HomeGrid Forum

G.hn: What's it all mean?

 A lot has happened in the last few weeks for G.hn. The PHY was Approved, the coexistence mechanisms achieved Consent and the DLL was deemed stable. The first semiconductor products were announced.  New IP has been made available for licensing.  And much more.  Find out what it all means by downloading the latest webinar from HomeGrid Forum entitled Wired Networking Inflection Point. 

Why G.hn is the best option for multi-wire networking

There is growing interest among Telco/Cable Service Providers in deploying networks that can take advantage of all the existing wires available in the home (power lines, phone lines and coaxial cables).

Until recently, there was a number a proprietary technologies for wired networking, but each one of them was designed for one single medium (ie, one technology for powerline only, another for coaxial cable only, and so on).

Each of these technologies is fundamentally different from each other, so networking chips have to be specialized: For example, a chip designed to operate over coaxial cable cannot work over powerlines.

Why are the chips different? In many cases, the reason is simply that they were designed in separate groups, inside closed organizations, which took different decisions when choosing technical elements such modulation type, Forward Error Correction, QoS architecture, Security architecture, etc.

Continue reading "G.hn: reducing chip count by 50%"

Major Progress in Geneva, First Product Announcements

Last week, the ITU-T made significant progress on the G.hn standard -- Approving the PHY and architecture, advancing the DLL and providing Consent to the complementary coexistence Recommendation G.9972 (aka G.cx).  These moves were supported by service providers, consumer electronics manufacturers, semiconductor companies and countries from around the world, and set the stage for G.hn to emerge as the single unified wired home networking standard.

Following the announcement of the ITU-T's accomplishments, several HomeGrid member companies publicized their support and first G.hn products.  DS2, for instance, confirmed its plan to launch its G.hn-compliant DSS9960 chipset next year.  Ikanos announced its support for the technology. And there will be many more announcements in the coming weeks. 

G.hn security overview

This blog post ("An introduction to G.hn security"), provides an overview of the security architecture of G.hn.

The post includes detailed information on the encryption, authentication and key distribution functionality of G.hn.

Click here to read the complete post at "An introduction to G.hn security".

Linley Group: "battle of proprietary home-networking tech nears end"

Joseph Byrne, Senior Analyst at Linley Group (one of the leading research firms for semiconductors), has written an in-depth post ("Fruitless battle of proprietary home-networking tech nears end") on the current situation of the wired home networking industry and the potential of G.hn to solve the fragmentation problem:

There are two efforts abreast to change the situation. The most promising of the two is the G.hn spec being developed under the auspices of the ITU. The developers of this spec made two sage decisions.

$7 billion by 2013

iSuppli analyst Steve Rago has done an exceptional amount of research into the digital home and broadband markets.  I just recently came across his latest on wired home networking.  In the report, he predicts the market will grow to some $7 billion in value and 500 million units.

According to Rago, "The connected home is coming. But how do we get there? The managed home network needs wired solutions. Wireless, such as WiFi, cannot meet the quality of service or the bandwidths necessary to support real-time multi-media traffic in the connected home."  Here, here Steve. We couldn't have said it any better ourselves. 

AT&T Speaks Out on G.hn

AT&T Labs' Tom Starr has been involved in the development of G.hn almost from the beginning.  And he has a unique insight into this next-generation standard.  He knows how the technology landscape for service providers around the world is changing.  He also knows how new multi-play and managed services are straining the current generation of technology. 

Find out what Tom knows, by downloading this new webinar.  

10 Things You Should Know About G.hn

This blog post ("Top Ten Things You Need to Know About the New G.hn Standard") includes a list of the most important benefits provided by G.hn, with a discussion on topics like security, Quality of Service, energy efficiency, performance over powerlines and more.

Click here to read the complete post ("Top Ten Things You Need to Know About the New G.hn Standard")

Baby monitors killing urban wireless home networks?

Wireless LAN technologies such as Wi-Fi or some of the emerging new wireless technologies for short distance communications (such as the recently announced WiGig Alliance) provide a very convenient solution for applications where users need mobility (laptops, smart phones, portable music players, etc).

But the fact that Wi-Fi frequently uses the crowded 2.4 GHz band tends to cause problems for applications which require a very stable connection such as IPTV distribution.

Ofcom, the independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries, has recently published a report on the effectiveness of the 2.4 GHz band. This story at PC Pro (UK) provides a good summary:

Baby monitors killing urban Wi-Fi

[...] "There is a view that some domestic users generate excessive amounts of Wi-Fi traffic, denying access to other users," claims the report from wireless specialists, Mass Consutling. "Our research suggests that this is not the case, rather the affected parties are almost certainly seeing interference from non-Wi-Fi devices such as microwave ovens, Audio Video senders, security cameras or baby monitors."

Parks: Connected CE sales to exceed 100 million units annually by 2013

Parks Associates has recently published a report on "Home Networks for Consumer Electronics", that predicts that "Consumer demand for digital media and online content will push worldwide annual sales of connected CE to more than 100 million units by 2013".