Latest Updates on Group Scheduling for VoIP on WiMAX

At the Spring 2009 Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in Beijing, Intel premiered a prototype demonstrating Group Scheduling, a technology to increase the capacity of VoIP in 802.16m, next-generation WiMAX networks. At IDF we demonstrated the reduction in size of the DL-MAP (management overhead information) for VoIP traffic with group scheduling. Here we demonstrate how the reduction in the MAP overhead leads to capacity gains, thereby supporting larger number of VoIP calls in next-gen WiMAX networks.

Since IDF we have extended our prototype to include the PHY layer in the BS and the MS. Additionally, the use of a channel emulator enables us to model actual cellular channel conditions. The prototype includes three WiMAX CPE devices each capable of supporting multiple simultaneous VoIP flows, similar to an actual WiMAX cell. The video below describes the extensions and the results from the prototype.

Click To Play

With the setup we see that the reduction in MAP overhead with group scheduling leads to up to 40% increase in VoIP capacity. This improvement is over and above additional gains achieved by the 802.16m specification, which will increase peak data rates up to 10x more than today’s wireless networks over time.

Comments (0)

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/IntelBlogs/~3/6jE7ahmBClY/latest_updates_on_group_schedu.php

NetMotion Wireless Releases Mobility XE 8.51

————————————————————————————————————-

—————————————————————————————————————

NetMotion Wireless, provider of mobile productivity and management software, today released version 8.51 of Mobility XE, the company’s Virtual Private Network (VPN) software. The new version now supports the use of character sets commonly used in French, German, Italian, Spanish, and most other European languages.

This enhancement means that IT administrators and end users can use their native language characters for specifying user names, passwords, resources, and rule sets. The new version of Mobility XE also provides support for Microsoft SQL Server 2008 and 2005 SP3.

NetMotion’s core client-server software, Mobility XE, enables mobile workers to maintain secure connections to applications as they move through wireless coverage gaps and across various networks. Used by more than 1,500 business and agencies, NetMotion Wireless’ software works across Windows(TM)-based laptops and mobile devices. Today’s international feature enhancement follows NetMotion’s recent expansion into Europe and formation of new European subsidiaries.

The updated Mobility XE now supports more than 30 languages.

NetMotion software also facilitates comprehensive reporting on the status of a mobile deployment with its new Mobile Analytics module. The Mobile Analytics module monitors the performance of all individual applications, devices and users within a mobile deployment with more than 20 pre-configured and fully customizable reports, enabling IT managers to measure the performance of a mobile deployment and proactively implement productivity changes, where necessary. The software allows network managers to set thresholds for problems with servers, individual users, or devices, and to receive notifications before critical problems develop, dramatically decreasing help desk calls.

Customers who upgrade to NetMotion Mobility XE 8.51 can now leverage the power of Microsoft SQL Server 2008 or 2005 SP3 in conjunction with the new Analytics module to proactively manage their mobile deployment as a business asset.

Around the globe, more than 350,000 mobile workers use NetMotion’s Mobility XE to mitigate some of the most common challenges in mobile deployments today, including application stability as users move in and out of wireless coverage areas, and seamless roaming between Wi-Fi and wide-area cellular networks. In addition, the company provides advanced security and network management controls that extend corporate security policies to mobile devices, while also allowing customers to utilize their existing mobile investments to reliably deploy real-time applications such as Voice over IP (VoIP) and streaming video.

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Virtualizationdotcom/~3/9AR8OULRboI/

Bright Future for Mobile Broadband

Imagine a future mobile experience where parents can stream their kid’s sports event live to grandparents halfway around the world with your handset. Or people can play immersive mobile games like World of Warcraft anywhere, anytime. Or enjoy true mobility for Voice and Video over IP phone calls over popular internet applications like Skype, to open up whole new opportunities for connectedness between family, friends, and colleagues. Social networks will become mobile and context-aware, multi-dimensional, and will utilize live video and highly immersive 3D Graphics, making today’s Facebook and Twitter seem like the command line interfaces of the past. Artists will collaborate real-time worldwide, and explore new frontiers of creativity. We’re taking the Internet mobile and transforming how our planet connects, whether you are a grandparent, gamer, gossip, geek, or guitar-hero!

A key foundation for this vision is reduced cost and increased throughput of cellular systems worldwide. With the advent of IEEE 802.16e WiMAX, the industry is beginning the shift to the most spectrally efficient wireless technology, Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access with Multiple-Input Multiple-Output antenna technology (MIMO-OFDMA), coupled with an all-IP open Internet network architecture. 802.16e is the industry’s first standards-based MIMO-OFDMA mobile broadband network, and it is ramping now worldwide. According to the [WiMAX Forum](http://www.wimaxforum.org), WiMAX is deployed in over 135 countries with more than 455 networks. I personally use WiMAX today with the CLEAR™ service on my notebook in Portland, Oregon and it works great.

The next generation WiMAX (IEEE 802.16m) standard is also making good progress. For the technically minded, our goal is to double spectral efficiency through innovations like multi-user MIMO using adaptive and differential codebooks, interference mitigation using fractional frequency reuse in downlink and power control in uplink, and MAC improvements such as group scheduling and efficient channel quality feedback. We are also addressing the issue of poor indoor coverage, which is a constant struggle for cellular operators, through low cost femtocell technology. Imagine a small, low cost base station (femtocell) in every home, with the ability to automatically configure and optimize settings. Our research shows that femtocells have the ability to deliver vast gains in capacity, in addition to improving coverage, and hence this is a very active area for research and standardization.

In April, Intel became the first company in the industry to propose an uplink power control algorithm that can meet 802.16m’s stringent cell-edge spectral efficiency requirement of 0.05 bits/sec/Hz (a measure of how efficiently data can be transmitted over limited frequency spectrum). This requirement is far more stringent than IMT-Advanced, and has been very difficult to meet. Our technical proposal provides approximately 2X better performance than other candidate algorithms. At Beijing IDF, we premiered our 802.16m Group Scheduling prototype which to our knowledge is an industry first. Group Scheduling increases Voice over IP capacity for WiMAX networks. We achieved frame overhead reduction of over 20% with 3 VoIP flows. See the [April blog](http://blogs.intel.com/research/2009/04/benefits_of_group_scheduling_f.php) for more details

So what’s beyond 802.16m? Can we ever reach peak user throughput of a Gigabit a second? (802.16m is expected to reach 300Mbps using 4×4 MIMO, with 20 MHz channels). More importantly, can we continue to achieve research breakthroughs to significantly increase network capacity? According to Intel and industry researchers, the answer is YES. I believe that mobile broadband innovation is still in its infancy, and we will achieve even more impressive gains in the coming decade. A few of the many examples include: Multi-cell MIMO, Client Cooperation, publicly accessible Femtocells, and advanced interference mitigation technologies. Our network capacity research in WiMAX-3 will focus on: 1) increasing average-user rate to help the “poor and needy” at the cell edge who suffer co-channel interference; 2) significantly increasing the number of users per Hz; and, 3) low-cost network topologies that bring our clients closer to network elements to provide superior wireless link quality. Our mission is to continue advancing the start of the art in affordable, reliable, high-throughput wireless connectivity.

In short, the future is bright for mobile broadband worldwide, and that’s good news for both the industry and the end-users who will benefit from the advances in wireless technology.

Comments (0)

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/IntelBlogs/~3/GT7ld0B3Jj4/bright_future_for_mobile_broad.php