Huawei, Vodafone Test Out Hybrid System That Combines LTE and GSM 46
alphadogg (971356) writes "In the hunt for more spectrum to speed up mobile networks, Vodafone and Huawei Technologies have successfully tested a technology that lets LTE and GSM share the same frequencies. The speed of future mobile networks will depend on the amount of spectrum mobile operators can get their hands on. The more they get, the wider the roads they can build. One thing they can do to get more space is to reuse frequencies that are currently used for older technologies such as GSM and 3G. But that isn't as easy as sounds, as operators still have a lot of voice and messaging traffic in those older networks. However, using a technology called GL DSS (GSM-LTE Dynamic Spectrum Sharing) Vodafone and Huawei have shown a way to allow GSM and LTE to coexist."
interesting (Score:2)
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ELI5 these acronyms (Score:3)
In case anybody reading this is five:
Eee PC is a brand of low-end compact laptop computer formerly manufactured by ASUS.
USB (Universal Serial Bus) is the little rectangular port in the side of your laptop, marked with a drawing of a stick figure carrying a bowling ball. (See #36 in this Photoplasty [cracked.com].) It's where you plug in a mouse, a phone, a memory card, or an adapter the size of a memory card that connects your computer to the cellular network.
UMTS is the language that 3G (third-generation) cellula
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Internet access for vehicle passengers (Score:2)
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As I understand it, cellular data is good for 1. transit passengers, and 2. customers in shops that have chosen not to offer free Wi-Fi to customers in order to discourage loitering.
3: people working on client sites where the client is too paranoid to let outsiders on their network.
4: people staying in places which either don't bother to provide wifi, provide a terrible wifi service or charge through the nose for wifi.
5: people trying to find their way arround on foot in a new city (google maps is pretty good for this, there are probablly offline alternatives but they are nowhere near as ubiquitous)
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I just got back from a vacation. All the hotels that offered free Wifi had it throttled from 0.5 to 1mbit. They offered faster speeds for $5/day. I just flipped on my 4G hotspot and let my family use that. I was pulling 15 up to 60mbit. Still on unlimited data via Verizon thankfully.
Also from my understanding, if there is no wifi password then the data between your devices and the wifi isn't encrypted. Correct me if I'm wrong. This is why I won't use a free wifi without passwords.
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You're sorta wrong.
The password you use to get onto a WiFi network will keep the rabble out of that network but anyone who is let onto that network will be able to read any packet on that network, because the password is used as a symmetric crypto key.
In short, if you want to avoid using public wifi because it doesn't use a password, you're avoiding it for the wrong reason. That said, using a VPN or TOR can mitigate most of that risk.
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Also from my understanding, if there is no wifi password then the data between your devices and the wifi isn't encrypted. Correct me if I'm wrong. This is why I won't use a free wifi without passwords.
Most public wifi services do not have useful encryption whether they have a password or not. Lets look at the wifi encryption/authentication options as they relate to public wifi.
open wifi: no encryption
open wifi with a web based login required to unloc internet access: no encryption
wep: encyrpted but everyone with the network password has the key and trivial to crack even if you don't have the network password
wpa/wpa2 in PSK mode: encrypted but everyone with the network password has the key, with public de
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RE: 5. Google Maps allows pre-caching of maps, for whatever that's worth.
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Granted, its been years since i last tried Maps for gps duty, but i dont think it changed that much as far as that is concerned.
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Granted, its been years since i last tried Maps for gps duty, but i dont think it changed that much as far as that is concerned.
Sure. Why bother to check when you can just reply.
Offline access - completely pre-loading towns, cities, whatever, got added in mid-2012.
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When they come up with a version of wifi that works over the dozens of miles that currently exist between me and my nearest tower, sure. But I suspect it would either look like a giant power plant attached to an enormous antenna, or just be a reinvention of the current cellular standards.
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Awesome.
For when you want to do wifi for only one person, who is standing still.
I'm sure it'll catch on in mobile uses real soon now.
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>When they come up with a version of wifi that works over the dozens of miles
When people stop telling people to turn on the 'security' on their wifi and instead suggest they all share and benefit from the widespread availability of open wifi.
Wi-Fi from the street (Score:2)
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No idea about this.
What's the difference between cell handoff and wifi handoff?
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That doesn't address the switching that I was asking about.
Smaller cells mean more handoffs (Score:2)
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Still doesn't have anything to do with the mechanics of the handoffs.
And these handoffs currently aren't fast enough (Score:2)
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Bigger cells. Coordination between those cells.
Handoff between APs on the same ESS is smoother, cleaner and quicker than cell handoff. It's all layer 2.
Handoff between APs on unrelated APs is a case of starting fresh each time.
You don't notice the first. You certainly notice the second.
Cell handoff is somewhere in between. A bunch of protocol occurs to prep the new cell and the network is using mIP so you see the same IP. It's slow and clunky, but good enough for voice and asynchronous data.
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When they come up with a version of wifi that works over the dozens of miles that currently exist between me and my nearest tower, sure.
Range is one thing, and probably the easiest to fix (compare the failed WiMax attempt). However, there are other requirements that we make of the cellular system that WiFi also ignores, such as (off the top of my head): Hand over between cells in an orderly manner, service guarantees for voice calls, emergency service guarantees (even kicking out already ongoing call of lower priority), keeping track of where the mobile is in case of incoming calls, being able to do all this with mobiles that travel at high
All ur data are belong to China (Score:1)
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It seems like it's based on dynamically allocating spectrum between GSM and LTE
http://www.networkworld.com/ar... [networkworld.com]
However, using a technology called GL DSS (GSM-LTE Dynamic Spectrum Sharing) Vodafone and Huawei have shown a way to allow GSM and LTE to coexist.
In a traditional mobile network, operators allocate each technology an exclusive set of frequencies. For example, many operators, including Vodafone, currently hold 20MHz of spectrum at 1.8GHz, of which 10MHz is used for LTE and the rest for GSM traffic.
GL DSS lets Huawei's SRC (Single Radio Controller) give GSM a higher priority during periods of heavy traffic, ensuring that voice calls get though unharmed. But the SRC can also provide more room for LTE when users aren't making calls, allowing for better throughput, the vendor said on Tuesday.
There's a paper on it (or at least a similar idea) here
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1302.0320... [arxiv.org]
It's interesting because it seems like GSM will live on for low bandwidth machine to machine applications even though most of the spectrum has been converted to LTE. So if you've got an embedded system with a GSM modem, there's no need to worry that the carriers will cut off the signal in order to get more LTE
right behind the other story (Score:2)
Speaking of acronyms [slashdot.org] ...
I see what /. did there. (probably unintentionally)
And all these technology advances... (Score:2)
... will help me get a cheap unlimited cellular data plan how?
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Not like the carriers currently define it, that's fo' sure.
Compressed audio? (Score:2)
Will this finally include the ability to use compressed audio to make more efficient use of the GSM spectrum (over LTE of course)? We are wasting a lot of bandwith there with ancient uncompressed audio, while modern phones are easily capable of doing that properly.