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Intel Wireless Networking Hardware

Intel Working on Agile Wireless Chip 78

Posted by Hemos from the new-developments dept.
Rob writes "Computer Business Review is reporting that Intel has announced that its scientists had invented a new type of chip that can process signals from different types of wireless networks. The chip also could handle upcoming WiMax technology, that promises wireless internet connectivity for up to 30 miles, and future flavors of WiFi."
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Intel Working on Agile Wireless Chip More

Intel Working on Agile Wireless Chip

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  • Nothing to see here... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 20, 2005 @10:04AM (#12863353)
    "It is more of a proof of concept rather than a device that will see the light of day," he said. That's because the chip integrates only analogue and not digital circuitry and WiFi chip would require both types to make it usable by a digital device.

    • Re:Nothing to see here... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by TomorrowPlusX ( 571956 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @10:19AM (#12863507)
      Doesn't seem like a "Nothing to see here" situation. They're just admitting it's R&D.

      I mean, obviously, they also hope to stir up investors and get good press, but, who wouldn't want to do that?

  • Holy Grail (Score:4, Funny)

    by markild ( 862998 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @10:05AM (#12863357)
    This type of agile chip is the "holy grail for Intel," said Sam Lucero, an analyst at research shop IDC.

    Let's see if they manages to find it then :P

  • Apple? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by wlan0 ( 871397 )
    The next Apple portable chip?

  • Woo hoo! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mister_llah ( 891540 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @10:12AM (#12863435) Homepage Journal
    Now I can see every wireless network for 10 miles, I'll have all sorts of crazy names to sift through!

    ===

    I'm on a college campus, so if I walk down the street, I can see almost dozens of seperate wireless networks (from apartments to different college wireless zones) ...

    If they expanded wireless to 10 miles... oh my!

    [not that I'd torment anybody, but it's always fun to look around :) ]

  • Intel invents firmware! (Score:5, Funny)

    by RealProgrammer ( 723725 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @10:16AM (#12863469) Homepage Journal
    Hot on the heels of its stunning disclosure of the "heat sink", which someday may allow computers to have processors that never overheat no matter how far they're overclocked, Intel has invented "firmware".

    Firmware will allow the electronics giant to reprogram its chips when new standards are developed. That should help Intel avoid a replay of the wireless Centrino debacle, in which they were shipping 10Mhz mobile chips into a market driven by 54Mhz base stations.

  • Any possibility that this new wireless chip will replace Blue Tooth and/or Airport in a Mactel machine?

  • 30 mile range? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jamescford ( 205756 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @10:19AM (#12863511)

    That 30 mile (48 km?) range sounds awfully nice, but I would guess it's not a figure to be relied on for regular use. The WiMAX forum's [wimaxforum.org] home page provides some more realistic range figures:

    In a typical cell radius deployment of three to ten kilometers, WiMAX Forum Certified(TM) systems can be expected to deliver capacity of up to 40 Mbps per channel, for fixed and portable access applications. This is enough bandwidth to simultaneously support hundreds of businesses with T-1 speed connectivity and thousands of residences with DSL speed connectivity. Mobile network deployments are expected to provide up to 15 Mbps of capacity within a typical cell radius deployment of up to three kilometers.

    It sounds like 3 km (under 2 miles) from a tower is best, with up to 10 km (just over 6 miles) plausible.

    Jamie

    • Re:30 mile range? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by gb7djk ( 857694 )
      Sigh....

      And we have solved all the hidden station problems have we? Shannon has been found to be tosh? Nyquist a mathematical bungler?

      Yes, you may get 40 Mbps if you are close enough, both sides are running enough (legal) power and you are the only two ends on the channel without any interference of any kind. Note the word "may".

      Look, there are some fundamental problems with using wireless for network connectivity. They are to do with the medium, the nature of transmitters and receivers (and the

      • ...and once science conquers all these challenges and delivers this reliable service to your home...

        You'll pay them for every machine in the house, individually! Just like cel phones! Hey, my cingular bill for just last month alone with over $1000, and my phone has been disconnected for 3 months now! I can't WAIT for WIRELESS INTERNET!

  • HSDPA? (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    As excited as I am about WiMax, I'm just as interested in whether or not this chip will be compatible with HSDPA, which is looking to be the competing standard in the coming years.

    Cingular, the nation's largest cellular carrier, is making a big push for HSDPA, hoping to have it rolled out in 15-20 markets by the end of the year. 3 Mbps wireless internet with a coverage area as large as Cingulars' is a pretty tempting prospect to me, and having compatibility built in to my devices with this Intel chip migh
  • Admittedly it'd be cool to cover a huge area with one base station, but I'd really like to see some improvements to the transfer rates. Whoever came up with the 11 and 54 Mpbs numbers must have been smoking something - I don't think I've ever seen either go above 8 Mbps. OK, so high speeds are good marketing, but getting 1/10th of the promised performance is pretty lame.

  • HotSpot lackey - manager (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Iriel ( 810009 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @11:05AM (#12863937) Homepage
    "Won't we have to beef up network security?"

    I'm not claiming to be an expert here, but if they could deliver this gargantuan wireless range, won't that provoke more crackers to break through the security so they can leech net access off of the Starbucks HotSpot a few miles away?

    It just seems logical to me that with such an impressive possible range of operation, there would be a greater tempation to pickpocket with telekinesis, so to speak.

    That's just my thought on it.
    • In a word, yes. But I don't think Starbucks is going to be operating one of these. While there are shops that offer free wireless just to get people in and buying coffee (or whatever they sell) at three miles radius its likely users won't even know where the base station is. Businesses with hotspot signs in the window won't have much incentive to move beyond good old 802.11g. the 'n' variety seems better suited to muni-wifi.
      • True enough, but the Starbucks reference is only an analogy. Imagine a signal so powerful (just like it's being advertised to be) that can easily deliver WiFi through walls and such. It wouldn't be long before people figure the best method for piggybacking off of someone else's IP to get the same access. It's the wireless equivalent of splicing cable from your neighbor.

        Given the average persons' poor tech safety practices, I hope these WiMax devices come with hardware firewalls. Otherwise, they're going t
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Will the Intel proof of concept chip design be available so that someone outside of Intel could design a digital chip based on the proof of concept design?


  • If the bands for WiMax are the same three ring circus we've seen in the 802.11b range for metro areas there is just no point to even trying - the noise floor for 2402-2483MHz in metro Omaha is so thick you can walk on it, and the 5.2 - 5.8GHz stuff is headed that way.

    I don't pay much attention to this stuff any more, since its a miserable waste of time and money here, but I hear tell of some sort of frequency allocation scheme for some of the new spectrum that has been opened ... that is the only ho
  • American Engineering's hallmark is world renown for its design of *independent* systems. American's redundancy in independent systems provides a level of robustness superior to an integrated design.

    Intel multiplexing a blackbox all-in-one chip flys in the face of historical precedent. You young whippersnapper's at /. will bite at any new angle to auger your grip on the clicker.

    Go back to bed...
    -r
  • I hope the Intel chip is capable of snagging all the different flavors of wireless. We already have a bunch in the 802.11 area. Now with WiMax...especially in the US...we have a bunch more. Scary thing is, the "The Federal Communications Commission has chosen to allocate radio spectrum in the 3.5- and 10-gigahertz bands to private WiMax providers. The rest of the developed world has WiMax allocation in different spectrum locations." Business Week [businessweek.com] Thus, we have a myriad of flavors here in the US, then the U

  • Verizon Guy (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    With this new chip, I can see the Verizon guy going, "Can you hack me now? Good!"
  • These huge "WiFi" footprints are really not that useful. Because each giant hotspot has to share the limited bandwidth. Rural areas will benefit from 2 million acres (30mi radius) served by only 155-500Mbps, because they've only got a few hundred people (and a lot of cows) willing to share 0.5-1.5Mbps. But cities must share that bandwidth in a vastly higher density. Manhattan, for example, would need a couple WiMax APs for every block, which typically have hundreds of pedestrians - never mind the stationary
  • scientists had invented a new type of chip that can process signals from different types of wireless networks
    Scientists don't make chips; engineers do.
  • from the article:
    ""It is more of a proof of concept rather than a device that will see the light of day," he said. That's because the chip integrates only analogue and not digital circuitry and WiFi chip would require both types to make it usable by a digital device."

    All they've done is build a radio that probably runs at 2.5GHz and is probably direct conversion down to baseband. If it has enough bandwidth, linearity, and low enough phase noise in the LO, it can be used with a variety of MAC chips to imple
  • From the article:

    "And since the so-called radio chip is the first that can be manufactured using Intel's existing 90-nanometer CMOS technology, it promises to be cheap. Most radio chips today are built using other materials, mostly silicon germanium and require different manufacturing processes"

    The important part is that it's CMOS. Now, they can make one cheaper chip that does the RF and the digital baseband processing.

    Wonder how close they are to a software radio on a chip? Imagine one chip that

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