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As soon as the article brought up plans of carriers to expand LTE into the unlicensed 5GHz band, I immediately thought about the implications for current users
by jrapdx3 11y ago
As soon as the article brought up plans of carriers to expand LTE into the unlicensed 5GHz band, I immediately thought about the implications for current users of WiFi. Specifically that high-powered LTE would overwhelm the signal output by home WiFi routers and in other typical scenarios.
The article comes essentially to to the same conclusion, and it will be unfortunate if new FCC regulations have to be created. It seems to be human nature that sooner or later powerful interests stop "playing nice", and start acting like bullies until regulators are forced to step in.
Of course it doesn't have to go that way, but what are the odds that it won't?
- paulmd 11y agoYes, my thoughts flew to the same thing. This is a recipe for regular users getting stomped. Allowing organized and coordinated commercial exploitation of unlicensed bands is a total violation of the intention of those bands. If you want to run your home router, fine, but when you turn it into a business that has the potential to cause a meaningful disruption of other users you need to either get a band of your own or contract/integrate with someone who does (like a cell carrier).
- wtallis 11y agoI think it's interesting (and scary) to consider this in the context of how smartphone vendors seem to be really dragging their heels on 5GHz WiFi on all but the high-end phones. If we're going to be broadening use of 5GHz, we should be doing it in a way that is interoperable with the existing deployments. At the very least, nobody should be allowed to ship a device that supports 5GHz LTE but doesn't support 802.11ac.
- VoightKampff 11y agoI would think that everyone operating in unlicenced parts of the spectrum was subject to the same regulations.
- KB1JWQ 11y agoThey are-- until you lobby the FCC to change those regulations. Part 15 is very clear on this.
- TorKlingberg 11y agoPart 15 of what?
- luxpir 11y agoFor US hams it's an extremely often cited regulation, touching on many aspects of the hobby. There's a good chance 'KB1JWQ' is a ham :) If you or others care: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_47_CFR_Part_15 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_47_CFR_Part_15 I'm not based in the States, but it pops up enough everywhere ham-related for general familiarity.
- adestefan 11y agoPart 97 is the amateur radio rules in the U.S. Part 15 is the catch all of FCC rules. If it's not define in some set of rules, then it's likely covered in 15.
- hacker234 11y agoPart 15 says (amongst many other things) that if a service causes (or suffers) interference it must go of the air. Nothing to do with Amateur Radio.
- luxpir 11y agoRFI doesn't affect amateur radio? Don't take my word for it, the ARRL have a few thoughts on Part 15: http://www.arrl.org/part-15-radio-frequency-devices http://www.arrl.org/part-15-radio-frequency-devices
- alphabetter 11y agoThe proposal in the LTE standard is not to use high-power transmissions, like those used for macrocells in licensed spectrum, in the unlicnensed band. This wouldn't be allowed anyway by existing regulations. The proposal is to use a form of LTE with low-powered tranmissions (in fact subject to exactly the same regulatory limits as WiFi) in the unlicensed band. All unlicensed band technologies are subject to the same regulations on power levels. While of course these may be changed I don't think there is a realistic chance that, even with heavy lobying, one particular technology would ever be given different rules from all the others. Basically all unlicensed technologies have to coexist as best they can. WiFi interfers with other WiFi users. Bluetooth interferes with WiFi etc. The questions are: 1) whether LTE-Us coexistence strategy is reasonable 2) whether the economic power of the carriers means that LTE-U might be deployed so densely that other users of unlicensed spectrum suffer degraded service