Wireless Blog

Inmarsat-4 (F3) - one of the biggest commercial satellites ever built - was successfully launched by a Russian Proton Breeze M rocket today. The F3 satellite, operated by Inmarsat, will complete the firm’s globe-spanning, 3-satellite broadband network. Each I-4 satellite can generate 19 wide beams and more than 200 spot beams using its giant unfurlable antenna reflector, stretching 30 by 39 feet.

The Inmarsat-4 F3 satellite, a Eurostar 3000GM model built by EADS Astrium, is expected to go into service at 98 degrees West longitude, providing broadband wireless access for small, laptop-size terminals on ships and aircraft as well as for businesses. Handy for West Coast emergency communications, too.

The I4s are almost the size of a double-decker bus and weigh six tons. It will take about a month to get the I4-F3 ready for service. “Each I4 is 60 times more powerful and has 16 times the capacity of an Inmarsat-3 satellite,” said Andrew Sukawaty, CEO and chairman of Inmarsat.

The Proton Breeze M, operated by International Launch Services, left the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 2243 GMT, Monday.

The 700-ton rocket was making its return to flight after stranding the US AMC-14 satellite well below its intended operational orbit. A review board determined that a pipe rupture in the Breeze M upper-stage caused the booster to shut down early, and the rocket’s manufacturer - the Khrunichev Space Centre - was ordered to make modifications.

Although the Proton can be regarded as one of the most successful heavy boosters in history, the March failure was the third in three years, notes the BBC, and a successful outing for the Inmarsat satellite was deemed absolutely essential to maintain market confidence in the rocket.

In other news, a German Synthetic Aperture Radar reconnaissance satellite (SAR-Lupe-5) was launched from Plesetsk last month. The final of five satellites, they operate in three, 500-kilometre orbits (about as high as the space station), and use an X-band radar with a three-metre dish. One-metre resolution of the International Space Station was achieved on ground tests, says Wikipedia, with day or night resolution down to 50 centimetres.

Of course you don’t need to be a space faring bureaucracy. A Short-Wave Infrared (SWIR) camera fits inside the diminutive ScanEagle UAV and may deliver an intelligence fix faster and cheaper. Inmarsat’s I-4 series might provide the backbone for all sorts of UAVs, as well as Wi-Fi in commercial jets.

Related satellite phone stories on DailyWireless include: America to Bomb the Moon, Satphone Terrestrial Repeaters: Uncertain, TerreStar Roams with AT&T, Skyterra/MSV Get $500M, MSS: Battle Space, ICO Deploys 40 Foot Antenna, ICO Wants Its Mobile TV - via DVB-SH, Spot Beam Sats Multiply, Satphones: Merger Ahead?, Inmarsat + SkyTerra = Spectrum Sharing.

Google on Monday launched a website FreetheAirwaves.com, as part of a campaign to rally support for its plan to open underutilized portions of the television broadcast spectrum for high-speed wireless Internet ...

The Intel Developer Forum runs Aug. 19-21, 2008 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco (press kit and blog). Intel is using its annual developer forum in San Francisco as a launching pad for its 45nm Nehalem processors, notes EE Times. The company’s first desktop chips, branded Intel Core i7 processors, and initial energy-efficient, high-performance server products (codenamed “Nehalem-EP”) will be first to production.

Intel speakers included Intel Chairman Craig Barrett, who took the U.S. federal government to task over what he felt was its failure to invest in education and research and development. “Nations are only as strong as their education systems,” he said during his keynote.

“The answer is not throwing money at the problem, the answer is throwing good, qualified people at the problem.” Barrett welcomed Brian McCarthy, a teenager from Hillsboro, Ore. and finalist in Intel’s 2008 Science Talent Search, to the stage to talk about his project.

Pat Gelsinger, senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s digital enterprise group, said Intel has won more than 700 designs for its low-power Atom chip since its debut less than two quarters ago. A follow-up chip, Menlow, will becoming to the market in the first quarter of 2009. Among the products that will use the Intel Atom chips is OpenPeak’s new IP media phone, which serves as a digital picture frame as well as a touch-screen Internet telephone.

He was followed by David “Dadi” Perlmutter, general manager of the company’s mobility group. Perlmutter unveiled Intel’s first-ever mobile-focused quad-core laptop workstation – the Intel Core 2 Extreme processor. While the products include four cores, they only use 45 watts of power.

Jim Held, Intel Fellow and director of tera-scale computing research, noted that there are over 2,000 virtual worlds today, and many are merging with popular social networks. Augmented reality–combining real-world information with data overlays–is also evolving, he added, with mobile augmented reality becoming more “compelling”.

Intel will finally enter the high-capacity solid-state drive business with the goal of replacing hard-disk drives in both consumer and corporate markets.

CEO Paul Otellini is on vacation, while Sean Maloney, chief of sales and marketing is in Beijing for the Olympics.

C/Net has complete coverage while EE Times has an overview of this week’s program.

AUSTRALIA'S first region-wide wireless broadband network has been established on South Australia's Yorke Peninsula.

Tranzeo Wireless, today announced that it has received Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approval for its 3.5GHz WiMAX subscriber units in the United States for use in the semi-licensed band from 3.65-3.7GHz. The FCC recently made this spectrum available for licensing by wireless ISPs.

The TR-WMX-3.5-N, TR-WMX-3.5-17, and TR-WMX-3.5-20 subscriber units are included in the FCC approval. The 3.65 GHz band is “lightly licensed”, meaning it requires all operators to register their equipment in the markets they deploy in. While competitors may use the same spectrum, they must to do it in coordination with one another, creating an unlicensed band with some protections to its users. But it cannot be deployed in areas where that frequency is used by satellite providers.

The Tranzeo equipment for customer premises has been verified to be interoperable with leading WiMAX base station technologies including Redline’s RedMAX suite which has also been approved for this band by the FCC.

Metro WISP Towerstream has completed a trial using Alvarion 3.65 GHz WiMAX gear, and is planning a major market rollout reports Telephony Magazine.

Towerstream’s wireless backhaul services in New York, Los Angeles, Boston, San Francisco, Chicago, Miami and Dallas have all used pre-WiMAX equipment from Aperto Networks and Alvarion, most in the 5.8 GHz unlicensed frequencies. Towerstream plans to use Alvarion 3.65 GHz gear going forward in all new deployments.

Related DailyWireless stories include; Towerstream Switches to Alvarion 3.65 GHz, Solectek 3.65 GHz WiMAX, Pipeline Wireless: We’re 3.65 GHz, FCC: Go For 3.65GHz, Airspan, Free 3.65GHz Mapping Service, Airspan Gets FCC Nod for 3.65 GHz, 3.65 GHz Gets Real, FCC: Non-exclusive 3.6GHz Licensing and Broadband Wireless — Hello Goodbye, Who the MuniFi MAN?, WiMAX: No Satellite Interference says WARC.

Google will help set up a two-story, 8,000 square-foot headquarters for hundreds of bloggers descending on the Democratic convention in Denver next week, reports the Wall Street Journal. It will offer similar services at the Republican convention in September, as new media gain influence in politics.

Google stands to gain exposure and goodwill from 500 or so bloggers who paid $100 for access to the facility, run by a coalition of bloggers. Google’s software and services will be featured, including a kiosk in the public area of the tent where anyone can post videos on YouTube.

Four years ago, YouTube hadn’t been founded yet. Now, it will have booths at each convention to help delegates and bloggers upload videos taken on the floor or at events around town.

“It’s an amazing opportunity for us. You don’t get all these people in one place but every four years,” says Robert Boorstin, director of corporate and policy communications in Google’s Washington office and a former Clinton administration official.

Verizon Wireless expects to handle 5 million more calls and data transmissions than normal during the August 25-28 Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Denver. It is adding three new cell sites downtown and installing a fully-functional, mobile “Cell on Wheels” (COW) near the convention location allowing thousands of extra calls and data transmissions to take place. Back-up microwave facilities are also installed in the event of fiber-line interruption or other landline connection failure.

Sprint is also prepared for the conventions in Denver (Democrats) and St. Paul (Republicans). The company’s Emergency Response Team (ERT) will deploy a Satellite Cellsite on Light Truck (SATCOLT) to stand by in case of weather-related power outages or increased call volume from other unforeseen disasters. The SATCOLT is designed to give users a mobile cell tower experience while other towers or sites are repaired or at capacity.

ADC’s InterReach Unison system delivers multi-carrier cellular coverage in the Colorado Convention Center and Denver International Airport

When Earthlink walked away from its plans to cover Houston’s 600 square miles with Wi-Fi, it gave the city $5 million as a payoff. Mayor Bill White said he would use that money to set up wireless access “bubbles” in public places such as parks, as well as in low-income areas

Now Houston’s downtown business district has free Wi-Fi, reports the Houston Chronicle:

I discovered this Monday night as I was leaving the Mighty Houston Chronicle building, compulsively checking my e-mail on my iPhone, and looked to see if any Wi-Fi networks were available. Connecting to a node called Houston Wi-Fi got me to this page:

It requires only an e-mail address to log in. Speeds were decent, at least in the area of the Chronicle. According to the About Houston Wi-Fi page, it uses excess bandwidth from the network of wireless parking meters installed downtown:

Houston WiFi is a free wireless internet service currently available in the Houston Downtown Business District, as part of the ongoing community development efforts of the City of Houston and the Downtown District. The network was implemented to provide electronic communication for City’s new state-of-the-art wireless parking meter pay stations. The high bandwidth capacity of this network allows the City to securely segment excess network bandwidth for the Houston WiFi service.

In related news, the municipal WiFi system in Tempe, Arizona, passed through at three owners in less than three years. The latest owner, Globility, came to an impasse with its suppliers, and unplugged the network’s authentication servers. The city declared Globility in default of the contract and declared the network abandoned. Now, despite the system’s failure, Computers and Tele-Comm Inc. of Independence, Mo., believes it can profitably operate the system, reports The East Valley Tribune. CTC runs wireless networks in the Kansas City area, and in the Hilton and Hyatt hotel chains.

President/CEO Graeme Gibson explained, “This is a million-dollar house that’s on sale for $138,000.”

DailyWireless has more than 650 related Municipal Wireless stories including; Houston Gets Its Money Back from Earthlink, Wireless Houston: Size Queen?, Earthlink to Philly: We’re Outta Here, Philadelphia WiFi Network To Shut Down June 12, MuniFi Roundup, Muni-Fi’s Got Trouble, Who the MuniFi MAN?, Municipal WiFi: What Would You Do?, Wireless Silicon Valley: Would You Believe a Dozen Hotspots in San Carlos?, Free Grass Roots Wi-Fi: It Works in Portland, Starbucks Adds AT&T Wi-Fi, Earthlink Gets Out, MetroFi Vs Portland, Meraki Proposes Free SF Wi-Fi Network, OpenAirBoston Regroups; Becomes Open, SoCal Wireless: Toast?, MuniFi: What Now?, MuniFi: Not Dead Yet, Earthlink Restructures, MuniFi Holds Breath, San Francisco WiFi Dead?, Earthlink Tweeks WiFi Business, New York’s 750 sq mile Cloud, WiFi Vs WiMAX in Windy City, New York’s 750 sq mile Cloud, Will “N” Rescue MuniFi?, Aeris + PacifiCorp: CDMA Meter Reading, M2Z: Free Internet Now!, Sprint’s WiMAX Cities, San Francisco: Now it’s the Antennas!.

Nokia and travel information company Lonely Planet said Tuesday they are joining forces to sell maps and city guides that can be accessed on mobile phones.

Nielsen Mobile reports that there were more than 13 million wireless data card users in the US as of Q2 2008. Recent adoption has been strong, with more than half (55 percent) of these devices acquired in the past 12 months.

The latest research from YouGov has revealed that one in every eight Mobile Broadband users have replaced their existing land-line ISP, using it instead of the land-line alternative.

Only 5% of those currently using both a land-line broadband ISP and a Mobile Broadband service said they intended to drop their land-line service within the next year, but over 25% of existing Mobile Broadband subscribers were contemplating the cancellation of their contract, sighting slow speeds and high costs.

As of Q2 2008, consumers report spending an average of $65 on their data card, excluding service costs. Wireless data cards come in ExpressCard and PCMCIA cards (54 percent of mobile data cards), USB cards (30 percent) and as embedded cards that come built into laptops (17 percent).

Mobile data cards typically augment high-speed home Internet access: 40 percent of card users also have cable broadband and 34 percent also have DSL in their home. That could change though, as 59 percent of mobile data card users say they might swap their ISP for data card use exclusively.

Mobile WiMAX, with twice the speed of cellular data at half the cost, is likely to accelerate that phenomena.

Some 32 percent of mobile data users say they are open to mobile advertising if it lowers their overall bill, according to a survey by Nielsen Mobile. The findings are from the bi-annual Mobile Advertising Report from Nielsen Mobile and are based on a survey of more than 22,000 active mobile data users who used at least one non-voice mobile service in the fourth quarter.

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