Quaser Tech

With the world becoming more and more mobile consumers are demanding real-time conversation (Mobile and Video broadcasting) for their business and entertainment purposes. This requirement can be fulfilled by very high capacity digital networks having sufficient bandwidth allocation. This is what WiMAX and Broadband communication seek to provide.

WiMAX stands for Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access. It is not a technology but rather a certification mark given to the equipment that meets certain conformity and interoperability tests for IEEE 802.16 family of standards. Similarly the term Wi-Fi is also a certification mar for equipments that meet IEEE 802.11 standard. Neither WiMAX nor Wi-Fi is a technology but their names have been adopted in popular usage to denote the technologies behind them.

WiMAX basically supports point to multi point broadband wireless access. In this topology, a base station is connected to several public networks. These public networks are fixed subscriber stations, which can be mounted on rooftops. These subscriber stations will allocate uplink and downlink bandwidth to the subscribers as per their individual requirements. The development of WiMAX came about as a complement to Bluetooth and Wi-Fi technologies. The characteristics of these technologies are summarized in the table below.

According to the communication theory, one can have either high bandwidth or long range, but not both simultaneously. However, as can be seen from the above table, one can get fairly long distance with high data rate using WiMAX technology equipments. In practical, using WiMAX technology a subscriber can get symmetrical speed of 10 mbps at 10 km in Line of Sight (LOS) environment.

WiMAX technology offers the following advantages to terrestrial communication providers:

(a) Very high speed

(b) Fairly long distance for communication

(c)WiMAX changes the last mile problem for broadband in the same way as Wi-Fi changed the last hundred feet of networking

(d)Available bandwidth is shared between the users

(e)Subscriber stations are small and can be mounted on rooftops

(f)The data is transmitted over air, thus reducing cabling cost.

Source: Science Reporter, January 2009 issue.

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