LightSquared Proposes Another GPS Interference Fix Another Antenna, This One by PCTEL After both GPS-related industries and government agencies highlighted that LightSquared's planned LTE/Satellite hybrid network interfered with GPS signals, the company in June LightSquared filed a revised plan with the FCC. The plan involved utilizing a 10 MHz swath of L-band spectrum in the lower portion of the company's spectrum assets to avoid interference. That still left some highly-sensitive GPS equipment with interference issues, so LightSquared recently proposed an additional fix using technology they're developing with a company named Javad. However, the cost of the fix was estimated at around $400 million, and LightSquared expected the GPS industry to pay it -- something that obviously hasn't made them happy. This morning an e-mail arrived in our inbox from LightSquared announcing that the company had cooked up another fix in the form of a new antenna by a company named PCTEL. According to LightSquared, the new antenna is headed for testing in New Jersey at Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs, and is another option that high-precision users can install (at their own expense) to avoid interference concerns. "Despite claims by some GPS device manufacturers that an interference solution would take ten years and billions of dollars to develop, the private marketplace has continued to develop inexpensive solutions using existing technology in just a matter of weeks," jabs the company's announcement. LightSquared says the fixes are all set to be tested by the NTIA and the FCC within the next few weeks, the latter LightSquared has promised to sue if they backtrack on plans to grease the regulatory rails to help LightSquared to market.
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 |  TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY
1 edit | Oh come on Oh I see instead of you fixing your system you expect the legacy users to fix theirs'. I am sorry but it is up to you to fix YOUR! system and if you can't go away.
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I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's.
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|  |  GuspazGuspazPremium,MVM
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3 edits | Re: Oh come on There's nothing wrong with LightSquared's system to fix. It's the broken GPS hardware whose manufacturers were too cheap to build them right in the first place. Why should LightSquared have to pay the GPS companies to use their rightfully licensed spectrum?
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Developer: Tomato/MLPPP, Linux/MLPPP, etc »fixppp.org | |
| | | | | Re: Oh come on That is not true. Lightsquared got bad advice. Spectrum does not have walls; adjacent bands have to be compatible. Any kid with a radio merit badge could have told them that. Bad advice. Tsk tsk. Caveat emptor. | |
| | | TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY | Broken GPS hardware, please, this broken GPS hardware was built with FCC type approval. You can feed some people this BS but it does not work with somebody who knows how the Type approval process works. So you are saying 10 years ago the manufacturers of GPS equipment should have consulted the Tarot cards to find out is somebody like LightSquared was going to appear. Don't heap blame on current GPS equipment providers, blame the idiots at the FCC for letting LightSquared get their foot in the door.
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I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's.
- Mark Twain in Eruption | |
| | | | | said by Guspaz:There's nothing wrong with LightSquared's system to fix. Yeah, actually, there is. It's broken in concept and cannot reasonably be fixed.
said by Guspaz:Why should LightSquared have to pay the GPS companies to use their rightfully licensed spectrum?
Because, for the umpteenth time, they're trying to use "their rightfully licensed spectrum" in a manner for which it was never intended. If they were using it in the manner for which it was intended, there'd probably be no problem.
The fact that LightSquared keeps coming up with one-solution-after the other ought to be a clue as to the likely efficacy of their "solutions."
Jim | |
| | | | | | | TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY
1 edit | Re: Oh come on =[user81984]
The laws of physics make GPS signals from moving satellites red shift into the frequencies lightsquared wants to use for ground base transmitters. Lightsquared will jam these red shifted signals. There is no fix for this except not broadcasting on those frequencies with over powering ground signals.
Also GPS is owned by US taxpayers. We had been building GPS since the 70s.
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I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's.
- Mark Twain in Eruption | |
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| said by Guspaz:There's nothing wrong with LightSquared's system to fix. It's the broken GPS hardware whose manufacturers were too cheap to build them right in the first place. Why should LightSquared have to pay the GPS companies to use their rightfully licensed spectrum?
You need to research some on radio propagation and theory. There's a reason these are laid out the way they are. Lightsquared is attempting to use weak satellite spectrum and re use it for stronger ground based operations. It is not the GPS makers fault Lightsquared is totally in the wrong here.
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| | | | | said by Guspaz:There's nothing wrong with LightSquared's system to fix. It's the broken GPS hardware whose manufacturers were too cheap to build them right in the first place. Why should LightSquared have to pay the GPS companies to use their rightfully licensed spectrum?
Wrong, but thanks for playing.
If you did any reading, you would have known that Lightsquared is not using the spectrum they were licensed for under the rules of their original intention. They changed their use of the spectrum was it has been found to be incompatible with the original intent. | |
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TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY
2 edits | Total Bovine Scatology
PCTEL antenna 1 | 
PCTEL antenna 2 | 
PCTEL antenna 3 |
"PCTEL has developed an antenna that will allow existing high precision users to retrofit their GPS devices to make them compatible with LightSquared's network. This antenna provides high precision GPS users with another in a series of solutions to make their equipment LightSquared-compatible."
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I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's.
- Mark Twain in Eruption | |
| |  mix
join:2002-03-19
Utica, MI | Re: Total Bovine Scatology There are plenty of high precession GPS receivers that have the receiver and antenna integrated into the same housing. This won't work for them... | |
| | | TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY | Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by mix:There are plenty of high precession GPS receivers that have the receiver and antenna integrated into the same housing. This won't work for them...
Exactly right, The antennas shown are huge by comparison and not designed for portable use. Again if you have a hand held GPS device you are screwed. 
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I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's.
- Mark Twain in Eruption | |
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| | | |  SeleniaI love DebianPremium
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| Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by swintec:said by Transmaster:the average Joe, back country Ranger, Search and Rescue person with the pocket Garmin, Tom-Tom car navigation system, or any other portable GPS receiver is screwed.
Why is this a problem? How many technology advances over the years has caused end users to upgrade or be left behind? Heck, just look at the analog / digital television swap of a few years ago. When new software comes out do you get pissed when you need to upgrade your machine to run it? Should all technology advances stop where they are at this point? You can't be for real. We're not talking a technology advance. We're talking about using the same technology others have deployed in a swath of spectrum never intended for this purpose and hugely impacts public interests. They bought spectrum intended for sat to ground communication and are not happy they are stuck with that.
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| | | Ulmo
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San Jose, CA Reviews:
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| said by swintec:said by Transmaster:the average Joe, back country Ranger, Search and Rescue person with the pocket Garmin, Tom-Tom car navigation system, or any other portable GPS receiver is screwed.
Why is this a problem? How many technology advances over the years has caused end users to upgrade or be left behind? Heck, just look at the analog / digital television swap of a few years ago. When new software comes out do you get pissed when you need to upgrade your machine to run it? Should all technology advances stop where they are at this point? That is so much garbage it's hard to explain how bad it is. GPS band interference isn't an advancement, it's regress. Future devices will depend on the GPS band to advance into better devices, so Lightsquared interference in the GPS band will cause REGRESS and IMPEDE ADVANCEMENT. Needing to get more expensive equipment to have inferior service for something that was working PERFECTLY WELL BEFORE THE INTERFERENCE is not an UPGRADE; it is a DOWNGRADE. | |
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| | | | said by swintec:said by Transmaster:the average Joe, back country Ranger, Search and Rescue person with the pocket Garmin, Tom-Tom car navigation system, or any other portable GPS receiver is screwed.
Why is this a problem? How many technology advances over the years has caused end users to upgrade or be left behind? Except this isn't a "technology advance." This is mitigation, and probably poor mitigation, at that, for an induced problem that need not occur.
Btw: Our five-year-old, going on six, marine GPS is still fine, thankyouverymuch. It does not need to be replaced. It does not need hardware upgrades. All it needs is occasional chart updates and possibly occasional firmware updates. So I should go out and pay another $500 or $600 for a new marine GPS when the one I have is just fine, just so LightSquared and their investors can make money? Is that your argument? Really?
Jim | |
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1 edit | Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by swintec:How many folks had to buy digital adapters for their TVs JUST so the government could make money auctioning off the analog airwaves? Where were you on that one? Maybe the government will send out a voucher or two to help you out, I dont know. You mean digital TV, the standard which was developed in 1995 and it took until 2009 before NTSC was shutdown. It took many years to allow an orderly transition with new supporting products to become readily available and minimize as much disruptions as possible to the user community. LightSquared wants the same thing done in basically one year.
quote:
This isnt just so Lightsquared can make cash, I look at it as much of the country will be getting decent data speeds where previously it was broadband black holes. It will give many areas another player for internet services. I am sure you have read this site long enough to see people whining about the evil monopoly and duopoly of their town and city.
The problem is LightSquared's network will not improve rural coverage. They have only one satellite in orbit, which will offer minimal capacity and speeds. It's only used as a loophole in their lease agreements regarding terrestrial service. And they are are so cash-poor they need to utilize Sprint's existing infrastructure but even then, the only way they can raise that money is if they are given the go ahead to utilize their full 20 MHz, which in testing has already shown to render GPS useless in the vast majority in the USA.
And it is essentially about LightSquare making cash. Harbinger pad somewhere around $2 billion for the bankrupt company that leased this spectrum. This spectrum is only worth this much due to significant limitations imposed on it, especially in regards to terrestrial operations and interference with GPS and other users. If they are able to convert it to full terrestrial use, then the value shoots way up. Verizon paid about $10 billion for roughly an equivalent amount of spectrum in the last auction. | |
| | | | | SeleniaI love DebianPremium
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| said by swintec:said by jseymour:o I should go out and pay another $500 or $600 for a new marine GPS when the one I have is just fine, just so LightSquared and their investors can make money?
No, you should go out and buy another because (I assume) you want to continue having navigation on the water? Your choice though really. How many folks had to buy digital adapters for their TVs JUST so the government could make money auctioning off the analog airwaves? Where were you on that one? Maybe the government will send out a voucher or two to help you out, I dont know. This isnt just so Lightsquared can make cash, I look at it as much of the country will be getting decent data speeds where previously it was broadband black holes. It will give many areas another player for internet services. I am sure you have read this site long enough to see people whining about the evil monopoly and duopoly of their town and city. Of course I am basing this off of what Ligthsquared is telling us about what they will be able to produce for a working network. So, you would be fine if I set a WISP next to your house and stepped on all the unlicensed bands, but left say the 900MHz band alone? Then give you the kicker that if you upgrade all your equipment to 900MHz gear it'll work fine if you want to not be sent back to the corded age, your choice, though really? Hilarious, yes. But I am only going on your assertions that private companies should be able to do whatever the hell they want, provided they let you pay to mitigate the interference.
--
A fool thinks they know everything.
A wise person knows enough to know they couldn't possibly know everything.
There are zealots for every OS, like every religion. They do not represent the majority of users for either. | |
| | | | | | | said by swintec:said by jseymour:o I should go out and pay another $500 or $600 for a new marine GPS when the one I have is just fine, just so LightSquared and their investors can make money?
No, you should go out and buy another because (I assume) you want to continue having navigation on the water? Your choice though really. How about instead we don't allow LightSquared to trash the GPS system just so they can make metric butt-loads of money for themselves and their investors?
Yeah, I think I like that solution much better.
said by swintec:How many folks had to buy digital adapters for their TVs JUST so the government could make money auctioning off the analog airwaves? Apples:Oranges. With digital TV we received benefit: We ended-up with many more channels, HDTV, digital sound and other benefits. For most: Also better pictures, even at SD. With LightSquared's trashing of the GPS system: For our replacement expense we'd end up with GPS equipment that would still work about the same as our stuff that used to work just fine--if we were lucky and not too close to one of LightSquared's terrestrial transmitters.
said by swintec:Where were you on that one? Maybe the government will send out a voucher or two to help you out, I dont know. We'd purchased a small (by todays standards, anyway) widescreen TV with built-in ATSC tuner far in advance of the switch. You see: Our old TV was, well, old. Old and wearing out. It still had a decent picture, but not that great. And we were tired of having to ask, when renting a DVD, "is it wide-screen?" all the time. For our money we received all the benefits I cataloged above, plus a slightly larger screen, diagonally measured.
For our re-spent $$$ on a replacement GPS receiver we'd have... just what we had before.
said by swintec:I am sure you have read this site long enough to see people whining about the evil monopoly and duopoly of their town and city. If you actually knew anything about how any of this stuff worked, you'd know two things: 1. What LightSquared is proposing absolutely will not prevent their interference with the GPS system. Their suggestions they will violates the laws of physics. They may reduce it, depending upon the receiver's distance from one of LightSquared's powerful land-based transmitters, but eliminate it they will not. 2. You are never, ever going to replace the performance possibilities of "wired" network connections with wireless. At least not with our current understanding of (here's that pesky word again) physics.
said by swintec:Of course I am basing this off of what Ligthsquared is telling us ...
Yeah, and they would never mislead us, would they? 
Jim | |
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| Lightsquared believability said by jseymour:said by swintec:Of course I am basing this off of what Ligthsquared is telling us ...
Yeah, and they would never mislead us, would they? Jim Right, Lightsquared's obvious false claims about GPS interference and their proposed snake oil fixes make me doubt anything they have to say.
Charles | |
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| | | | | | said by swintec:said by jseymour:o I should go out and pay another $500 or $600 for a new marine GPS when the one I have is just fine, just so LightSquared and their investors can make money?
No, you should go out and buy another because (I assume) you want to continue having navigation on the water? Your choice though really. How many folks had to buy digital adapters for their TVs JUST so the government could make money auctioning off the analog airwaves? Where were you on that one? Maybe the government will send out a voucher or two to help you out, I dont know. you really want to use digital tv as an example? ok, here goes, i live in the middle of the city, before "the switch" my tv's worked fine, i could get local stations with rabbit ears. after "the switch" ? i cant get OTA tv with out installing a mast mount outdoor antenna.
so that was a poor example because it basically emphasized what every one is saying, that this "change" is not for the better. | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by swintec:Nope, sorry. jseymour  says that the digital switch was perfect because HE benefited from it and got something good from it in the end. jseymour never asserted any such thing. What jseymour did assert was there was benefit to be realized on the part of TV users by the switch to digital whereas, with the LightSquared situation, consumers would have to spend money just to get what they already have.
Not only did jseymour not assert that "the digital switch was perfect," but, post-switch, jseymour, not unlike thedragonmas, found himself with two or three stations that were marginal every time the wind and rain blows--a problem he never had before. One station is beyond "marginal"--becoming thoroughly unwatchable at times.
However jseymour has observed that he appeared to be in the minority, with respect to the above, and so concluded that most people likely benefited from the switch, even if it was not a resounding success for him.
Your not going to win by making stuff up, swintec.
Nor are you going to win by tearing down your own arguments
Jim | |
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| Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by jseymour:jseymour never asserted any such thing. What jseymour did assert was there was benefit to be realized on the part of TV users by the switch to digital whereas,
You specifically said that me comparing one wide scale change with another (light squared and Digital-Analog conversion) was apples and oranges, and your reasoning was:
"With digital TV we received benefit: We ended-up with many more channels, HDTV, digital sound and other benefits."
Now I am not sure if by "we" you mean you specifically, or "we" as in the majority of the population, I expect the former but never the less, the tone in that post did not show any issue with what the government did "just so LightSquared and their investors the government can make money".
You saw benefit to it, and incidentally did not take issue about the others who had perfectly working systems who had to spend the cash to get things up to snuff...or even the tax dollars that went to giving out the $20 vouchers to the households that requested them.
Well, maybe you did express your displeasure about it, can you point me to your posts on here from that time stating similar complaints like you do here, on this story?
Look, I am sure you got some nice GPS equipment. I have to say though that if Lightsquared can produce what they say, AND they get the industries problems straightened out and they work with the larger industries to keep there equipment functioning...I am fine with the consumer / end user gear needing to be replaced over time if the end user wants it to remain functional. Nothing personal to you, it is just I want decent broadband on the go. 
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| | | | | | | | | | | Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by swintec:You specifically said that me comparing one wide scale change with another (light squared and Digital-Analog conversion) was apples and oranges, and your reasoning was:
"With digital TV we received benefit: We ended-up with many more channels, HDTV, digital sound and other benefits."
Now I am not sure if by "we" you mean you specifically, or "we" as in the majority of the population, I expect the former ... "We" as in "the TV-using public, in general." I don't tend to refer to myself as "we," being as, unlike those in government, I do not regard myself as royalty.
said by swintec:You saw benefit to it, and incidentally did not take issue about the others who had perfectly working systems who had to spend the cash to get things up to snuff... Because there was benefit to it. Yes: People had to spend cash to upgrade. But it was an upgrade. Yes: Some people, such as thedragonmas and, to a lesser extent, me experienced greater or lesser degrees of downsides, but, in general terms there were benefits to the TV-using public.
Contrast that with my having to spend money to replace a perfectly function GPS with another GPS just to have the same thing.
Apples and oranges.
said by swintec:...if Lightsquared can produce what they say...
Can't. Not without defying the laws of physics.
Once again: You absolutely cannot expect to have one signal source far out in space, the signal from which is very, very weak on the ground, and another very, very strong transmitter nearby, both geogaphically and frequency-wise, and expect the latter not to interfere with the former.
Anybody that knows anything about how radio works knows this. And I know how radio works. It's what I used to do.
said by swintec:... it is just I want decent broadband on the go.
Wonderful. I hope you get it. But not on my nickel and not to the degradation of the GPS system.
Jim | |
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| | | mix
join:2002-03-19
Utica, MI | What if your marine GPS was instead a high precision GPS unit that cost between $10K and $20K and you own between 3 and 7 of them like most SE Michigan land survey companies? Would you be pissed? | |
| | | | | | | Re: Total Bovine Scatology said by mix:What if your marine GPS was instead a high precision GPS unit that cost between $10K and $20K and you own between 3 and 7 of them like most SE Michigan land survey companies? Would you be pissed?
What if my marine GPS led me astray, our boat became hard-grounded while trying to sail for safe harbour before an on-coming storm, we ended-up capsizing in the storm, and the crew all died from drowning or hypothermia because rescue wasn't able to arrive in time because the DSC emergency call data from the GPS was invalid?
Jim | |
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| |  r81984Fair and BalancedPremium
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| said by swintec:said by Transmaster:the average Joe, back country Ranger, Search and Rescue person with the pocket Garmin, Tom-Tom car navigation system, or any other portable GPS receiver is screwed.
Why is this a problem? How many technology advances over the years has caused end users to upgrade or be left behind? Heck, just look at the analog / digital television swap of a few years ago. When new software comes out do you get pissed when you need to upgrade your machine to run it? Should all technology advances stop where they are at this point? LOL, in the business world you dont upgrade unless there is some new great feature to get.
Companies out there are using software like autocad that could be 10 years old (they have no reason to upgrade). They use equipment 15 years old that runs with DOS, win95, etc because they have no benefit to upgrade.
A company could have 10 year old GPS gear that makes them a fortune. Without lightsquared they can use that same gear as is forever. With lightsquare and its foreign CEO they would be forced to buy new gear for no good reason.
Companies buy something to get the job done. If the job required does not change then they can keep using old gear that gets the job done forever. They are not going to buy new gear that does the same thing as the old stuff that still works.
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ciid
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Baltimore, MD | clown show.... I wanna see the first senate hearing were they try to BS a 4 star General.Let them sue It,ll be 2 years by the time it even makes it to a Judge and by then all the investors will have pulled out. | |
| | Ulmo
join:2005-09-22
San Jose, CA Reviews:
·SONIC.NET
| Re: clown show.... said by ciid:I wanna see the first senate hearing were they try to BS a 4 star General.Let them sue It,ll be 2 years by the time it even makes it to a Judge and by then all the investors will have pulled out. Our politicians are so dirty I will not be at all surprised if our only remedy is taking down the actual ground transmitter sites by hand. Eventually their colocated peers will be so afraid of collateral damage, they won't allow colocation, and eventually Lightsquared will loose their margins and go bust. It may come to pass. We can all hope we don't have to go there, but just look at how far this atrocity has gotten. | |
| | | | said by ciid:I wanna see the first senate hearing were they try to BS a 4 star General.Let them sue It,ll be 2 years by the time it even makes it to a Judge and by then all the investors will have pulled out.
During previous hearings a chorus of three and four letter agencies came out of the woodwork against LS. If I were brass at FCC would happily take the lawsuit. | |
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 a333A hot cup of integrals please
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Rego Park, NY
·Cingular Wireless
| Guise do you know how doppler effect works...? I think some folks here need a major physics fact check: RF spectrum, as some have mentioned, doesn't really have "walls" in between it. This is why spectrum is allocated with so-called "guard bands" on either side, to avoid interference. The spectrum LightSquare rushed out to buy so eagerly was bought ENTIRELY based on the assumption that it could be "converted" into terrestrial comms. However, the WHOLE REASON the government / FCC / ITU classified these frequencies for Earth-space communications was because signals from satellites in orbit are red-shifted by about 25 MHz when they reach the ground (that's the doppler effect in action... the same effect that lets cop ticket you for speeding, at least when they're paying attention). In LS's case, that would mean the frequencies they are using are within the (red-shifted) GPS signals on the ground. Also, guess what? The LS signal is a factor of roughly ten thousand to million times the strength of the incoming GPS signal from space, effectively wiping out GPS.
Essentially, LightSquare was poorly advised on the decision to pursue this route by some financial bozo who never bothered asking the folks at the engineering department whether or not this was even technically possible...
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| | Kendas
join:2001-02-26
Tucson, AZ | Re: Guise do you know how doppler effect works...? "Sales" and "PR" have ALWAYS sold things to the public and then told the guys in the trenches (programmers/engineers/support) to "make it work because because I've already sold it".) Doesn't matter that the physics doesn't allow for it. No wonder PR and sales don't like us... | |
| | HIPAR
join:2005-11-10
Tannersville, PA | Red Shift .. I'm trying to remember where I first saw that term. Was it in reference to Einstein and light being bent by gravity?
I do have some idea about Doppler shift. You need to determine the relative (radial) velocity between the satellite and receiver. Then it's a simple calculation that's also a function of frequency.
The biggest Doppler shift occurs when a satellite is approaching on an observed trajectory that will bring it directly overhead. There the frequency shift goes through zero as the satellite moves away.
For GPS at L1 band I'd be surprised if Doppler ever exceeds plus or minus a kilohertz. But it's certainly not in the order of 25 MHz.
--- CHAS | |
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HIPAR
join:2005-11-10
Tannersville, PA | Kaboyashi Maru? Lightsquared is running around telling everyone 'I told you so. Interference is a simple engineering problem and we solved it'.
What problem did they solve? The original problem was GPS compatibility with both upper and lower LTE network channels. Now they say JAVAD and PCTEL will demonstrate compatibility with only the lower channel.
That's kinda like Captain Kirk beating Kaboyashi Maru by reprogramming the parameters of the problem.
Problem is, Lightsquared hasn't given up on using the upper LTE channel. They intend to use it in a few years. Has anyone designed a filter that will protect GPS reception when that channel is turned on?
Another half truth from the Lightsquared spinsters.
--- CHAS | |
| | TransmasterDon't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY | High Powered Lobbying With all of the lobbying horse power, government agency, public service interest lined up against Lightsquared I don't think this is going any where. In the future there will be a quiet sale of the frequencies in question to somebody who will use them as they where intended to be used.
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- Mark Twain in Eruption | |
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 Romney2012Defeat Obama 2012-Chg we can believe inPremium
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USA
kudos:4 |  Latest News: Lobbying teams in mortal combat in D.C.
With the showdown heating up between Reston-based wireless broadband firm LightSquared and a broad coalition of players in the global positioning system industry, both sides are lining up lobbyists to sway lawmakers.
This month, LightSquared hired four new firms to lobby on its behalf. Trimble, Garmin and John Deere (registered as Deere & Company, which uses GPS in agriculture and construction equipment) are pouring resources into their own army of lobbyists.
Since January, Trimble(GPS lobby) has spent $840,000 in lobbying fees related to the LightSquared spectrum issue — including nearly $330,000 in the third quarter alone — according to records filed with the Senate. Most of Trimble’s lobbying on spectrum interference is through one of K Street’s leading firms, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, to whom Trimble has shelled out $620,000 this year. Garmin has retained Dow Lohnes, paying the firm $70,000 since March on GPS interference issues; John Deere has spent $964,000 on in-house lobbyists.
»www.washingtonpost.com/business/···ory.html
This month, LightSquared stepped up its lobbying efforts, hiring four firms — K&L Gates, Gibson Dunn, Podesta Group and Shockey Scofield Solutions — to advocate on its behalf. That brings the total number of new firms hired by LightSquared in 2011 to nine.
LightSquared has spent just over $1.6 million in lobbying fees so far this year, according to disclosure records filed with the Senate.
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»www.politico.com/rss/2012-election.xml
»www.politico.com/rss/2012-election-blog.xml
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| | HIPAR
join:2005-11-10
Tannersville, PA | Re: Latest News: Lobbying teams in mortal combat in D.C. Obviously everyone is gearing up for a political solution to a technical debacle.
All that money feeding these vultures! I wonder how many of them could pass a simple Ham Radio test.
--- CHAS | |
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HowardP6
join:2001-03-31
Port Jefferson, NY | LightSquared Porposes Another GPS Fix Lightsquared should only be allowed to use the spectrium, they purchased as they originally intended. They should sell what they purchase, if they cannot use it and buy something the can use with out interfering with legimate GPS users. Grow up and stop trying to put the blame somewhere else. How many GPS units will be effected and is Lightsquared going to pay everyone to replace their GPS units? The answer is on they will not, just sell what you bought and buy something that will work or go out of business. | |
| | HIPAR
join:2005-11-10
Tannersville, PA | Re: LightSquared Porposes Another GPS Fix You can judge for yourself what Lightsquared bought with TerraStar.
This is the best historical synopsis of MSS rules I have found
Slide 20:
»www.pnt.gov/public/2011/10/NGAC/robinson.pdf
Certainly the 2005 authorized 600 kHz sector bandwidth is not useful for an LTE network. But LTE networks were still on the drawing board when 2005 MSS rules were adopted.
That's the problem when technology outpaces pertinent regulations.
--- CHAS | |
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 FronkmanAn Apple a day keeps the doctor awayPremium
join:2003-06-23
Saint Louis, MO | don't worry worst case scenario: lightsquared convinces some stupid politicians that their new system works, the whole gets turned on and everything goes to hell.
1. planes crash
2. boats crash
3. every garmin and tomtom stops working
4. people can't checkin on facebook
the public outcry from the experiment will be so loud it will be shut down almost right away. lightsquared loses billions, end of story.
hopefully no one dies in the crashes because i am pretty sure there are some lawyers out there who would jump all over this...
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Everyone should own a Mac! Go Bucks! | |
| WhatNowPremium
join:2009-05-06
Charlotte, NC | The rules don't apply to me Just another case of some rich person thinking the rules don't apply to me as they try to game the system. The FCC should have stopped it in the beginning. | |
| | | GPS in phone, modern tv. 1. Y'all worried about having to buy a new antenna? I'd be more worried about having to lug it around with my phone just so I could make an emergency 911 call. Is someone proposing that a billion-plus cell phones be glued to a box the size of a small microwave oven?
Forget about your Garmin, Tomtom, etc.
2. Fact: RF spectrum is a very limited resource.
Fact: more data requires more bandwidth.
Fact: hdtv is considerably more data than sdtv.
Fact: sdtv is 1950's (and earlier) tech.
First question: do you want to stick with tech so bad you can't see the difference between a ray gun and a salt shaker? Or would you, after 60+ years, like to step up to something that can show art worth appreciating?
For comparison, your computer made at least 3 such massive tech shifts in only 20 years, and most people did not say "boo".
Fact: higher data rates require higher frequencies.
Fact: different band have different penetration/reflection/etc. attributes.
In old tv (sdtv), you saw this a ghosting (reflections off buildings, natural objects) and distance (could pass through some objects, walls, etc.).
GPS does not reflect/penetrate. So no false signals, only direct from satellite is visible.
Fact: these differences are why your cellphone works indoors, but your gps does not, and why sdtv did, but hdtv does not.
LS telling me to fix/upgrade my GPS so they can use their little slice of bandwidth for a purpose the physics of RF does not support is just a waste of all our time.
It's like buying a pickup instead of a moving van. That grand piano is just NEVER going to fit in the pickup truck without hanging over the sides...
Here's the life test: if the roles were reversed - if I told LS that they had to upgrade everything, and carry around a honkin' big antenna on their cellphone, fish tracker, etc., would they? | |
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1 edit | Re: GPS in phone, modern tv. While I appreciate your sentiment, that you shouldn't have to be screwed over by a company using spectrum for its unintended use, I find your arguments and 'facts' to be somewhat thin and rather under-researched. Some are blatantly false.
said by ConspireNut :2. Fact: RF spectrum is a very limited resource.
True. This is the one thing I cannot fault you on. Too many people want a slice of the pie, and pretty soon that pie becomes crumbs.
Fact: more data requires more bandwidth.
Fact: hdtv is considerably more data than sdtv.
Even if you take the SAME compression, say MPEG2 and compress both, then yes, its still HDTV>SDTV.
BUT
Take Digitized/Compressed HDTV and compare with UNcompressed ANALOG SDTV: They take EXACTLY the same amount of "spectrum" to transmit. Not to say that one requires more data to describe, certainly the HDTV one does, but when presented in a modulated RF format, the physical amount of spectrum bandwidth is the same. Assuming 8 bit color sampling, UNcompressed digital video at 1920:1080/30p takes 180 megaBYTES per second compared to 720:480/30p which ends up being 30 megaBYTES.
Now, for analog, there are lesser-important portions of the signal where as with digital its 'all or nothing'. In analog the color data for example can be entirely missing due to a large amount of frequency attenuation but the black and white luma signal is just fine and dandy, maybe missing a bit of brightness range.
Granted you never see the massive data rates mentioned above because perceptual video coding is so good lately. Compare h.264 compression vs MPEG2 and you find that very good looking downloaded/satellite HDTV can take up LESS bits than badly compressed SDTV on a DVD.
Conversely, you can use MUCH MORE data and bandwidth to describe the analog signal in pristine detail with pixel-accurate sampling of all the noise inherent to an analog transmission. Perceptual coding such as MPEG/H.264 are meant to remove the 'noise' and preserve the 'picture within the noise'. That's why 10 SD channels get stuffed within a single 6mhz spectrum QAM256 modulated channel on digital cable.
Hell, there's even video filters to encode and reproduce 'noise' to re-gain film train and such. Strange we are re-adding noise to a lesser-noisy medium for visual 'enhancement'. Just how much of that static do you want to preserve? The more static you encode, the higher your bitrate, and thus your bandwidth/modulation requirements are.
In short, its all relative. Stop comparing apples with kiwifruit.
Fact: sdtv is 1950's (and earlier) tech.
First question: do you want to stick with tech so bad you can't see the difference between a ray gun and a salt shaker? Or would you, after 60+ years, like to step up to something that can show art worth appreciating?
For comparison, your computer made at least 3 such massive tech shifts in only 20 years, and most people did not say "boo".
Fact: higher data rates require higher frequencies.
What IS affected by the frequency, is propagation and attenuation.
Fact: different band have different penetration/reflection/etc. attributes.
In old tv (sdtv), you saw this a ghosting (reflections off buildings, natural objects) and distance (could pass through some objects, walls, etc.).
In fact, in Europe where COFDM is used as a modulation scheme, multipath is WELCOMED because it allows for 'missing parts' to be filled in by the reflections. The entire signal is held for a slight period waiting for those reflections to fill in the missing bits before handing it off to coding algorithms to mathematically derive other missing bits from the FEC data it already has.
But, our idiotic FCC decided to use a totally different modulation scheme, one which is HORRIBLY BROKEN when it comes to multipath. There have been multiple generations of tuners made to reject all but the strongest signal, but they still don't work in all cases. So you can have 3 copies of the same signal so strong as you live directly in line with a broadcast tower a mile away, and none of them get demodulated properly due to the physical characteristics of the modulation. COFDM would work much better in many situations. Please read up on MODULATION SCHEMES.
GPS does not reflect/penetrate. So no false signals, only direct from satellite is visible.
ANY signal CAN reflect/penetrate. What it penetrates/reflects off and to what extent of depends on how strong the signal is. Guess what: satellites are NO MORE POWERFUL THAN A BLOODY HEAT LAMP FOR YOUR BATHROOM.
THAT is all you get up in space sending down data to cover massive zones of the globe at any given time. About 200-300 watts total. Perhaps. Depending on the satellite. I've seen DirecTV satellites specced at 240 watts, GPS I would presume to be similar if not lesser powered due to the decreased area of the earth needed to be covered by a roving fleet instead of a singular geostationary orbit for an entire continent.
Blame the fact you're basically trying to 'see' the faint glow of a 200 watt light bulb 26 thousand miles up in space from within an enclosed structure. It ain't happening.
Compare the massive amounts more signal a cell phone can put out, relative to the distance it is from the receiver, relative to the actual gain of the receiving antenna. Funny that 2.5ghz wimax is usable indoors yet with your theoretical 'its the frequency' argument, 1.5ghz band is unable to be. Transmission power / receive gain vs frequency. LOWER frequencies penetrate MORE.
Fact: these differences are why your cellphone works indoors, but your gps does not, and why sdtv did, but hdtv does not.
There are NUMEROUS reasons that you don't touch upon, which I have above. But I'll give it to you again here:
1: A satellite signal strength is infinitesimal in comparison to a local cell tower ~1mile away from you with massive 10-15 foot tall antennas to amplify the signal by many dB and make it directional etc all increasing gain in one direction--towards your phone. Give every GPS unit a massive directional antenna and certainly you'll pick something up indoors. Have the room? I didn't think so.
2: Modulation choices for HDTV in the USA mean that many people with strong signals in urban areas get shafted due to multipath signals. The industry counters with "oh but we can't continue to use the same transmitters to cover further-away areas if we use COFDM" .. They don't mention that their digital transmit strength is approximately 6dB less than their analog either in any of this. Many watts are not being used that were before with analog. Not to mention, Europe fixed this slight distance problem easily with a multi-transmitter single-frequency-network paradigm. The closest tower will be received in-line with the further away one all correlating to improve the reception locally for omni-directional receivers. And to boot, COFDM works flawlessly at moving-car speed; 8vsb cuts out horribly due to doppler shift of the single carrier/8 sidebands.
(and while not a 'reason you can't get the new stuff vs the old stuff' its definitely worth touching on again)
3: Amount of data transmitted is based on modulation of a given amount of bandwidth. Frequency is 100% irrelevant for 'quantity of data'. Baseband data networks over UTP and Coaxial Cable prove this. VDSL isnt in the GHZ my friend, no, it goes ONLY up to 30mhz at present. Wide-band multiple-discrete-carrier multi-tone (read OFDM) modulation makes this feasible without the many issues of a single wide-band carrier as is used in 8VSB HDTV. Compare also QAM256 data networks over Coax in use now for every digital TV and Internet bundle your cableco gives you. You have that same 6 MHz frequency band at ANY given point of the cable: from 100mhz to 1000mhz. Its still 6 MHz wide. That same 6 MHz wide channel at 990mhz gives you the SAME data that the channel at 100mhz gives you. Sure, some frequencies on a cable plant may be noisier than others, requiring lower-order-modulation (qam 128, qam 64, QPSK even) but this is due to noise characteristics, and nothing to do with the actual frequencies in use. FM band bleed-in is a problem in poorly maintained cable plants.
LS telling me to fix/upgrade my GPS so they can use their little slice of bandwidth for a purpose the physics of RF does not support is just a waste of all our time.
Here's the life test: if the roles were reversed - if I told LS that they had to upgrade everything, and carry around a honkin' big antenna on their cellphone, fish tracker, etc., would they?
I say yes they would, if you were a regulatory body during the initial alpha/beta phases of the LS deployment. Enough people without GPS would likely sway many of those regulators. This is likely to have occurred already. | |
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