Felix's Friends

View All

Felix's Groups

WiMAX System Integration Group

84 members

View All

Felix's discussions

Solar Powered Remote Video Security Cameras & WiMax
2 Replies

Started this discussion. Last reply by Wade Sarver Aug. 12, 2007.

Felix's Page

Latest Activity

Felix joined the group WiMAX System Integration GroupMay 4

Felix started a discussion called Mobility and Utility NetworksSep. 30, 2007

Felix's profile changed Sep. 30, 2007

Profile Information

Current Position: I now work in promoting energy efficiency and power reliability for a large electric and gas utility. Prior this this I worked for a large large manufacturer of wireless systems and devices that are deployed throughout the world.

Areas of Expertise: Utility systems, monitoring systems, high speed real time data acquisition, muni wifi, zigbee, energy, greenhouse gas emissions, Wireless systems, converged networks, mobile IP, broadband & narrowband convergence

Country of Residence: USA

Why are you interested in WiMAX?: I am involved greeen house gas emission reductions, energy efficiency, power quality and reliablity, in urban and rural areas, mainly urban; also interested in urban and rural wireless broadband and the connected facility for energy efficiency, zigbee, voice and data systems, extending fiber networks, extending fiber in rural areas, wireless devices in the muni space. I received WiMax training, have deployed fixed wireless WiFi systems, Mesh networking, WLAN, utility monitoring systems on 802.11, Mobile IP, Radio IP and related. I am involved with traditional narrowband wide area voice RF sysetms converging with broaderband systems. I am interested in experiences where WiMAX fits in certain vertical enterprise applications.

Felix's Blog

Hello WiMax360 Readers: I plan to post my thoughts on where I think WiMax may apply bsed on my past field experience of installing real Point to Point, Point to Multipoint fixed wireless networks, & WLAN networks for "wireless access" in the public and private enterprise space; including involvement with traditional integraed voice and data radio (RF) systems; commonly referred to as two way radio; and 802.11(_) systems;commonly referred to as "muni WiFi systems". I took in-depth technica…

Continue

Posted on April 7th, 2007 at 8:08pm — 1 Comment

View All

Comment Wall (11 comments)

You need to be a member of WiMAX360 to add comments!

Join this network

At 6:26pm on September 15th, 2007, Nafay, Abdul said…: Hi Felix,

How are you doing? Couple of days back i went through your case study on WiMAX monitoring systems and that was inspiring. It is both informative and useful.

Given a scenario, what is the flow-chart model that you follow (as in your basic procedure that you put to test) and is a skeleton for every case-study you come across? (it has to be common for all right?)

Can you share your thoughts on this or share your Prac Experience Library (case studies etc)? that is if you have all of it gathered up...

As an RF network designer i am just looking for some hardcore WISP case-studies or useful tips that can widen my thinking and sense of innovation...Thanks!!

Nafay

At 12:53am on April 30th, 2007, Felix said…: At 11:15am on April 28th, 2007, Felix said...
Hi Naafay, I received your message and you have great observations. You are correct that many pre-WiMax systems (Motorola Canopy and Orthogon, Expediance), (Alvarions), etc. are delivering good bandwidths now. Many WiSPs in my area are completely content with the services they provide over existing private Fixed Wireless Systems in delivering ethernet access or public WiFi 802.11. For example, the Point to Multipoint available now deliver up to 14 Mbs with GPS sycnching and an Element Management System. I installed a couple last year in my areas near Silicon Valley. And many of my municipal customers are using pre-WiMax "fixed wireless" to extend fiber to rural areas. Typical Point to Point in 300 Mbs up to 30-40 miles is about $20K (two radio tranceivers) in my area. However they are FIXED systems. NOT MOBILE. That is the big difference. I see more clients asking for MOBILITY and that is where I see the Mobile WiMax 802.16(e) standard as the main differntiator. For example, one city manager thinks the Public WiFi 802.11(g) will give "mobilility" to his policemen who need to check email while they walk their downtown areas. Is this really true? What is mobility in the 802.11 standard? If you think about it the 802.11 standard can give you "walking" mobility on a laptop but in my opinion it is quite limiting. So I think what I see happening over here is that end-user workers are asking their organisations to give the true mobility with enough bandwidth to do work and things. I will send you my further thoughts and real case studies with numbers. I hope I have provided some prelminary observations, ok?
FelixDelete Comment

At 9:24am on April 29th, 2007, Felix said…: Hi Naafay: Thanks for the reply to my earlier response. I just met with another Wireless Network Operator in my rural area. They have fiber and extend fiber to their Wireless ISPs who then provide retail ISP services to end user such as home owners and small business people. The trend is end users want Mobility…and later IPTV. The Mobility is a desire for worker bees at the edge. I think IPTV is a desire by operators to offer the “triple play” services we read about more so than the people at the edge.

But we discussed how existing fixed wireless systems provide broadband wireless access and that seems to be adequate for right now. The said the next trend is their WiSPs want to offer IPTV and mobility to their end use customers which verifies my comments above. And they want this at a minimal capital investment.

We concluded that the constraint is not the fiber operators but rather the fixed wireless piece. And it’s not really a constraint but rather the available specification on the 802.11 (we didn’t get into WiMax discussion) protocol in terms of what it can or cannot do with mobility and IPTV. In my meeting with operator we concluded that IPTV needs multicast to meet the "business case" and service packages. The current fixed wireless systems are designed for unicast on the advanced 802.11 protocols. If you read other postings by RF Planners here you will see that the Mobile WiMax 802.16(e) will provide the "mobility" on a "fat client". However I saw one posting yesterday that indicated the 802.16 is still unicast. So you need to verify this. Now let me conclude that for video surveillance and other "Uni" or "one way" applications that you can still do many "IPvideo" applications on the existing fixed wireless systems. I just (my dealer) installed a point to point video surveillance system using Canopy Access point to Subscriber Module connected to a Sony IP Camera. It was a NLOS so we used high gain Yagi antennae. This was a highly forested area and it worked.
Please note my observations are practical in nature and you will need to verify your deployment with an RF Planner. I am trained on Orthogon Point to Point, Canopy Point to Multipoint, Mesh, and experienced in utility systems. My buddy has a company called Integrity Networks here in California and he uses Apertos gear

At 1:09am on April 29th, 2007, Nafay, Abdul said…: Hey!! thanks Felix that really helped...these days im deploying Aperto's Packetwave pre wimax solution with a GSM Operator here 'Etisalat'. And exactly the next big thing they want is broadband mobility...and theyre totally passing over .16'd' and looking straight ahead to .16'e'...so the picture has cleared up... Thanks once again, i'll look forward to your discussions.

At 10:59am on April 28th, 2007, Nafay, Abdul said…: Hey Felix,

Having gone through your vaious contributions, i would like you to help me with few questions. I believe you have a good experience with proprietary systems as well as WiMAX Systems.

My question is related to proprietary systems. I know these are desgined for some specific deployment scenario or customer needs, but technically speaking, other than being a standards based technology how are WiMAX systems better than proprietary? As for the changes in PHY and MAC layer i believe these prewimax systems are able to give you good throughput and range. For example i am able to get 9 MB aggregate throughput at 16 QAM on a TDD system which is very much equal to a WiMAX system which gives you 11 Mb aggregate throughput with 64 QAM with a 3.5 MHz channel bandwidth. I know WiMAX has alot of add-ons and above all is a standard based technology also for example adaptive modulation and you have OFDM which is a big plus but with my practical experience ive found preWiMAX systems to have worked well in NLOS conditions as well, even better than WiMAX systems.

What worries me out the most is that equipments developed in late 90's and in 2000 are able to give you a comparative throughput that these WiMAX systems today claim to give you. Infact they claim more than they actually give (in the end, it's all about throughput and capacity, right?)

I'll be expecting your answer in terms of numbers not like WiMAX has more channel bandwidhs options or like many freq options etc etc. I know its a standard based technology and has beautiful features but are these the only goods? And with interoperability in line, can you comment on any success stories so far?

At 6:31pm on April 17th, 2007, Juliana Freitag Borin said…: Hello Felix,

thanks for the help and the papers.
Regards.

At 10:20pm on April 15th, 2007, Felix said…: WINOG Talk: I had a WiMax discussion with one of my Wireless Network Operators today. For past five years he owns and operates a 400 square mile wireless network with three towers and fiber POP and offers broadband wireless access (BWA) to customers in rural areas. If you think about it five years is a long time and a lot of progress has been made. He said WiMAX is indeed the next BIG THING. But for regional WiSP operators he said without a 2.5 GHz license it is a challenge for any regional WiSP to consider deploying a regional WiMax 802.16 (e) network. So he plans to maintain his existing WiSP on the unlicensed spectrum and focus on satsifying his customers. I recall helping him install Access Points, CPE equipment, and fiber/ethernet equipment because of my desire to get my hands dirty. There is nothing like installing a network with your own hands and experiencing what it takes in real life to deploy a network. I got on a bucket truck, looked at Line of Sight, NLOS applications, pulled ethernet cable, installed CPE, and toured the fiber NOC. (on another project We installed a Mesh system too.) We then looked at the RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indication where. RSSI is a measurement of the received radio signal strength) on his EMS - Element Management System via his Cisco server. I guess my point is there are many components to a wireless network and the issues germane to preWiMax networks will be germane to mobile WiMax networks. I recall having another discussion with a client where they have all these workers in the field but cannot push and pull data applications because of weak signal strength in fringe areas for both the commercial carrier network. Therefore they had to rely on their narrow band traditionl RF network (VHF). The devices themselves are "fat" clients; meaning they will carry applications and processing. So how does that client insure the fat data gets back and forth? There are existing software solutions via compression algrorithms that will help. However, I can see how a Mobile WiMax network can offer supplemental services to such a situation.
Have a WiMax'imum day.

Felix

At 11:56am on April 11th, 2007, Euriael R. Jordan said…: Felix,
Thanks for the add. I look forward to reading more..

Euriael

At 9:59am on April 8th, 2007, Felix said…: Why am I interested in WiMAX?
I am involved in urban & rural wireless broadband, voice and data systems, extending fiber networks, extending fiber in rural areas, wireless devices in the muni space. I received WiMax training, have deployed fixed wireless WiFi systems, Mesh networking, WLAN, utility monitoring systems on 802.11, Mobile IP, Radio IP and related. I am involved with traditional narrowband wide area voice RF sysetms converging with broaderband systems. I am interested in experiences where WiMAX fits in certain vertical enterprise applications.