Comments on: Intel invests in WiMax again amid doubts

Intel has invested in a mobile broadband startup as part of what has become a long, hard slog to get WiMax into the mainstream.

[Bill_I]

I think that WiMax will outlast its growing pains. Imagine getting online any place your phone works. This includes a cab ride from the airport, moving trains, etc. All rural areas around the world will benefit.

[COCOViper]

This article has a couple big errors in it, specifically the statements of the Gartner analyst they quoted.

He said, "It's semi-mobile, which means you pretty much have to stay in one place while you're using (WiMax)," Dulaney said. "There were supposed to be mobile phones out from Motorola and Samsung but those haven't appeared."

"So, we would say WiMax, as a (pure) mobile technology, has underperformed and doesn't have much potential there." "

Except the version of WiMax being implimented by Xohm (Sprint's WiMax business unit that is being spun off into Clearwire) is a mobile version of WiMax, aka 802.16e. I have witnessed multiple demos of 5-7Mb/sec (faster than DSL and as fast as cable) at 35-45 miles per hour. If that's not mobile, I don't know what is.

Also the author references Wimax not being able to compete with LTE, except LTE is at least 2 years out (it's not currently even in a hardware test stage). I mean they are still writing white papers about how they think it might work. And right around the time LTE comes out (late 2010-2011), the WiMax forum expects to have 802.16m (which is currently in the works) deployed. 802.16m matches or exceeds LTE's speeds (100Mb/sec) while also being backward compatible with 802.16e. Think of how 802.11g/b WiFi work in relation to each other today.

This means that when LTE deploys, Wimax will be able to offer equivalent speeds to match- except LTE will be starting from scratch. So if you roam outside the area where a new LTE site just went up, you won't have service. If you roam away from a new 802.16m site however you will probably be able to pick up an older 802.16e signal (as the networks will have had 2-3 years of build-out).

Wimax is launching 2 weeks from now in Baltimore, but everybody is welcome to sit on their hands for 3 years and wait on Verizon. I'd rather have my 4G service now.

[woofs_a_lot]

More Bell spawned BS. WiMax is alive and thriving all around the world. Only in the US where Ma's boys want to defend their vulnerable markets is there even a hint of "dreaded competition". How dreaded that competition might be is doubtful when it is still 2-3 years out while the Clearwire crew will be picking off major metro markets for Wimax starting almost immediately.