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To: Michael F. Donadio who wrote (7215)11/15/1999 11:50:00 AM
From: Scrapps  Respond to of 9236
 
I saw that posted on the Amati thread. John Cioffi the Amati founder has always been at odds with AWRE, as has TI & Globespan. The $10 Micro filter price is very high from what information I get. Maybe they are including the cost of having a tech install them. No doubt an occasional micro filter could be required, but most should be owner installed. I doubt it's much to worry about.



To: Michael F. Donadio who wrote (7215)11/15/1999 11:57:00 AM
From: TedTurner  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 9236
 
There is also a good bit of good news in that article for G.Lite, plus the bad news comes from full-rate suppliers which is no surprise at all.

I found these points to be great news for G.Lite:

Some carriers, chip makers and OEMs remain firm backers of G.Lite. Service provider Northpoint Communications Inc. (San Francisco) has finished G.Lite trials in Santa Clara, Calif., and is prepared to launch a multicity G.Lite offering that involves retail sales through Tandy/Radio Shack, according to Mark Peden, director of technology strategy.

Peden, former chairman of the Universal ADSL Working Group, the ad hoc industry group that rallied behind G.Lite, said that any move to make DSL services cost-effective is a boon to the industry. That would include full-rate ADSL through microfilters, Peden said, but he believes G.Lite retains the edge in low power dissipation and interoperability across vendors.
But others are still pushing G.Lite forward, and "G.Lite is definitely going to be the accepted medium for consumers," said Kevin McClure, senior analyst for communications ICs at Dataquest Inc. (San Jose, Calif.).

Motorola Inc. also backs the splitterless standard for consumer markets. While G.Lite adoption is proceeding quickly, "not all of the central office switches have updated software; the new code has not reached all of the COs, and that has caused some delays," said Matt Nelson, G.Lite product line marketing manager for Motorola (Huntsville, Ala.). "But on the consumer side, I think it is important to note that G.Lite reached a fully interoperable standard well ahead of full-rate [ADSL], which is about a year behind."

Yet the rise of the microfilter doesn't completely collapse the G.Lite chip set market. Faraj Aalaei, vice president of marketing at Centillium Communications Inc. (Fremont, Calif.), said G.Lite line cards can be a cost-effective solution for carriers, letting them field full-rate services to customers able to pay for it, and slower chip sets for users willing to accept G.Lite's slower data rates.

"G.Lite line cards use much less power than full-rate versions, and the densities are much higher," Aalaei said. "The whole goal of G.Lite is to reduce complexity and power dissipation."



To: Michael F. Donadio who wrote (7215)11/16/1999 2:53:00 AM
From: Scrapps  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 9236
 
One example of excellence is Lucent's new broadband modem, WildCard, which has nothing to do with company problems over switches. It's a product with a great deal of promise.

Analysts predict that the G922.2 G.lite standard will see widespread deployment as it moves down in price. So serious gadget hounds will appreciate WildCard, which represents the first round of that deployment. The product is based on Lucent's WildWire DSP1690 chip, whose claim to fame is that sends and receives data nearly 25 times faster than today's analog modems. Tony Grewe, director of business strategy and development for the Microelectronics Group, emphasizes that the chip is user friendly.

“We were driving hard to make G.lite easier and more plug-and-play,” said Grewe. “We're not selling chip sets as data pumps. We're selling software that makes it easy on the end user.”

WildCard allows client-side connections with a majority of U.S. central offices equipped with standards-based ADSL. It lifts some of the traditional barriers to DSL installation. The modem is flexible, with the ability to talk in both lite rates to deployed G.lite head ends and full rates to standard head ends.

What makes this modem such an effective trump card is its ability to “lower its voice.” When sending out a G.lite handshake, WildCard negotiates a series of heavy tones to provide lite rates. Grewe said WildCard “tricks” the Central Office switch into dropping down to a lower data rate, eliminating the need for further CO configurations.

Grewe said his team wanted to design something that would get away from the “inherent problems with plumbing,” such as bickering with the phone company about the copper lines. “WildCard represents a discussion shift from having to do constant technical troubleshooting with the consumer and endless negotiations with the ILEC.”

By filtering out higher band frequencies, WildCard effectively stretches G.lite's geographical coverage from the CO switch. Grewe said the modem extends G.lite's outer limits of 20,000 feet. (G.lite's target is 18,000 feet). The modem also has increased throughput, with an upstream/downstream of 600 Kbps/2 Mbps. G.lite's target speeds are 512 Kbps/1.5 Mbps.

WildCard eliminates the need for installing splitters, the generally-hated customer premise equipment that replaces a demarc box on the side of the house and splits voice and data into the home. Customers can use the same phone line to make and receive phone calls while on line with their G.lite connection.

WildCard works with a wide range of non-Lucent silicon. It inter-operates with a variety of DSLAMs, or multiplexer boxes that concentrate ADSL traffic. Grewe points out that WildCard communicates with the head ends of 12 Lucent rivals/partners, including Cisco, Siemens, Ericsson and Samsung. However, the modem does require microfilters on some phones.

WildCard is also compatible with current analog cards, so ISPs will be able to swap out analog with digital modems.

“It's low power, too,” said Grewe. “Each port uses about a watt of power. So there are no racks to buy. This is a simple swap out.”

So the public will soon enjoy laptops, PCs and modems with nearly T-1 capacity. According to Grewe, Lucent DSL chips are already being built into Compaq Presarios, while the vendor has shipped nearly 250,000 DSL modems overall.

With WildCard, the two-year industry headache to build up ADSL head ends won't have to be repeated. The great advantage is that these G.lite modems can make use of non-G.lite ADSL equipment which may already be in place in the CO.

boardwatch.internet.com



To: Michael F. Donadio who wrote (7215)11/17/1999 12:45:00 AM
From: SteveG  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 9236
 
- G.lite is more than splitterless. There are power management & fast retrain procedures, as well as simplifications designed for more PC-oriented solutions.

Message 11519799

- Microfilters were envisioned awhile ago as part of g.lite to treat phones which required too much power cutback.

- G.lite's rate limit is artificial. The standard only sets the minimum maximum bit rate that can be supported (1.5 Mbps) while the actual max rate that can be supported (on shorter loops) is often over 3 Mbps and may be as high as 4.5 Mbps. At higher rates, performance is a bit less than you would get using full-rate ADSL. Its on short loops that the extra tones in full-rate kick in.

- (most importantly) they can't install an unlimited amount of microfilters since the line capacitance is additive. (eg., if a CPE has 5 phones ..fax, answering machine, etc... chances are with g.lite, 2 or more would need microfilters. And if you use more microfilters, then both modem & voice quality degrade from over-capacitance.

Also, some Loring detail clarifications (from info likely gotten from 2Wire's marketing dept)

"..John Cioffi at Stanford University revealed that the splitterless systems could see severely eroded data speeds when nearby phones were taken off the hook, and users heard significant noise when trying to place a voice call..."

Cioffi's tests were on prototype (ie., not standards-compliant) G.lite transceivers - subsequent work dramatically improved power back-off & fast retrain algorithms. Even so, microfilters are still often needed.

"..As a tactical response, Texas Instruments Inc. and Globespan Inc. designed microfilters * tiny devices that plug into every phone or fax in the home to demarcate voice and data traffic and keep the signals clean * to sell along with their chip sets".."

Globespan's (and possibly TI's) microfilters predated G.lite chips & were used with CAP ADSL - originally branded as "easy-DSL".

"..Peden, former chairman of the Universal ADSL Working Group, the ad hoc industry group that rallied behind G.Lite, said that any move to make DSL services cost-effective is a boon to the industry..."

Mark Peden was never chairman of UAWG. Not known as a technician, he was marketing committee chair.

"...G.Lite line cards use much less power than full-rate versions, and the densities are much higher," Aalaei said. "The whole goal of G.Lite is to reduce complexity and power dissipation..."

The power issue that centillium raises is implementation specific - the power savings are small when compared to that saved by using different implementations.

Multi-mode modems are thought by many to be the way to go since g.lite offers significant advantages when running at <1.5 Mbps which a large number of users are constrained to running at due to line length.