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Networking The Internet Wireless Networking

First White Spaces AP Gives Grandma the Internet 43

Posted by timothy from the new-health-hazard-to-panic-about dept.
alphadogg writes "A Houston restaurant worker is the first user of a prototype wireless access point using low-frequency signals in the so-called White Spaces between unused UHF digital TV signals. The access point was set up in the home of a grandmother and homeowner who had never had a reliable Internet connection before the White Spaces spectrum created one. Widely but wrongly dubbed 'Super Wi-Fi,' these lower frequencies can reach further and penetrate buildings more easily than standard Wi-Fi radios, which implement the IEEE 802.11 specification."
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First White Spaces AP Gives Grandma the Internet More

First White Spaces AP Gives Grandma the Internet

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  • I took White Spaces AP in high school. It saved me a lot of time in college!

  • Is this some kind of racist WiFi?

  • Interesting tech. Would be nice to see it employed more.

    But nothing in the article about transmission speeds.

    Or potential distance covered, and interference with other white space devices.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by m1xram ( 1595991 )
      Follow the links. First one takes you to the real article. In the real article there is something like "What the heck is Super WiFi?" on the left about a paragraph down. It's lower frequency than WiFi so expect less throughput bandwidth unless the spec allows more than one channel at a time.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Wikipedia says speeds would be in the 80 to 800 Mb range. I suppose then that the actual speeds for a typical user would be in the 8 to 80 Mbit range.

      In other words it would be fast enough for standard definition video and often fast enough for HD video.

  • WUT?? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by $RANDOMLUSER ( 804576 ) on Wednesday April 20, 2011 @04:11AM (#35877918)
    Unreadable most ever headline.

  • Already use CB Radio Wi-Fi. (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Have a Station that I created myself using CB Radio as a half-duplex physical layer for low-rate TCP/IP communications by modulating through my Soundcard, getting reliably around 500 Baud 3 miles range with 2-watts: it's enough to send fax-like messages like what NOAA Wether stations do on storm alerts.

    Working on migrating to RS232C to use a simply timer circuit and make it audible with a little peizo-electric speaker setup, to free-up my Soundcard.

    Anyone remember Wavewhore that would use an actual ISA-bus

    • If you're in the US and in an area where Uncle Charlie keeps a close watch on things you may want to rethink using a CB radio, data transmissions aren't legal. HAMs can do packet radio iirc, but not CB.

  • "Maggie Smith, a former restaurant worker, has died from advanced colon cancer as a result of being one of the first to use the portable WiFi hotspot device. Smith at the time thought he was advancing technology when volunteering for the device. Unfortunately the manufacturer didn't do enough radiation analysis and didn't realize that the device created frequencies that caused her to fart uncontrollably and induced Irritable Bowell Syndrome as well. This ultimately led to colon cancer which ended her lif

    • "... Smith at the time thought he was advancing technology when volunteering for the device. Unfortunately the manufacturer didn't do enough radiation analysis and didn't realize that the device created frequencies that caused her to fart uncontrollably and induced Irritable Bowell Syndrome as well.."

      Not to mention the Spontaneous Hermaphrodism Syndrome.

      • LOL, oops "In other news, this reporter has been fired for not checking his personal pronouns."

  • That's some damn good marketing.

  • I can't find anything in any of those links that describes technical details of Whitespace wifi? Max bandwidth? Positives/Negatives? The Wiki article talks about a suit filed by broadcasters against the FCC for licensing this tech, as they assert devices in these frequencies cause interference, but says a result was expected Feb 2011...with no update.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      I can't find anything in any of those links that describes technical details of Whitespace wifi? Max bandwidth? Positives/Negatives? The Wiki article talks about a suit filed by broadcasters against the FCC for licensing this tech, as they assert devices in these frequencies cause interference, but says a result was expected Feb 2011...with no update.

      "White Space" is about using the unused broadcast TV bands that (may) exist - if you look at the bandplan, a wide swatch of bandwidth is reserved for broadcast

  • Low Frequency??? (Score:3)

    by Maximum Prophet ( 716608 ) on Wednesday April 20, 2011 @08:38AM (#35879074)
    UHF => Ultra High Frequency. Yet, somehow the spaces between are channels are "low frequency". Perhaps they mean low bandwidth, as each unused channel in only about 6MHz. Alternately, this could just be a redefinition of what "High Frequency" is.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mortonda ( 5175 )

      I believe UHF was named back in the FM days when they didn't have modern 2.4 Ghz type transmitters...

      • Earlier than that, actually, but not really the point. The nomenclature is standardized, and "low frequency" refers to frequencies four orders of magnitude lower than UHF. It would, however, be correct to say lower frequency. Technically, WiFi is UHF, also, as UHF is from 300 MHz to 3.0 GHz.

        (Yes, I know, 802.11a, at 5.8GHz, is not UHF, but SHF. Most WiFi is 802.11b/g/n, so that's what I'm using as a baseline)

        • The nomenclature is standardized, and "low frequency" refers to frequencies four orders of magnitude lower than UHF

          True, but then it would be Low Frequency; the caps denoting a proper label and not a relative term

    • Low frequency as compared to 2.4/5 GHz used with WiFi. "Lower" would have been more appropriate, though, I guess.

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