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FCC opens entire 6 GHz band to low power device operations
- ThrowawayR2 2y agoThe news release doesn't say what qualifies as very low power. There's a definition at https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DOC-397315A1.pdf https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DOC-397315A1.pdf.
- lelandbatey 2y agoTo quote that PDF as it was a bit hard to find within the many dozens of pages: Pg. 95: Very Low Power Device. For the purpose of this subpart, a device that operates in the 5.925-6.425 GHz and 6.525-6.875 GHz bands and has an integrated antenna. These devices do not need to operate under the control of an access point. Pg. 98: Geofenced Very Low Power Access Point. For the purpose of this subpart, an access point that operates in the 5.925–7.125 GHz band, has an integrated antenna, and uses a geofencing system to determine channel availability at its location.
- 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y agoSooo no watts or meters?
- jareklupinski 2y ago> The Further Notice sought comment on the appropriate power levels as well as other rules for VLP devices to ensure that the potential for causing harmful interference to incumbent operations is minimized. (6 GHz Further Notice, 35 FCC Rcd at 3940-42, paras. 236-43.)
- Tuna-Fish 2y ago14 dBm EIRP and a power spectral density of -5 dBm/MHz EIRP.
- rtkwe 2y agoMost newer band definitions specify the limits less in wattage and more in EIRP that measures the actual output of the antenna instead of just the power applied to the antenna by the transmitter. They also specify how the power as to be spread through out the channel and how sharply it has to fall off outside the channel. [0] [0] See page 3 for an example definition of a VLP definition and requirements from earlier this year. It specifies EIRP and how the power has to be distributed so you're not throwing one big spike in the middle of the channel for example.
- hnuser123456 2y ago14 dBm EIRP = 25 milliwatts, typical legal max for wifi, and the -5 dBm/MHz EIRP power spectral density says that 25 mW must be spread over an 80 MHz channel.
- JoshTriplett 2y ago> 25 milliwatts, typical legal max for wifi AFAIK wifi can use more power than that, at least in the US: 100mW, possibly 200mW, not sure what the hard limit is (or how much that must be spread).
- olyjohn 2y agoI'm pretty sure you can run 1 watt on WiFi.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- jdietrich 2y ago1 watt conducted power, 4 watts EIRP. For most of the world, the ETSI limit is 100mW EIRP. https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-A/part-15/subpart-C/subject-group-ECFR2f2e5828339709e/section-15.247 https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-A...
- throw10920 2y ago1 watt? With beamforming to increase the energy density you could run a tiny microcontroller off of that.
- rocqua 2y agoThis is about radiated power in any direction not exceeding what you would get with an omnidirectional 1W antenna. So beamforming under these rules lets you use less input power for the same directional power. But it doesn't let you bundle all your power into a single direction.
- jareklupinski 2y ago> The Commission envisioned that body-worn devices would make-up most VLP device use cases and that these devices would provide large quantities of data in real-time. Entities that support the Commission permitting VLP device operation expect that these devices will support portable use cases, such as wearable peripherals (e.g., smartphones, glasses, watches, and earphones), including augmented reality/virtual reality and other personal-area-network applications, as well as in-vehicle applications (e.g., dashboard displays). i was expecting vehicle-to-vehicle communications
- mmanulis 2y agoThere's IEEE 1609 series of standards. I haven't looked at it since 2009, so no clue how actively used/deployed that is though.
- guestbest 2y agoYou could just put your mobile number on your back window to encourage conversations.
- 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y agoGetting a burner number is expensive though
- aftbit 2y ago$5/mo or so here in the US; not that expensive.
- ryukoposting 2y agoI like the idea of an LED marquee board with a little speech-to-text thingy inside the cabin.
- perdomon 2y agoI've always dreamed of communicating with other drivers this way.
- cbhl 2y agoDo folks know if this increases the number of channels available for Wi-Fi 6e over 6GHz in the US, or does that require additional process?
- makiftasova 2y agoLooks like it does not allow new channels for 6 GHz Wi-Fi. 802.11be (Wi-Fi 7) already covers full range of FCC's allowed frequency range. IEEE committee may add new channels in 802.11bn (expected to be ratified around 2028, and commercial name will be Wi-Fi 8) but it also looks like a low probably, considering both 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6/ Wi-Fi 6e) and 802.11be (Wi-Fi 7) mostly focuses on reducing the interference between different networks by reducing the collision, instead of widening the spectrum (BSS coloring, Flexible Channel Utilization etc.)
- tradertef 2y agoYes and no. It increases the number of "VLP" channels. 6GHz has 3 modes of operation: 1) VLP: can now happen in 1200 MHz (5925 MHz to 7125 MHz); previously it was only 850 MHz. Very Low Power: 25 mW (14 dBm) power.. with -5 dBm/MHz PSD, indoor and outdoor usage. Think of short range use-cases like smartphone to laptop or smartphone to earbuds/ARVR. 2) LPI: already allowed in full 1200 MHz Low Power Indoor: 1W (30 dBm) power with 5 dBm/MHz PSD (clients are 6 dB lower); only indoor usage. Think of your home router. 3) SP: allowed in 850 MHz; no plan to expand AFAIK Standard Power: 4W (36 dBm) power with 23 dBm/MHz PSD (clients are 6 dB lower); indoor or outdoor usage. Requires Aautomated Frequency Coordination; send your location to cloud, cloud tell you which channels area available. Think of enterprise or high power routers; outdoor point to point links (WISP) So, this new regulation is only for VLP and will result in more (especially 320 MHz) channels. No change to the most common usage of Wi-Fi (Router to Laptop/PC).
- extraduder_ire 2y agoWas this band used for anything else previously? I hope other jurisdictions follow suit so hardware using it can be cheaper due to economies of scale. The segmentation of LoRA radios between US/EU is already pretty annoying and they're fairly niche.
- pclmulqdq 2y agoSatellite communications, point-to-point microwave systems, and other similar things (high-data-rate, point-to-point communication) all operate near this band. However, there's plenty of spectrum and the use cases may be declining. There were also some radar systems in this band, but IIRC the useful new radar systems are higher-frequency (10's of GHz for resolution) or lower-frequency (10's-100's of MHz to have longer range).
- anthomtb 2y agoFrom the press release: > expand very low power device operations across all 1,200 megahertz of the 6 GHz band alongside other unlicensed and Wi-Fi-enabled devices. Unless I am missing something, this means Wifi6 currently operates in this range.
- astrange 2y ago6E does, not 6.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- DidYaWipe 2y agoGiven the fragility of signals at these frequencies, how useful is this? By that I mean that they're easily blocked, diffracted, whatever.
- chriscappuccio 2y ago6ghz isn't very fragile, 60ghz is
- bangaladore 2y ago60ghz is isn't very fragile, 600 ghz is
- semi-extrinsic 2y agoYou kids get off my submillimetre lawn.
- K0balt 2y ago600ghz isn’t very fragile at 50db, 6THz is! (6THz if a common wavelength for fiber)
- 2y ago
- BeefySwain 2y agoChart of all US frequency allocations (as of 2016, but there doesn't appear to be a more up to date one?): https://www.ntia.gov/sites/default/files/publications/january_2016_spectrum_wall_chart_0.pdf https://www.ntia.gov/sites/default/files/publications/januar...
- drmpeg 2y agoThe most current document is here, but it's text. https://www.fcc.gov/sites/default/files/fcctable.pdf https://www.fcc.gov/sites/default/files/fcctable.pdf
- ur-whale 2y ago> The most current document is here, but it's text. "but" ???
- zanderwohl 2y agoNot everyone has the same use case.
- smolder 2y agoAs opposed to a chart.
- Gracana 2y agoI get what you mean, but look at it. It's horrible.
- Amira465485 2y ago[flagged]
- echelon 2y agoAM radio, FM radio, amateur radio, and television broadcast have quite a lot of spectrum real estate. Are they being used enough to justify this allocation?
- binary132 2y agoCan someone translate this into maximum usable range please
- superkuh 2y agoIt's line of sight only. Think about it like a flashlight. If you have a flashlight (w/power) up on top of a skyscraper roof or a mountainside it can be seen at very long distances. At street level it goes till the next small rise in the ground.
- wtallis 2y agoRange for the newly-available parts of the 6 GHz band will not be substantially different from range for the 5 GHz band and the portions of the 6 GHz band that were already available for uses like WiFi.
- Joel_Mckay 2y agoExcept C band, which could be huge depending on the ERP limits. =3
- bigbones 2y agoI think you're confusing this with the 60 GHz band (WiGig)
- superkuh 2y agoI am not. Everything above 30 MHz or so is line of sight in the consumer products sense of the word. We can talk about niche modes like tropospheric ducting or super high power troposcatter, but ducting is irregular and unpredictable and tropo scatter requires many kilowatts of power. Pretty much everything from VHF and up (all of wifi) is line of sight only. Not just the mm-wave stuff. Cell phone networks only work because the telcos pay big money to get their transceivers power/data up on towers high above the terrain. Store and forward meshes assume the nodes will eventually see each other but down at 5ft above the ground they often won't.
- ricksunny 2y agoWondering if this will spur innovators' handoff-based mesh networks (slow, low-bandwidth but very, very democratic). When whitespace in television bands went unlicensed i don't know how much of that we saw: https://www.fcc.gov/general/white-space https://www.fcc.gov/general/white-space I feel like the barrier may be whether dedicated hardware is required or not. In such a large band, 6 GHz, I would expect a lot of generalized (i.e. non-dedicated) platform hardware to be developed & offered allowing software-focused innovators to offer into the long tail of applications, including mesh network(s).
- dylan604 2y agoThis feels very pie in the sky and dreamlike. Of course some corp will figure out something to do within this space and make closed products that push out free and open uses. At least that's my pessimistic view opposed to your optimism.
- bigfishrunning 2y ago6ghz is pretty fragile -- i can't imagine one product "pushing out" another when a wall will block the signal. Just don't have the closed products in your home, and the open ones should work just fine...
- schmidtleonard 2y agoIf you pop open a spectrum analyzer in most places, you'll see a ghost town in the Cathedral and a hopping lively Bazaar in 2.4/5GHz. On net, it is good that more resources are going to the Bazaar.
- ricksunny 2y agoThat's a Bazaar I would love to window-shop in - and heck maybe purchase a couple of ornate unique carpets while I'm at it =)
- larodi 2y agoEveryone I've talked to from the LORA crowd and even some (LORA) alliance guys tells me lo-energy meshes are hard to get right. Am I missing something?
- mannanj 2y agoIs there any merit to non-ionizing frequencies having harmful impacts on human biological function, I thought so, but is it all "conspiracy" and laughed out of the room or a legitimate scientific part of these discussions?
- hgomersall 2y agoWell the microwave oven is an example of non-ionising frequencies having harmful impacts on human biological function.
- bithive123 2y agoI'm not a physicist or biologist but what's always made sense to me is that anytime you walk outside during the day you are bathed in broad spectrum radiation from the sun. So anything weaker than the sun is probably safe enough. Anything a million or billion times weaker is probably a million or billion times safer. We already know when and how radios get dangerous (large transmission towers, microwave ovens, etc) and how to mitigate that danger. Inverse cube law and somesuch.
- avidiax 2y agoThe sun is damaging because it contains ionizing radiation (radiation that is powerful enough to directly disassociate a molecule into ions). This is the UV portion of sunlight. UV starts at 800,000 GHz. The 6Ghz being discussed here is completely non-ionizing, not even comparable to UV. The only concern with 6Ghz is that is can also cause dielectric heating, which is the same as a microwave. But again, at 25mW, you can't even feel the heat from direct contact with the antenna, let alone a few meters away. Your exposure follows the inverse-square law [1], which means that it drops proportional to the square of the distance. So if it's not a problem at 10cm, it's 100x less of a non-problem at 1m. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse-square_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse-square_law
- rjegundo 2y agoevolutionary argument is humans are aligned with broad spectrum radiation from the sun, but not the artificial forms which have different magnitudes in different frequencies. Eg: you are much less likely to get sunburn if you get plenty of natural (or artificial) infrared.
- dang 2y agoUrl changed from https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-opens-entire-6-ghz-band-very-low-power-device-operations https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-opens-entire-6-ghz-band-ver..., which points to this.
- glitchc 2y agoIt would be wonderful if we could increase Bluetooth bandwidth by switching to this new spectrum.
- 20after4 2y agoI think that is exactly what they are going for.
- fidotron 2y agoI wonder if this is going to be the distraction to suggested changes in 900MHz. My other guess is the major uses of this will turn out to be UWB related: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-wideband https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-wideband Which in practice is largely about short range location finding.
- hammock 2y agoWhat are the suggested changes?
- hammock 2y agoI found this: A current proposal regarding the 900MHz band, primarily put forward by NextNav, suggests a significant reorganization of the spectrum to allocate a portion for their terrestrial 3D positioning network, potentially creating dedicated uplink and downlink bands within the lower 900MHz range, which could impact existing users like toll systems and RFID devices due to potential interference concerns; however, this proposal faces strong opposition from various industries currently utilizing the band
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- throwway120385 2y agoI work with some of that RFID/Tolling equipment and I can tell you this would be very bad news for a lot of industries.
- RF_Savage 2y agoAnd 100% incompatible with all existing installations. I also doubt Amazon will be happy about their Sidewalk mesh network getting degraded.
- LeifCarrotson 2y agoSelling the amateur/LoRaWAN spectrum to a private company for more cellular bandwidth. And, ostensibly, a terrestrial GPS backup that operates concurrently with those cellular functions, but that's a red herring in my opinion, it's basically a land-grab of public unlicensed frequencies to lease out to Verizon/ATT/Tmobile.
- awelkie 2y agoI feel like limits on EIRP are overly conservative and restrict the usefulness of phased arrays. If the limit were on total radiated power, then your 1 watt WiFi router could have the range of a kilowatt transceiver with a reasonable number of antenna elements, while emitting the same total power as interference. But since the limit is on EIRP, the phased array is limited to the same range, and so there's no point in using a phased array over a single antenna. Does anyone know if there's a good reason to use EIRP that I'm missing? I figure satellite communication terminals can have huge EIRPs because they're all pointed at the sky, but the FCC can't guarantee that the beams won't cross for other bands, so they limit the EIRP, but I still think we would all be better off of our systems were spatially selective.
- ballooney 2y agoYes, for the same reason that I can look into a 5mW LED but 5mW of laser can blind me. Your neighbour's WiFi routewr might be entirely DoS'd by the Maser of RF coming through the wall at it from your phased array, even thoughh it's only 100mW.
- awelkie 2y agoSure, but the probability would be low-ish of that happening, and the other system could either switch frequencies or beamform a null in the direction of the interferer if they were also a phased array. Maybe the EIRP shouldn't be unlimited, but I still think it would be beneficial to encourage spatially selective systems.
- adrian_b 2y agoIn an unlicensed band, everyone may have receivers and transmitters, so the probability of other receivers in the same direction as yours is not low at all, but it is very high, unless you live in the middle of nowhere, so you do not have neighbors. There is no justification for imposing additional costs for others in order to accommodate your desires that do not matter for them. Nobody stops you to use a phased array antenna only to obtain a higher gain for reception, in order to increase the communication range. Even without phased array antennas, using just classic directive antennas that are placed on high masts, it is possible to communicate through WiFi at tens of km (but only at low bit rates and not in all countries, as some have more severe EIRP limits). The problem of directive antennas is that they are usable only for fixed positions of access points and wireless stations. Phased array antennas are not enough to enable mobility, because initially a mobile wireless station must discover the direction of the AP and the AP must discover the direction of the station, by using omnidirectional transmission, which limits the range to what can be achieved without phased array antennas. To use a mobile wireless network that works at distances greater than possible with omnidirectional antennas requires much more sophisticated equipment than just the phased array antennas. You also need means to determine the coordinates of each station (and of the access points, if they are also mobile) and maps with the locations of the access points so that a station that wants to associate with them will know in what direction to transmit. You also need a protocol different from standard WiFi, e.g. the access point may need to scan periodically all directions in order to allow new associations from distant stations.
- bradgessler 2y agoDoes this mean Unifi will sell outdoor WiFi 7 APs with 6Ghz transceivers?
- 20after4 2y agoIt specifically says this is not for use with fixed wireless infrastructure, so no.
- rapjr9 2y agoSeems like that will also limit the uses for outdoor IoT applications, like wireless sensing in farm fields or wireless management of solar panels or industrial applications. Outdoor mobile applications seem to be allowed, but that may be of limited use if there is nothing outside to talk to. Maybe using robots or mobile platforms to create a mobile network with wide continuous coverage would be a work-around? For example vehicle-to-vehicle communications.
- modeless 2y ago> 1,200 megahertz of the 6 GHz band Spectrum allocation is very weird.
- qwertywert_ 2y agoWasn't this already done for Wi-fi 6e? We have commercial routers already supporting 6GHz channels
- tradertef 2y ago6GHz has 3 modes of operation: 1) VLP: can now happen in 1200 MHz (5925 MHz to 7125 MHz); previously it was only 850 MHz. Very Low Power: 25 mW (14 dBm) power.. with -5 dBm/MHz PSD, indoor and outdoor usage. Think of short range use-cases like smartphone to laptop or smartphone to earbuds/ARVR. 2) LPI: already allowed in full 1200 MHz Low Power Indoor: 1W (30 dBm) power with 5 dBm/MHz PSD (clients are 6 dB lower); only indoor usage. Think of your home router. 3) SP: allowed in 850 MHz; no plan to expand AFAIK Standard Power: 4W (36 dBm) power with 23 dBm/MHz PSD (clients are 6 dB lower); indoor or outdoor usage. Requires Aautomated Frequency Coordination; send your location to cloud, cloud tell you which channels area available. Think of enterprise or high power routers; outdoor point to point links (WISP) So, this new regulation is only for VLP and will result in more (especially 320 MHz) channels. No change to the most common usage of Wi-Fi (Router to Laptop/PC).
- Havoc 2y ago[shaky conspiratorial theory] I wonder if this was in motion for a while and then intentionally accelerated to ensure it happens under Biden. Optically it's a pretty pure win. Open stuff sounds good. Less regs sounds good. Tech sounds good. And it's not something that has a corresponding voting block opposing. Just pure upside politically. Either party would love that.
- neuroelectron 2y agoYes good conspiracy, vote for trump or biden. Nothing about personal data or tracking.
- carterschonwald 2y agoI like how they list their Twitter account
- schappim 2y agoThis is cool, I hope Australia follows suit! Australia's communications regulator, ACMA, has already permitted Wi-Fi 6E devices to operate in the lower 6 GHz band (5925–6425 MHz) under the Low Interference Potential Devices (LIPD) Class Licence. This includes low-power indoor (LPI) and very low power (VLP) devices. As for the upper 6 GHz band (6425–7125 MHz), ACMA is still evaluating its use. In June 2024, it sought public input on possible applications, including RLANs and wide-area wireless broadband services. So, while unlicensed device operations are allowed in the lower 6 GHz band, the upper band is still under consideration.
- Aeroi 2y agocan anyone explain what this will enable, that previously was not possible?
- armanjr 2y agoDevices can now use all 1,200 MHz of the 6 GHz band, which was previously restricted. This move supports newer tech standards like Wi-Fi 6E and sets the stage for Wi-Fi 7.
- tradertef 2y agoIt increases the number of "VLP" channels. 6GHz has 3 modes of operation:' 1) VLP: can now happen in 1200 MHz (5925 MHz to 7125 MHz); previously it was only 850 MHz. Very Low Power: 25 mW (14 dBm) power.. with -5 dBm/MHz PSD, indoor and outdoor usage. Think of short range use-cases like smartphone to laptop or smartphone to earbuds/ARVR. 2) LPI: already allowed in full 1200 MHz Low Power Indoor: 1W (30 dBm) power with 5 dBm/MHz PSD (clients are 6 dB lower); only indoor usage. Think of your home router. 3) SP: allowed in 850 MHz; no plan to expand AFAIK Standard Power: 4W (36 dBm) power with 23 dBm/MHz PSD (clients are 6 dB lower); indoor or outdoor usage. Requires Aautomated Frequency Coordination; send your location to cloud, cloud tell you which channels area available. Think of enterprise or high power routers; outdoor point to point links (WISP) So, this new regulation is only for VLP and will result in more (especially 320 MHz) channels. No change to the most common usage of Wi-Fi (Router to Laptop/PC). This will allow better channel availability (low latency, higher throughput) for mobile applications in very dense areas..
- anticensor 2y agoWhy don't they make it an auctioned band but only with individual natural persons eligible for joining it?
- calebm 2y agoOn tomorrow's news: "FCC AUTHORIZES DEVICES TO EMIT MICROWAVE RADIATION!"
- jeden 2y agoEU planing open 169 MHz for ISM (free) communications but trouble is distance. This band is world