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rf_engineer
join:2003-08-04
USA
| reply to Hipjones
Re: Nice
said by Hipjones  :Funny how when they get this to work there is less bashing on the BPL's and more on the HAM's. This is great.You wanted more upload for 2006,you got it.Please dont comment on how no one will ever get it or how it's gonna fade,been there,heard that. The only ham bashing I've seen has been here on BBR, and it was going on way before the TXU deal and before Current's improved technology was available. It's funny how hams say we don't disapprove of BPL, we have a problem with the interference. And then when we say something good about a particular system because it avoids some of the interference issues, we're still the bad guys.
"BPL is going to be everywhere", been there, heard that. Yet there's only one rural BPL trial and I haven't seen anyone show how that wonderful rural BPL model will work. Merely saying BPL will bring broadband to the huddled masses won't make it happen; interference is just one of the issues to overcome. And despite Current's success with interference issues and Motorola's new technology, there's still several BPL vendors trying to push their interference-ridden technology in existing operational systems. | |
W1RFI
join:2003-05-12
Burlington, CT
| quote:
The only ham bashing I've seen has been here on BBR, and it was going on way before the TXU deal and before Current's improved technology was available.
Actually, from the posts I have seen here, most have been reasonably supportive of Amateur Radio, listeners of international shortwave broadcasts and CB, the services most likely to be affected by BPL. All in all, hams have a pretty good reputation.
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/bpl/emcomm.html
Now, in some other forums, "hamster" bashing seems to be the best way to avoid the tough issues, or at least a way to try to protect one's investment until the price of their stock goes up enough to sell.
Now, look through a few of the links above and try to imagine that community deliberately lying about BPL to make a few "fat cats" at ARRL rich with more members.
In reality, ARRL's policy arm -- its Board of Directors, President and Vice Presidents, are all unpaid volunteers. The League has a paid staff, whose role and function is defined by its volunteer Board of Directors.
Ed Hare, ARRL Lab
W1RFI@arrl.org | |
moonpuppy
join:2000-08-21
Glen Burnie, MD
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| reply to rf_engineer
said by rf_engineer :said by Hipjones :Funny how when they get this to work there is less bashing on the BPL's and more on the HAM's. This is great.You wanted more upload for 2006,you got it.Please dont comment on how no one will ever get it or how it's gonna fade,been there,heard that. The only ham bashing I've seen has been here on BBR, and it was going on way before the TXU deal and before Current's improved technology was available. It's funny how hams say we don't disapprove of BPL, we have a problem with the interference. And then when we say something good about a particular system because it avoids some of the interference issues, we're still the bad guys. "BPL is going to be everywhere", been there, heard that. Yet there's only one rural BPL trial and I haven't seen anyone show how that wonderful rural BPL model will work. Merely saying BPL will bring broadband to the huddled masses won't make it happen; interference is just one of the issues to overcome. And despite Current's success with interference issues and Motorola's new technology, there's still several BPL vendors trying to push their interference-ridden technology in existing operational systems. AGREED!
When the truth is against you, resort to insults and bashing. God forbid anyone take a look at the technology behind BPL.
Some people, on this board, have a "broadband at all costs" attitude and shame on you for getting in their way. They don't care if the HAMS are interfered with but one problem with their TV and some want to resort to vandalism and murder. | |
W1RFI
join:2003-05-12
Burlington, CT
| quote:
Some people, on this board, have a "broadband at all costs" attitude and shame on you for getting in their way. They don't care if the HAMS are interfered with but one problem with their TV and some want to resort to vandalism and murder.
»www.arrl.org/tis/info/tvi.html
»www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/catvi/index.html
»www.arrl.org/tis/info/rfigen.html
Ed Hare, W1RFI@arrl.org | |
moonpuppy
join:2000-08-21
Glen Burnie, MD
·Verizon Online DSL
| Nice links Ed.
Unfortunately, for some people here, it will fall on deaf ears. They would rather blame someone else and not their own TV.
I had one comlant against me that was completely unfounded. (My station was not even plugged in.) My guess is that it was a mobile CB setup with an illegal amp that caused me problems once before. | |
W1RFI
join:2003-05-12
Burlington, CT
| quote:
Unfortunately, for some people here, it will fall on deaf ears. They would rather blame someone else and not their own TV.
Information for the Neighbors of Hams
»www.arrl.org/news/rfi/neighbors.html
Licensed Amateurs will almost invariably correct any problems with their stations.
Even if the interference is caused by inadequate filtering in consumer equipment, hams will usually help their neighbors find a solution.
»www.arrl.org/tis/info/rfi-info-fcc.html
Although I have run across a few jerks, it has been my experience that most of the time, the neighbor is willing to be reasonable, especially after they see the FCC information.
Ed Hare, W1RFI@arrl.org | |
W1RFI
join:2003-05-12
Burlington, CT
| reply to W1RFI
quote:
Some people, on this board, have a "broadband at all costs" attitude and shame on you for getting in their way. They don't care if the HAMS are interfered with but one problem with their TV and some want to resort to vandalism and murder.
Interference can go both ways. What about interference from licensed services to BPL? Initial testing indicates that there is a serious susceptibility problem with some BPL:
»www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/plc/degrade.html
I will add a few more data points. In contrast to the AMRAD tests, when I was in Cincinatti, I did some similar testing outside the house of a ham in that system. While the Current Technologies equipment in the AMRAD tests in Potomac showed that as little as 5 watts from the mobile station brought the BPL Internet connection down, in Cincinatti, I used 75 watts with the same BPL manufacturer's equipment and didn't see a problem. At this point, Current is discussing these findings with ARRL, and I hope those discussions will lead to some joint work and testing.
Susceptibility tests done recently in Cottonwood, AZ showed 65 watts from a mobile station caused the BPL system to significantly degrade.
I did some testing at an Ohio BPL system and found that if they didn't "notch" the ham bands, two watts in band from a mobile station parked on the street caused two of the nodes to completely lose track of each other. When the notches were put in place, 100 watts caused the system to degrade.
OTOH, the Motorola system here at ARRL HQ kept going without a hitch when the W1AW bulletin station fired up with 1000 watts on seven different bands simultaneously, with antennas clustered all around the building.
Clearly, more work in this area is needed, and some companies appear to be serious about assessing this threat to their performance.
Under the FCC rules for unlicensed devices, BPL must accept any interference caused to it, so this is pretty serious work.
In a recent article in EDN, I was quoted as saying that my job it so help make BPL successful.
»www.edn.com/article/CA6280032.ht···yid=2282
My role in their success will be to help them address their EMC issues. ARRL has done that over the years with the cable industry, the DSL industry, and even HomePlug.
It is ironic that the most successful BPL company so far -- Current Technologies -- is building on the work that ARRL did with HomePlug some years ago.
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/rfi/HomePlug···ARRL.pdf
Other examples:
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/rfi/HPNA/HPNAtests.html
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/rfi/VDSL/VDS···nix.html
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/rfi/VDSL/VDSL-TIA.htm
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/rfi/VDSL/2E142351.PPT
The latter is a presentation made formally by me at one of the VDSL standards meetings.
Ed Hare, W1RFI@arrl.org | |
moonpuppy
join:2000-08-21
Glen Burnie, MD
·Verizon Online DSL
| said by W1RFI :Interference can go both ways. What about interference from licensed services to BPL? Initial testing indicates that there is a serious susceptibility problem with some BPL: » www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/plc/degrade.htmlI did some testing at an Ohio BPL system and found that if they didn't "notch" the ham bands, two watts in band from a mobile station parked on the street caused two of the nodes to completely lose track of each other. When the notches were put in place, 100 watts caused the system to degrade. Ed Hare, W1RFI@arrl.org Ed, I read the link describing the test with the ICOM 706 using as little as 5 watts.
I know this might be a bit outside of the scope of your experiments but has anyone considered doing the same experiment with a CB using Part 95 rules (limit of 4 watts PEP AM, 12 watts SSB PEP?) | |
W1RFI
join:2003-05-12
Burlington, CT
| quote:
I know this might be a bit outside of the scope of your experiments but has anyone considered doing the same experiment with a CB using Part 95 rules (limit of 4 watts PEP AM, 12 watts SSB PEP?)
This should not be much different than what would be seen on the 10-meter band. In practice, probably any of the measurements made above 14 MHz should correlate pretty well to 11-meter operation.
All in all, the results so far indicated that more work is needed in the immunity area, and more testing should be done. Some of the testing done is on earlier generation equipment, and the results may or may not correlate well with what is being produced now. The best example of that may be in the very preliminary finding by me in Cincinatti, where I used a higher power level than the earlier Potomac tests and didn't see the same susceptibility. Is that a difference in equipment, or in the configuration of the installations?
I have added my office signature file to my signature line in this post, so those that are reading this may have a better understanding of the scope of my work and about the productive ways that ARRL works with industry. Even with BPL, more of the BPL companies and utilities are taking a more productive approach to the interference issues that still dog this industry. Others are not, although the door to sincere cooperation is open.
Some examples of my technical work are found in ARRL's various papers on BPL:
»p1k.arrl.org/~ehare/bpl/ARRL_BPL_Papers.html
It should come as no surprise that the more successful BPL companies are the ones that are addressing BPL interference issues head on instead of butting heads. As ARRL has noted, the Current Technologies system deployed past 50,000+ homes in Cincinatti has not had major interference problems. If the other companies would come to terms that the only way to avoid harmful interference is to not use spectrum for BPL that is in use locally, then I think that overall, the industry would be more successful.
Ed Hare, W1RFI
ARRL Laboratory Manager
225 Main St
Newington, CT 06013
Tel: 860-594-0318
Internet: W1RFI@arrl.org
Web: »www.arrl.org/bpl
Member: ASC C63 EMC Committee (»www.c63.org)
---Chairman: Subcommittee 5, Immunity
---Chairman: BPL Working Group
Member: IEEE, Standards Association, Electromagnetic Compatibility Society
Member: IEEE SCC-28 RF Safety committee
Member: IEEE EMC Society Standards Development Committee
---Chairman, BPL Study Project
Member: Society of Automotive Engineers EMC/EMR Committee
Board of Directors: QRP Amateur Radio Club International
| |
W1RFI
join:2003-05-12
Burlington, CT
| reply to W1RFI
quote:
It is ironic that the most successful BPL company so far -- Current Technologies -- is building on the work that ARRL did with HomePlug some years ago.
I should add that two other BPL manufacturers selling in the US use HomePlug modems -- IBEC and Motorola. IBEC is tarteting the rural market mostly. They, too, have deployed without major interference to Amateur Radio problems. Motorola is just getting started, but I just noted in the BPL database at »www.bpldatabase.org that ZIP codes 92117 and 92122 in San Diego show that SDG&E is expanding their BPL trial to include Motorola. I have alerted the local amateurs, but also told them of our experiences here with Motorola. (We installed a system here, and couldn't hear it in the ham bands. It was pretty loud in the shortwave broadcast bands, though).
Ed Hare, W1RFI | |
trapper12
@optonline.net
| Re: Nice alternative to Amateur Radios
read: Multiple phones good idea in a crisis
Among the lessons learned from the devastating hurricanes of 2005 is that no one telephone service can be counted on to work in a widespread calamity.
By the Editors of Consumer Reports
Among the lessons learned from the devastating hurricanes of 2005 is that no one telephone service can be counted on to work in a widespread calamity. At least not now.
More than 3 million customers' phone lines were knocked out in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama by wind and water during Hurricane Katrina in August.
Many of the phone lines that still worked couldn't summon help because 911 call centers or the switching centers that route calls to them went down. Wireless phones also proved useless in many places, as more than a thousand cell sites and their switching centers became inoperative in the wake of the storm.
Yet some residents of the affected areas managed to reach help using other phone services. For example:
• During Katrina, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), which transmits your voice calls over the same Internet lines that carry your e-mail, worked well in locations where broadband connections were available. In fact, New Orleans city officials were first able to communicate with the outside world via VoIP.
• The most consistently available emergency phone service throughout Katrina's onslaught and aftermath was satellite telephony. This service -- used primarily by government, industry and nomadic world travelers -- is generating interest as a backup option for emergencies.
• While wireless voice calls jammed the few remaining cell sites in Katrina-battered New Orleans, text messages continued to go through. Also called SMS, for short message service, this feature allows you to tap out a message on your wireless phone's keypad and send it to another cell phone. If you're not familiar with creating and sending a text message, consult your phone's instruction book -- or the nearest teenager.
»www.dailybreeze.com/business/art···ge=1&c=y | |
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