Using FM stations for wireless broadband delivery?
A new communications tool that can use FM (or TV) stations' signals could enable broadband internet services for on-the-go wireless devices or hook-up homes that cannot yet get broadband web access. xG Technology, LLC, moved its spectrum sharing technology out of the lab and into the field in May, successfully conducting its first long-range wireless tests of xMax - an (RF) signaling technique that represents a new approach to the problem of spectrum overcrowding. Using a VHF paging channel and negligible power in adjacent sidebands, an xMax transmitter and receiver pair with ground level antennas delivered data to the xMax receiver over a mile away.
RBR/TVBR asked xG Exec. Chairman Rick Mooers if an FM station could host such a service (The founder is Joe Bobier).
"As a physical-layer technology, it's going to work on any technology. We know that the sweet spot for this technology is in the sub-gigahertz, given the better propagation characteristics. Given the FM channels are in the VHF area, this will be especially well suited for it. Given the lower frequency and the better propagation characteristics, the impact is that your cost of deploying a wireless network is going to be 30 to 50 times less than others because we're not dealing in the microwave area of the spectrum."
Are you talking to broadcasters about using this system over their stations?
"We are looking at a number of things. We've been very low profile until just recently. We are just a couple of months away from putting up a base station that will cover all of Ft. Lauderdale and Miami with just one."
But how will users be able to send a return data path to that one base station from their homes?
"If you boil right down to the uniqueness of the technology, it's like a whisper out there. It's 100,000 times below the noise floor, way below anything required by the FCC. How is the receiver so sensitive to detect it? That goes right to the heart of the proprietary "secret sauce." It doesn't have the limitations of regular wireless transmissions with uploads and downloads. We're sort of a hybrid of ultra-wideband and narrowband technology. Literally, we could do this with a pico-watt if we wanted to. Think of the ramifications of your cell phone battery life and talk time at that power."
So if an FM station has, say an available subcarrier channel open, could this work over it for a metro area?
"That is correct. We're getting a lot of inquiries from a variety of companies, but today were just collecting names."
Transmitting at .0005 Watts, xMax was able to demonstrate range orders of magnitude farther than other broadband technologies such as Wi-Fi. By comparison, typical performance of a Wi-Fi 802.11 hotspot at 1 Watt (or 2,000 times more power than xMax) using ground level antennas is approximately 300ft For more info, http://www.xgtechnology.com/
Are you reading this from a forwarded email?
