008-May-17: A new generation of GPS satellites are starting development in 2008 which will feature higher transmission power, the most recent generation in use may have an accuracy of 3-5m. [6179]
- 2008-May-14: Comparing 3G networks, something to consider before signing up for the $60/month data plan. [6159]
- 2008-May-09: Google is starting to fight to make sure Verizon does not violate the open-access stipulation on the 700MHz band. Verizon says they are going to be good. [6053] [1]
- 2008-May-04: In WiFi pirate radio Dan's Data discusses the possibility of home grown public WiFi mesh networks based on inexpensive solar powered WiFi hardware. Plenty of links to related materials. [6043] [1]
- 2008-Apr-14: wibree the next version of Bluetooth with ultra low power use will be changing its name to ULP (Ultra Low Power) Bluetooth and should start to appear in 2008. This could use 1/50th of the current Bluetooth's power while transferring data, so should make for some very long battery life equipment. [5792]
- 2008-Mar-04: Some discussion of how the OLPC mesh networking works. [5222]
- 2008-Jan-30: The Digi Connect WAN 3G is a router that will allow a local network to share an HSDPA or EV-DO wireless link for internet connectivity. Now if only cell phone data plans would get sensible data rates in North America... [5020]
- 2008-Jan-29: The insane price of SMS messages. My suspicion is that these messages are actually transmitted as part of the basic cell phone to tower connection infrastructure, and as such, are a fixed part of the service so the cell company is charging you for something you're already paying for. [5009]
- 2008-Jan-19: Using La Fonera router and the Fon Network to share an internet connection. [4963] [1]
- 2008-Jan-12: In the photos that follow this Engadget CES'08 article there are some interesting things, this item appears to be the swappable GSM radio module (which looks like you put your GSM SIM card into it and then put the module into whatever device you want to activate with GSM). An e-book reader, and another view. And another of these unobtainable Korean more than a dictionary devices that might function as a small webpad (it may be something like this model: MD8500). Some sort of net TV viewer with WiFi support. The company doing this is apparently GroupSense. [4660] [1] [2]
- 2008-Jan-10: Bruce Schneier talks about the pros and cons of leaving a wireless LAN unsecured. This gets discussed here on Slashdot. [4643] [1]
- 2007-Dec-23: The US analog cellular network (only 24 years old) will start being shutdown on 18-Feb-2008. [4513]
- 2007-Dec-05: Telegenisis has a USB connected ZigBee radio dongle. [4393]
- 2007-Nov-29: Canada is going to open up some more of its radio spectrum to new competition. [4210]
- 2007-Nov-21: SmallNetBuilder has a lot of reviews and information on NAS devices and wireless networking. [4184] [1]
- 2007-Nov-16: Google is getting serious about acquiring access to some of the 700MHz spectrum. [4161] [1]
- 2007-Nov-16: Once terrestrial TV broadcasts stop the spectrum that will be freed up will become available for use in mobile services, in the USA this should happen around 2009. The US has been pushing at the UN level to make this consistent across the world, which would be a good thing. [4160]
- 2007-Nov-11: The idea of using existing WiFi access points to implement a public WiFi grid is discussed here on Slashdot. [4065]
- 2007-Nov-11: Using Bluetooth emissions to track people using simple USB Bluetooth sticks to pick them up. [4064]
- 2007-Nov-08: The LTE trial has achieved 100Mbps downlink and 50Mbps uplink speeds for mobile communications. [4051]
- 2007-Nov-04: ZigBee is getting more serious about the home automation market. Now if only ZigBee control became common place in home entertainment equipment. [3958]
- 2007-Oct-22: IBM is researching the 60GHz band with the view to bringing a 100-fold increase in the speed of wireless communications. [3499]
- 2007-Oct-21: Embedded Works makes a variety of wireless communications modules for all sorts of applications. They also have developer kits. [3482] [1]
- 2007-Oct-21: It looks like the US FCC is trying to open up some of the new radio spectrums to allow the consumers who use it to have more choices in what hardware and applications they use on it. This is an interesting change from the past where the company that licensed the spectrum got to control everything, which led to a lot of the silly anti-competitive restrictions that exist today in the cell phone industry. [3480]
- 2007-Oct-20: The UM150 EV-DO USB modem for wireless internet. [3476]
- 2007-Oct-20: WiMax has been added into future versions of the 3G phone standards. [3475]
- 2007-Oct-10: A prototype 700MHz WiFi card has been announced by Ubiquiti, this has been tested with a range of up to 31 miles at 50Mbps. With the potential of such long ranges its easy to see why the 700MHz auction that will happen in Jan'08 may be very important to the future of mobile broad band. [3050]
- 2007-Oct-04: A-WIT Technologies makes some C-Stamp modules as well as some BlueTooth interface modules. [2536] [1]
- 2007-Sep-30: A cell phone jammer from Brandos, targets nearby GSM phones. [2412]
- 2007-Sep-28: Why most attempts at municipal WiFi have failed. One success story, St. Cloud in Florida, is mentioned here. [2258]
- 2007-Sep-23: How software is starting to shape radio communications. [2246]
- 2007-Sep-19: The computers that control the GPS satellite system have finally been upgraded to (nearly obsolete) UNIX servers. What's interesting in this is that the GPS satellites are relatively simple, rather passive devices, essentially doing a precisely timed rebroadcast of signals that originate at this control center. [2226]
- 2007-Sep-19: Canadian cell phone users have put together a class-action suit to try and recover the cell phone "network access fees" that all the major carriers in Canada have been charging. [2218]
- A 802.11b wireless link over 72 miles long. [5921]
- Wireless network bridging. [5920]
- RFID Tags may soon be in wide use, thanks to Wal-Mart. [5889]
- Picoradio, wireless networking done at the lowest powerlevels to do useful things [5888]
- Ultra Wide Band - UWB - radio communications [5887]
- In Aug'07 the FCC rejected attempts to use the white space (gaps between the regular TV channel bands) as a free wireless internet band. [2217]
- In Aug'07 UWB was approved for use in the UK [2216]
- Bluetooth has adopted Nokia's Wibree system for short range, but much lower power, connections [2215]
- Tzero produces a ZeroWire ultrawideband chipset for use in short range high-speed wireless links (probably wireless USB) and also over cable connections. [2214]
- One RF Technology makes ZigBee modules [2213]
- Intel is developing a long range (up to 100km) wireless solution based on WiFi [2212]
- According to Slashdot more unlimited wireless plans will be appearing and some are forecasting that this will become the norm for cellular in a few year. At over $100/month its still a long shot (especially as in 2004 one could get this in India for about $30/month). [2211]
- DART-T troposcatter communications from Raytheon, for the millitary today, but who knows tomorrow? [2210]
- Various enterprises are starting to make money providing WiFi access throughout the world. Boingo.com has about 60,000 hot spot locations around the world. Canadian Hotspots agregates the hotspots of a number of providors across Canada. [2209]
- The A to Z of wireless, a quick overview of wireless topics [2208]
- The FCC is going to let wireless devices use the empty TV channels [2207]
- The GlobalSurfer cell modem does HSDPA, 3G UMTS, EDGE and GPRS data communications [2206]
- The MetaGeek Wi-Spy 2.4GHz Spectrum Analyzer could be quite useful when tuning your WiFi channel usage to avoid interference from other users of the 2.4GHz spectrum [2205]
- The next generation of RFID may be based on a magnetic approach, there is now an IEEE working group to develop this RuBee protocol. [2204]
- Ultra-Wideband wireless USB was demoed at CEBIT in Mar'2006. [2203]
- Intel claims they will ship WiMax cards in 2006. [2202]
- Seagate is due to ship wireless USB hard drives in early 2006. This got revised a day later to say that Seagate were still just showing a proof of concenpt with no firm plans to ship in 2006. [2201]
- Golomb Rulers, have application in sonar and radar [2200]
- Long haul wireless LAN stuff [2199]
- A Florida based startup called xG has developed a wireless technology more efficient than WiMax [2198]
- A pneumatic antenna launcher, for when you need to deploy a long cable antenna without a ladder [2197]
- Panasonic has produced a low-power, bi-directional, radio communications module for use in the 400MHz band. [2196]
- xMax, this might be the ultimate in wireless communications, very low power, up to 22km, penetrates buildings well and does not need a dedicated slice of the spectrum. In Feb'06 they have received some FCC approval based on transmitting a 3.67Mbps signal 18 miles with only 35mW of power. [2195]
- Olympia DualPhone, does Skype and regular land line calls [2194]
- Easy to use ZigBee modules [2193]
- Very long distance cordless phones - up to 130km claimed [2192]
- WiMax could blanket the USA [2191]
- Oct'04 It looks like the HAMs finally lost the battle against powerline broad band radio noise. The question now is what other applications get hurt by this? [2190]
- Wireless neighborhoods in Canada [2189]
- WiMax, up to 10 miles of WiFi data rates? [2188]
- Radio equipped data collection from Dust Networks [2187]
- IDBLUE a blue tooth equipped RFID reader [2186]
- 40 miles range from 1 watt [2185]
- UMA, unlicensed mobile access, a new standard that may allow a GSM phone to call via a local WiFi access points [2184]
- Are there cordless phones that don't interfere with WiFi? [2183]
- Bluetooth may not be as short ranged as previously thought, this artical talks about achieving 1km distances with it! Some of the security concerns arrising are also mentioned. [2182]
- The FCC may make it legal to exchange your WiFi antenna for a better model, or one more suited to your purpose [2181]
- RFID communications in a network [2180]
- Using an iPod to broadcast on FM radio [2179]
- Hacking the Linksys WRT54G, Cringely takes a look at it. More follow up on this and also on hacking the Hauppage Media MVP. [2178]
- Building your own cell-phone telco using WiFi and VOIP [2177]
- Innovative use of cookware to boost WiFi range, using the inexpensive bamboo handled skimmers (also known as spiders) that are used in deep frying. [2176]
- A cartoon guide to the regulation of the air waves [2175]
- Now FireWire is planning to go wireless [2174]
- Cingular is going to offer a 2mbps wireless service (June'04) [2173]
- Fido is launching a new wireless broadband Internet service [2172]
- Turbo Codes to boost wireless transmission, getting near the Shanon Limit. [2171]
- Magnetic induction based communications, with the first products from Aura Communications, may enter the same niche as Bluetooth [2170]
- UWB (ultra wide band) may be used for home wireless LAN type applications to achieve 480Mbps. [2169]
- Getting 35 miles out of a WiFi link, using classic techniques [2168]
- The Griffin iTrip is an ultra low power FM transmitter that turns an iPod into a micro radio station, giving you to ability to share the tunes you are listening to with a number of other people in your vacinity. Actually a pretty neat idea, much better than running cables between, say joggers or cyclists... [2167]
- Then there's the curiously named ZigBee low-power, short range (though longer than BlueTooth), low-cost, wireless networking system. Slashdot reports on it. The idea for this is to eliminate the need to wire your home for control systems, and other similar devices (like alarms). According to Slashdot, Cyprus Semiconductors is developing a similar technology. Here's more on the Cyprus WirelessUSB technology. May 2004: an update on this from Slashdot, they are looking at volume shipments in Oct 2004, which means this will start to become common in 2005 or 2006. In Mar'05 an SD card format Zigbee controller was announced, which would allow a PDA to participate in a Zigbee home LAN. In Sept'06 AMX announced a ZigBee wireless remote control system. [2166]
- WiMax (IEEE 802.16) allows for up to 70Mb/s and 31 miles of service. More on WiMax from XG Technology. [2165]
- The ARRL ham radio home page [2164]
- The Stratellite is a high altitude balloon that could be used to provide radio communications (much like the failed low orbital projects). Of course it could also be used for some pretty good surveillance given its so much closer to the ground. A similar idea is to use airships to provide this sort of service (and even better surveillance). [2163]
- Running 802.11 over 72 miles, they did get 1Mbps but the FCC didn/t like their power levels, so have cut them back to 300kbps [2162]
- More 802.11 antennas, the cookie-tenna and a commercial unit called the Cantenna. [2161]
- long distance radio and TV reception due to odd atmospheric conditions [2160]
- Wi-Fi networks can be used to locate the postions of client machines [2159]
- wireless networking has a free networks underground screen, even in New York city (and more on New York's free LANs), including some details on how to hack up an externally mounted access point using a RubberMaid container as a case. Byte has this article on setting up your own wireless freenet. Here is another Byte article, this time on antennas for WLANs. Problems with boosting the power of the WAP11 from Linksys [2158]
- build your own BattleBot , now I wonder hopw long before someone makes a GuardBot [2157]
- Motorola has announced Canopy a 5GHz wireless LAN technology that could be a strong contender for the last mile of service [2156]
- Pushing 802.11 wireless ethernet to the limit, see also this and this and this and this and this in San Francisco. Apparently the Linksys WAP11 unit has programmable control on its power output. And the great 802.11b Homebrew Antenna Shootout. And then there is Hawaii Wi-Fi, a free wireless on the Big Island. And now the HAMs are getting into the act. Non-line of sight technologies may may long haul broad band more of a viable alternative. Here's a neighbourhood that set up their own DSL coop. [2155]
- transmitting data with fluorescent lights [2154]
- Meteor Burst radio communications [2153]