Starry, Starry Wifi?

[mmcpher]

Wondering what to think of today's announcement by Aereo founder of new internet access alternative called Starry (see https://starry.com/internet). Starry aims to be an ISP and hardware supplier, in the form of a new router. Starry says it will faster, cheaper, simpler, but than what? If feasible and off-the-ground, will be faster than upper tier fiber optic? Will the new, pricey Starry Station Router be competitive?

 

[stevech]

cm frequencies.
Think outdoor equipment, $$, directional antennas at the home/business.
Think little/no building penetration, i.e., the above.
Think spotty coverage outdoors.
Ponder been-there-done-that: Metro-WiFi and Earthink some years back, even at 2.4GHz. And others: backhaul on cable TV cables and access points along pole-mounted cable, or on undergrounded TV coax with access at above-ground pedestals (CableTV owned.
Arrgh. Business model derails.

 

[thiggins]

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-news/32937-so-whats-the-story-on-starry

 

[sfx2000]

Arrgh. Business model derails.

The business model for this type of service has always had challenges...

I do wish them the very best of luck...

 

[HawkFire]

If this has been tried in the past with little success, is it possible that the technology has improved or is it the same?

 

[stevech]

If this has been tried in the past with little success, is it possible that the technology has improved or is it the same?

No, it's a matter of the laws of physics for Radio Frequency propagation and attenuation of signals due to common construction materials and foliage/trees.

The problem is ever the "last mile". The cable companies have it made - that coax cable to your house is capable of (but not used for) 2GHz of bandwidth. For TV, Phone, Internet. Fiber to the home is a rare luxury but will be common in 20 or 30 years. Too expensive to retrofit.

"Wireless isn't a thousand times harder than wired, it's a million times harder."
Prof. Paulraj, Stanford Univ.

 

[sfx2000]

Last mile is always a challenge - and FWIW, WiFi doesn't scale well... scheduled MAC's like Wimax and LTE do for longer range and higher capacity...

Folks have been talking about things like Mesh, and this has been long standing academic projects as well as extended discussions in IETF and IEEE - 802.11 is great technology for short range communications, but not as a WAN technology...

(BTW - @thiggins - check the image tags for the in-house base - it's not an Edimax FishEye Cam)

Saw the head end unit - reminded me a bit about a Wimax project I was doing design work for - rather than POE or running coax - we did USB to the Wimax Radio, on a flat panel, putting the radio right at the antenna - cheap, easy, and fast... the panel was a thin plastic flex that one would put in a window, similar to the HDTV flat panel antennas...