======================================================== EPHRAIM SCHWARTZ "Wireless World" InfoWorld.com ======================================================== Thursday, April 18, 2002 Mobile computing commentary by Ephraim Schwartz - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - FROM POINT B TO POINT A Posted April 12, 2002 01:01 PM Pacific Time SOMETIMES HIGH-TECH can even make paint drying exciting to watch. Let me explain. The equipment for the ultraviolet curing of paint in the automotive industry uses the 2.4GHz spectrum. You remember 2.4, don't you? It's the Wi-Fi spectrum. OK, arguably there aren't many companies outside of the automotive OEMs that will have to restrict deployment of Wi-Fi because they are curing paint. But there is a bigger issue here, and the examples that follow will illuminate the problem. Pope Air Force Base in North Carolina, the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, and the exterior of the Department of Energy building are all lit with Fusion Lighting, a technology from a company of the same name based in Rockville, Md. Fusion Lighting uses a standard magnetron, the kind used in millions of microwave ovens, to focus energy on a quartz sphere the size of a golf ball filled with inert krypton or argon gas and sulfur. The microwave energy focused on the bulb excites the gas and transforms it into plasma to create extremely efficient light. The light is full-spectrum, nearly identical to sunlight. And it costs about 75 percent less than running fluorescent lighting, according to Sal Spada, an independent analyst and director of discrete automation research at ARC Advisory Group in Dedham, Mass. "You can create virtual indoor sunlight with it," says Kent Kipling, senior vice president of business development at Fusion Lighting, noting that of the thousands of beta installations around the world, Fusion's biggest customers are in Scandinavia. By now, you've probably guessed the problem. The magnetron that generates the microwave energy uses the 2.4GHz spectrum, which is unlicensed. And with magnetrons being mass produced for microwave ovens, they're a low-cost solution for creating this light. Pope Air Force Base officials liked fusion lighting so much, they chose it over their IEEE 802.11b wireless LAN, which was co-located with the lighting at the base. "I was told the two conflict and 802.11 was turned off," Kipling says. The bigger problem, Spada says, is that there is too much traffic on the 2.4GHz spectrum, generated by everything from paint drying and microwave ovens, to satellite radio and Bluetooth (see " http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op/xml/02/04/01/020401opwireless.xml "). For example, Spada says, sure, you can put Bluetooth and Wi-Fi together, but the resulting data degradation will give a user the performance of a 9600 baud modem. The truth is the 2.4GHz spectrum, by international treaty, was designed as an ISM (Industry Scientific and Medical) band and not meant for communications, Kipling says. Of course, 802.11a, which uses the 5.5MHz spectrum, is also an ISM band, but it's far, far less congested. Here's what ARC's Spada advises: "A lot of issues with wireless [LANs] haven't unfolded yet. We are recommending that companies wait for 802.11a products to come out." If you've had noise problems with 802.11b deployments send an e-mail to ephraim_schwartz@infoworld.com. I will publish the most harrowing examples.