OT: Wireless Internet
05-11-2001, 01:53 PM
#21
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Re: Ricochet is expensive as far as infrastructure is concerned... will only be available...
Expensive compared to the hundreds of billions spent on the still vaporware 3G?
OFDM is nice if you want to stay within a few hundred feet of a tranciever and are happy with publicly accessible specifications for transmitting your precious data, but with the security and low cost of Ricochet, I doubt OFDM will be found anywhere but in airport lounges in the near future. Plus, every 802.11 base station has to be wired. That doesn't seem like a very good way to cover large distances.
Meanwhile, Ricochet already covers over 50 million people.
As far as the company going out of business...well, Paul Allen owns 49% and Worldcom another 40-odd percent. Interest rates are low and the cash burn has trimmed significantly.
OFDM is nice if you want to stay within a few hundred feet of a tranciever and are happy with publicly accessible specifications for transmitting your precious data, but with the security and low cost of Ricochet, I doubt OFDM will be found anywhere but in airport lounges in the near future. Plus, every 802.11 base station has to be wired. That doesn't seem like a very good way to cover large distances.
Meanwhile, Ricochet already covers over 50 million people.
As far as the company going out of business...well, Paul Allen owns 49% and Worldcom another 40-odd percent. Interest rates are low and the cash burn has trimmed significantly.
05-11-2001, 07:49 PM
#23
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OFDM is defintely NOT limited to a few hundred feet. OFDM is a modulation scheme...
that has many inherent improvements over conventional FM and CDMA technologies (multi-path being one of them) - if that was not the case, I would seriously doubt that there would be amount of effort put in to it as there has been to date.
As far the the broadband applications, I was not referencing 3G - that is designed as the successor to the PCS and CDMA handsets (with data capability). The WBIF spec is what I'm talking about (backed by the likes of Cisco, TI, Broadcom, and anybody that is anybody in the wireless arena). It is NOT vapor ware... I had one of our prototypes running at my house.... awsome performance, unbelievable bandwidth (30 Mega bits per second), and very secure.... unfortunatly, our bread and butter was killed by Mr Greenspans total f'up with the market, so the company closed... but there are many other out there doing this...
Unless Ricochet is planning on seriously upping the bandwidth, it will go the way of the dialup modem... broadband is coming, a few years away, but it IS coming.... business guys are no dummies, if they see the tide swinging out of their favor, they will pull the plug faster than you can blink!
Of couse, this is just my opinion.... I have no intention of insulting you in any way, I just see Ricochet's products being leapfrogged bigtime by the WBIF consortium....
Pease,
As far the the broadband applications, I was not referencing 3G - that is designed as the successor to the PCS and CDMA handsets (with data capability). The WBIF spec is what I'm talking about (backed by the likes of Cisco, TI, Broadcom, and anybody that is anybody in the wireless arena). It is NOT vapor ware... I had one of our prototypes running at my house.... awsome performance, unbelievable bandwidth (30 Mega bits per second), and very secure.... unfortunatly, our bread and butter was killed by Mr Greenspans total f'up with the market, so the company closed... but there are many other out there doing this...
Unless Ricochet is planning on seriously upping the bandwidth, it will go the way of the dialup modem... broadband is coming, a few years away, but it IS coming.... business guys are no dummies, if they see the tide swinging out of their favor, they will pull the plug faster than you can blink!
Of couse, this is just my opinion.... I have no intention of insulting you in any way, I just see Ricochet's products being leapfrogged bigtime by the WBIF consortium....
Pease,
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