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What is WiMax?

Figure 1

What is WiMAX or Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access?

WiMAX is an Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE, see

http://www.ieee.org) standard designated 802.16-2004 (fixed wireless applications) and
802.16e-2005 (mobile wire-less).

The industry trade group WiMAX ForumTM (http://www.wimaxforum.org ) has defined

WiMAX as a "last mile" broadband wireless access (BWA) alternative to cable modem
service or telephone company Digital Subscriber Line (DSL).

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Fixed WiMAX

Figure 2

What makes WiMAX so exciting is the broad range of applications it makes possible but not
limited to broadband internet access, T1/E1 substitute for businesses, voice over Internet
protocol (VoIP) as telephone company substitute, Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) as
cable TV substitute, backhaul for Wi-Fi hotspots and cell phone towers, mobile telephone
service, mobile data TV, mobile emergency response services, wireless backhaul as substitute
for fiber optic cable.

WiMAX provides fixed, portable or mobile non-line-of sight service from a base station to a
subscriber station, also known as customer premise equipment (CPE). Some goals for
WiMAX include a radius of service coverage of 6 miles from a WiMAX base station for
point-to-multipoint, non-line-of-sight service. This service should deliver approximately 40
megabits per second (Mbps) for fixed and portable access applications. That WiMAX cell
site should offer enough bandwidth to support hundreds of businesses with T1 speeds and
thousands of residential customers with the equivalent of DSL services from one base station.

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MobileWiMAX

Figure 3

Mobile WiMAX takes the fixed wireless application a step further and enables cell phone-
like applications on a much larger scale. For example, mobile WiMAX enables streaming
video to be broadcast from a speeding police or other emergency vehicle at over 70 MPH. It
potentially replaces cell phones and mobile data offerings from cell phone operators. It offers
superior building penetration and improved security measures over fixed WiMAX. Mobile
WiMAX will be very valuable for emerging services such as mobile TV and gaming.

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WiMAX is not Wi-Fi

Figure 4

One of the most often heard descriptions of WiMAX in the press is that it is "Wi-Fi on
steroids". In truth, it is considerably more than that. Not only does WiMAX offer
exponentially greater range and throughput than Wi-Fi (technically speaking 802.11b,
although new variants of 802.11 offer substantial improvements over the "b" variant of
802.11), it also offers carrier grade quality of service (QoS) and security.

Wi-Fi has been notorious for its lack of security. The "b" variant of 802.11 offered no
prioritization of traffic making it less than ideal for voice or video. The limited range and
throughput of Wi-Fi means that a Wi-Fi service provider must deploy multiple access points
in order to cover the same area and service the same number of customers as one WiMAX
base station (note the differences in nomenclature). The IEEE 802.11 Working group has
since approved upgrades for 802.11 security and QoS.

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Wireless Architectures
The following section will provide a simple overview of wireless concepts and nomenclature
to help the reader understand how WiMAX works and will assist us in understanding in
communicating with the WiMAX industry.

Wireless architecture: point-to-point and point-to-multipoint

There are two scenarios for a wireless deployment: point-to-point and point-to-multipoint.

Figure 5

Point-to-point

Point to point is used where there are two points of interest: one sender and one receiver. This
is also a scenario for backhaul or the transport from the data source (data center, co-lo
facility, fiber POP, Central Office, etc) to the subscriber or for a point for distribution using
point to multipoint architecture. Backhaul radios comprise an industry of their own within the
wireless industry. As the architecture calls for a highly focused beam between two points
range and throughput of point-to point radios will be higher than that of point-to-multipoint
products.

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Point-to-Multipoint

As seen in the figure above, point-to-multipoint is synonymous with distribution. One base
station can service hundreds of dissimilar subscribers in terms of bandwidth and services
offered.

Line of sight (LOS) or Non-line of sight (NLOS)?

Figure 6

Earlier wireless technologies (LMDS, MMDS for example) were unsuccessful in the mass
market as they could not deliver services in non-line-of-sight scenarios. This limited the
number of subscribers they could reach and, given the high cost of base stations and CPE,
those business plans failed.

WiMAX functions best in line of sight situations and, unlike those earlier technologies, offers
acceptable range and throughput to subscribers who are not line of sight to the base station.
Buildings between the base station and the subscriber diminish the range and throughput, but
in an urban environment, the signal will still be strong enough to deliver adequate service.

Given WiMAX's ability to deliver services non-line-of-sight, the WiMAX service provider
can reach many customers in high-rise office buildings to achieve a low cost per subscriber
because so many subscribers can be reached from one base station.

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 WiMAX Antennas

WiMAX antennas, just like the antennas for

car radio, cell phone, FM radio, or TV, are
designed to optimize performance for a given
application. The figure above illustrates the
three main types of antennas used in
WiMAX deployments. From top to bottom
are an omni directional, sector and panel
antenna each has a specific function.

Figure 7

Omni directional antenna

Omni directional antennas are used for point-to-

multipoint configurations. The main drawback to
an omni directional antenna is that its energy is
greatly diffused in broad-casting 360 degrees. This
limits its range and ultimately signal strength.
Omni directional antennas are good for situations
where there are a lot of subscribers located very
close to the base station. An example of omni directional application is a WiFi hotspot where
the range is less than 100 meters and subscribers are concentrated in a small area.

Figure 8

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Sector Antennas

Figure 9

A sector antenna, by focusing the beam in a more focused area, offers greater range and
throughput with less energy. Many operators will use sector antennas to cover a 360-degree
service area rather than use an omni directional antenna due to the superior per-formance of
sector antennas over an omni directional antenna.

Panel Antennas

Panel antennas are usually a flat panel of about one

foot square. They can also be a configuration
where potentially the WiMAX radio is contained in
the square antenna enclosure. Such configurations
are powered via the Ethernet cable that connects
the radio/antenna combination to the wider
network. That power source is known as Power
over Ethernet (PoE). This streamlines deployments
as there is no need to house the radio in a separate,
weatherproof enclosure if outdoors or in a wiring
closet if indoors.

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Subscriber Stations
The technical term for customer premise equipment (CPE) is
subscriber station. The gen-erally accepted marketing terms now
focus on either "indoor CPE" or "outdoor CPE". There are
advantages and disadvantages to both deployment schemes as
described below.

Outdoor CPE Figure 11

Figure 11: An outdoor CPE device. Note mounting brackets

for outdoor mounting on roof or side of building

Outdoor CPE, very simply put, offers somewhat better performance over indoor CPE given
that WiMAX reception is not impeded by walls of concrete or brick, RF blocking glass or
steel in the building's walls. In many cases the subscriber may wish to utilize an outdoor
CPE in order to maximize reception via a line of sight connection to the base sta-tion not
possible with indoor CPE. Outdoor CPE will cost more than indoor CPE due to a number of
factors including extra measures necessary to make outdoor CPE weather re-sistant.

Indoor

Figure 12: Indoor WiMAX CPE (Airspan EasyST)- object on left) with telephone
handset and VoIP adapter

The most significant advantage of indoor over outdoor CPE is that it is installed by the
subscriber. This frees the service provider
from the expense of "truck roll" or
installation. In addition, it can be sold online
or in a retail facility thus sparing the service
provider a trip to the customer site. Indoor
CPE also allows a certain instant
gratification for the subscriber in that there
is no wait time for installation by the service
provider. Currently, many telephone
companies require a one month wait
between placement of order and in-stallation
of T1 or E1 services. In addition, an instant
delivery of service is very appeal-ing to the business subscriber in the event of a network
outage by the incumbent service provider.

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Objections to WiMAX
A discussion of WiMAX is not complete without taking on objections to the technology.
Before any one can sell a high technology product, they must first sell the customer on the
technology.

Technology sales people invariably encounter objections to the technology they are sell-ing.
The primary objections to WiMAX are:

1. Interference: Won't interference from other broadcasters degrade the quality of the
WiMAX service?
2. Quality of Service (QoS): Wireless is inherently unstable so how can it offer voice
and video services?
3. Security: Is WiMAX secure? Can anything wireless be secure?
4. Reliability: Nothing can be as reliable as the telephone company's service

The answers to those objections are best understood via the Physical (known as the
PHY, pronounced "fi") and Medium Access Control (MAC pronounced "mac")
Layers. The WiMAX Working Group no doubt were aware of these objections based
on experiences with earlier wireless technologies (Wi-Fi, CDMA, GSM) and have
engineered WiMAX to fix failures of past wireless technologies.

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Interference
Wireless services have been around for a century. There is always the potential for inter-
ference and the service provider must engineer accordingly.

Source: IEEE
Figure 13

Countering interference is a matter of understanding it and engineering accordingly.

Interference occurs naturally in the electromagnetic spectrum. Figure above shows out-of-
channel interference, which comes from other transmitters that are not on the same frequency
as the primary radio. A co-channel interfering transmission occurs on the same frequency as
the desired signal.

Step One in interference mitigation is to avoid co-channel interference through frequency

planning, use of licensed spectrum, and dynamic frequency selection.

Step Two is to pay close attention to the link budget on the wireless network and plan power
and spectrum to overcome interfering signals. Much of the im-pact of out-of-channel

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interference can be avoided using such technologies as OFDM, OFDMA, and a host of
antenna technologies.

Solutions to Interference - OFDM

Figure 14

OFDM mitigates interference by breaking the signal into subcarriers. The loss of the data on
a small percentage of the subdivided signal does not degrade the reception of the received
signal.

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Figure 15

Site Survey
Before any equipment is deployed, there must be a site survey to determine what is needed in
order to have a successful wireless operation. By understanding the dynamics of the market
where the deployment will take place and planning accordingly, the service provider can
ensure success on Day One of operations.

Link Budget

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Figure 16: The link budget determines the success or failure of a wireless operation

The figure above illustrates a link budget. It is the equation of the power of a signal
transmitted minus detractions between the transmitter and receiver (rain, interference from
other broadcasters, vegetation, gain at the antennas ate either end) and what signal is received
at the receiver.

Frequency Plan

Part of the site survey process is to determine a viable frequency plan. The wireless op-erator
must make maximum use of limited spectrum assets. How does one do that?

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Figure 17: By reusing frequencies at different base stations, a WiMAX operator can
avoid interference from their own network

The diagram above illustrates how a wireless operator (cellular, WiMAX, etc) uses their
limited spectrum allocation to deliver the best service possible while avoiding interfer-ence
between their base stations. Note there are nine different base stations with three different
frequencies but no similarly shaded circle touches another. If they did touch, there would be
interference between base stations because they would be operating on the same frequency.

Antenna Technologies & Interference

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Adaptive Antenna System (AAS)

Figure 18: By utilizing AAS and beam steering technologies, WiMAX overcomes
interference while boosting range and throughput

Adaptive Antenna Systems (AAS) use beam-forming technologies to focus the wireless beam
between the base station and the subscriber. This reduces the possibility of interference from
other broadcasters as the beam runs straight between the two points.

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Dynamic Frequency Selection, MIMO, and Software Defined Radios

Figure 19: Dynamic Frequency Selection enables a radio to shift frequencies when
interference is present

One of the simplest remedies to interference is to simply change frequencies to avoid the
frequency where interference occurs. Dynamic frequency selection (DFS) does just that. A
DFS radio sniffs the airwaves to determine where interference does not occur and selects the
open frequency to avoid the frequencies where interference occurs.

Multiple in and multiple out (MIMO) antenna systems work on the same principle. With
multiple transmitters and receivers built into the antenna, the transmitter and receiver can
coordinate to move to an open frequency if/when interference occurs.

Software defined radios (SDR) use the same strategy to avoid interference. As they are
software and not hardware defined, they have the flexibility to dynamically shift frequencies
to move away from a congested frequency to an open channel.

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Quality of Service

Quality of Service (QoS) is what determines if a wireless technology can successfully deliver
high value services such as voice and video. The chief detractors from good QoS are latency,
jitter and packet loss. Solve these issue and you have a carrier-grade service. Very simply put,
WiMAX offers a very low latency across the wireless span. Most ven-dors have products
where latency is less than 10 milliseconds from base station to CPE (and vice versa). To put
this in perspective, latency must be measured end-to-end. VoIP, for example, is highly
susceptible to latency. If latency exceeds 150 milliseconds for ex-ample, the quality of the
conversation begins to drag. At or above 200 milliseconds many listeners may find a
conversation unintelligible.

In the case of WiMAX, the large majority of latency will not occur on the air link be-tween
subscriber and base station but rather on the wired portion of the connection be-tween the
subscriber and what ever the "other end" might be (web site server, IPTV server or VoIP
called party). The figure below illustrates how any latency on the wireless portion of a
network is minimal relative to that on the wired portion of a network.

Figure20

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Applications for WiMAX
The race is on in the service provider community to offer "triple play" (voice, video and data)
or "quadruple play" (voice, video data as well as mobile voice and data). Some ser-vice
providers are attempting to do this with 3 or 4 dissimilar networks as illustrated in the figure
below. For example, at the time of this writing, Qwest Communications Inter-national sold
their own voice and broadband data for the residential market, Dish Net-works for satellite
TV and resells Sprint Nextel cellular service. Reselling other service providers services does
not generate the profit margins as selling one's own services does. Given the vertical
orientation of legacy systems like cable TV (only does TV), circuit-switched voice services
(like cell phone networks-designed almost entirely for voice), it is difficult and expensive to
offer more than one type of service on any one "stovepipe" network. The solution is IP
Multimedia Subsystems (IMS).

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Figure 22: IMS allows a subscriber to access any service on any device using any form
of access

IMS began as a concept in the cell phone industry to offer voice, short messaging service
(SMS) and video on cell phones. It utilizes a simple three-layer architecture consisting of the
Connectivity Layer (similar to the physical layer in the OSI model), a Control Layer, which
provides switching and signaling functions, and the Service Layer where applica-tions such
as IPTV and VoIP features are offered. Running parallel to those function layers are a range
of support systems, which control security and QoS across the network. The signaling
protocol known as Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) provides signaling across the network.

Fixed Wireless (IEEE 802.16-2004) Applications

Perhaps the most lucrative application for WiMAX is that of substitute for the telephone
company's copper wire. This is achieved through fixed wireless solutions. A majority of US
businesses and residences receive their telephone service and internet access via the
telephone company's copper wires. A T1 data line from the telephone company may re-tail
for $800/month in many US cities. About 50% of that expense is "local loop" charges or
paying to use the telephone company's copper wire to access a wider network. WiMAX
service provider could purchase the bandwidth equivalent of a T1 (1.54 Mbps) at, say, $45
and resell to an enterprise customer for $400. Through oversubscription (overselling), that
service provider could realize a multiple of that profit.

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WiMAX & IPTV
The third leg of the triple play is Internet Protocol Television (IPTV). IPTV enables a
WiMAX service provider to offer the same programming as cable or satellite TV service
providers. IPTV, depending on compression algorithms, requires at least 1 Mbps of
bandwidth between the WMAX base station and the subscriber.

Figure 26

In addition to IPTV programming, the service provider can also offer a variety of video on
demand (VoD) services. The subscriber can select programming a la carte for their television,
both home and mobile, viewing needs. This may be more desirable to the sub-scriber as they
pay only for what they want to watch as opposed to having to pay for doz-ens of channels
they don't want to watch. IPTV over WiMAX also enables the service provider to offer local
programming as well as revenue generating local advertising.

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WiMAX Mobile Applications (802.16e)
In order to execute a true quadruple play strategy, a service provider will need to offer mobile
services. Even though it's called "mobile", 802.16e-2005 offers a number of ad-vantages to
the fixed wireless market as well. Better building penetration as well as im-provements in
security and QoS point to a strategy of "one network serves all".

WiMAX as cellular alternative

Of all the sub industries in telecommunications, perhaps the one best positioned to take
advantage of WiMAX is the cellular service providers. They have a lot going for them
including a wireless culture (RF engineers, wireless savvy sales staff, etc) and millions of
"early adaptor" customers. On the other hand, the transition from legacy circuit switching and
a dependency on the incumbent telephone service provider's network will not be easy or
inexpensive.

As the diagram below supports, a large percentage of a cell phone operator's monthly
operating expense (OPEX) is T1 backhaul to support their base stations. In addition, they use
aging circuit switches (Class 4 and 5 as well as Mobile Switching Centers) to switch phone
calls. These come with expensive annual service contracts. A WiMAX substitute for the cell
phone infrastructure could be operated at as little as 10% of the OPEX of a cellular operator
using legacy infrastructure.

Figure 27 : The cellular network is a mixture of wireless and PSTN architectures

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REFERENCES

www.wikepidia.com

www.IEsEE.org

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