Bell pushing cottage country wimax

July 6th, 2008Bell pushing cottage country wimax

Bell cottage wimax

Bell and Rogers haven’t quite given up on Wimax yet. Bell is serious enough about marketing cottage-country wimax to the extent of graffitoing local sailboats.

For a first hand account, Martin has a recent post on his blog on his experience with Rogers cottage wimax. Rogers and Bell use the exact same boxes (and towers too most likely).

Ivan Canarus

James, Robert, and Sharp thanks for your comments.

I don`t think, Bell and Rogers deployed the real WiMAX, because the technology has not standardized yet. But what is the reason of the operators for bidding wireless spectrum ? For sure they are going to provide fast-speed wireless broadband! But real WiMAX (it is coming) is the most efficient wireless broadband technology when 3G is. What do you think, are the Canadian operators will deploy WiMAX or will be waiting LTE ? Thanks.

Ivan
Robert

If you are an operator running on a UMTS, wouldn't it be more cost effective to upgrade to LTE? IMHO, if wimax is to happen, there must be a new player willing to compete with rogers and bell. 2.5 Ghz is still virgin, once over the air video broadcasting is history, maybe we get true wimax.
Ivan Canarus

Sorry for easy question, but i am new in Canada and don`t know the Canadian broadband market yet.But deployed WiMAX in Russia. Is the Internet is anavailable for cotteges in Canada ?
Is it indoor WiMAX in Canada and what is range ?
Robert

Welcome to Canada!

If you live in the city, WiMAX is not meant for you. In most other countries, the WiMAX technology and freq band is NOT in the hands of wired broadband ISPs. But here in Canada, where competition is not welcome, WiMAX is owned by wired broadband ISPs (Rogers and bell) and is used primarily to extend their "service" into rural areas and cottage country.

In short, forget WiMAX. Get wired broadband. I'm on Bell. I saw my service deteriorate from a uber high speed unlimited internet service to a capped trottled mid-speed service. Needless to say, I'm not sticking to bell after my contract expires.
Sharp

Quick clarification, it is NOT wimax. The Inukshuk uses a pre-wimax standard. It will probably be upgraded to the real wimax and the provider of the equipment has been bought by motorola (one of the wimax key player).

As a pre-wimax, it does not provide handover (you can move the modem between cells while surfing) and has a limited bandwidth ( roughtly 1-3mbps). The spectrum is in the wimax band though.
mrjcleaver

Re: handover - I have happily travelled for long distances (40+ km) at reasonably high speeds (120km/h) using the portable modem.

Sure the bandwidth is limited. But most of the time, so are my data consumption needs.
Robert

That's correct. Search and replace "WiMAX" with "quasi-WiMAX" :).
WirelessNorth

This is true. It is wimax-like. And though the (user) equipment is marketed as being portable, it is not particulary convenient to move it around. As a mostly fixed wireless broadband service it is okay however. Assuming you get a signal at all (keep it near a window) the bandwidth is more than sufficient for casual websurfing and the like. The latency however is not great (150+ms typically) so games or voip performance is not ideal.

We've had some good success bringing these boxes in to power internet at small to medium-sized conferences. As long as no one fires up azereus, one portable internet is enough to keep a lot of people connected to their basic gmail and twitter. A lot of venuew eithr have no public wifi or want to charge you $500 per IP address. A rogers or Bell "wimax" box is by comparison $45/month and you can return the $99 box within 30 days...
James Testani

It all depends really on where you are naturally.. But I can tell you that the broadband market here is very different from say, Russia's assuming thats where you reside from. WiMAX is still in the beginning stages here in Canada and the because few Canadians could really see a massive demand for this.. Its probably not gonna be anything spectacular. Our wired broadband is on the lower end of the totem-pole when it comes to speed compared to other countries and, prices are outrageous for those not use to it..

Wirelessnorth.ca

July 6th, 2008Bell pushing cottage country wimax

Recent Comments

Categories

Archives

Blogroll