4G

"4G" is the term used to refer to the International Mobile Telecommunications-Advanced (IMT-Advanced) technology family of mobile wireless services, which has been defined and ratified by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). In an October 2010 meeting, The ITU's Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R) Working Party 5D, which is responsible for defining the IMT-Advanced global 4G technologies, completed the assessment of six candidate technology submissions for the global 4G mobile wireless broadband technology. Of the proposals, two technologies, LTE-Advanced and WirelessMAN-Advanced, were each determined to have successfully met all of the criteria established by ITU-R for the first release of IMT-Advanced and were accorded the official designation of IMT-Advanced, qualifying them as 4G technologies. Final ratification of the full IMT-Advanced technology family took place at the ITU-R Study Group meeting on November 22 and 23, 2010, in Geneva, Switzerland.

As background for this IMT-Advanced project, ITU published a document, "Recommendation ITU-R M.1645: Framework and overall objectives of the future development of IMT-2000 and systems beyond IMT-2000."

These technologies will now move into the final stage of the IMT-Advanced process, which provides for the development in early 2012 of an ITU-R Recommendation specifying the in-depth technical standards for these radio technologies.

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LTE Technology

 Long Term Evolution (LTE) is a radio platform technology that will allow operators to achieve even higher peak throughputs than HSPA+ in higher spectrum bandwidth. Work on LTE began at 3GPP in 2004, with an official LTE work item started in 2006 and a completed 3GPP Release 8 specification in March 2009. Initial deployments of LTE began in late 2009.

LTE is part of the GSM evolutionary path for mobile broadband, following EDGE, UMTS, HSPA (HSDPA and HSUPA combined) and HSPA Evolution (HSPA+).  Although HSPA and its evolution are strongly positioned to be the dominant mobile data technology for the next decade, the 3GPP family of standards must evolve toward the future. HSPA+ will provide the stepping-stone to LTE for many operators.

 

The overall objective for LTE is to provide an extremely high performance radio-access technology that offers full vehicular speed mobility and that can readily coexist with HSPA and earlier networks. Because of scalable bandwidth, operators will be able to easily migrate their networks and users from HSPA to LTE over time.

LTE assumes a full Internet Protocol (IP) network architecture and is designed to support voice in the packet domain. It incorporates top-of-the-line radio techniques to achieve performance levels beyond what will be practical with CDMA approaches, particularly in larger channel bandwidths. However, in the same way that 3G coexists with second generation (2G) systems in integrated networks, LTE systems will coexist with 3G and 2G systems. Multimode devices will function across LTE/3G or even LTE/3G/2G, depending on market circumstances.

 

Standards development for LTE continued with 3GPP Release 9 (Rel-9), which was functionally frozen in December 2009.  3GPP Rel-9 focuses on enhancements to HSPA+ and LTE while Rel-10 focuses on the next generation of LTE for the International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) IMT-Advanced requirements and both were developed nearly simultaneously by 3GPP standards working groups. Several milestones have been achieved by vendors in recent years for both Rel-9 and Rel-10. Most significant was the final ratification by the ITU of LTE-Advanced (Rel-10) as IMT-Advanced in November 2010.

 

The first commercial LTE networks were launched by TeliaSonera in Norway and Sweden in December 2009; as of November 2012, there were 117 commercial LTE networks in various stages of commercial service. Many trials are underway with up to 130 LTE deployments expected in 2012.

 

For many years now, a true world cellular standard has been one of the industry’s goals. GSM dominated 2G technologies but there was still fragmentation with CDMA and TDMA as well as iDEN. With the move to 3G, nearly all TDMA operators migrated to the 3GPP technology path. Yet the historical divide remained between GSM and CDMA.  It is with the next step of technology evolution that the opportunity has arisen for a global standard technology. Many operators have converged on the technology they believe will offer them and their customers the most benefits. That technology is Long Term Evolution.  Most leading operators, device and infrastructure manufacturers, as well as content providers support LTE as the mobile technology of the future. Operators, including leading GSM-HSPA and CDMA EV-DO operators as well as newly licensed and WiMAX operators, are making strategic, long-term commitments to LTE networks. All roads lead to LTE.

In June of 2008, the Next Generation Mobile Networks Alliance (NGMN) selected LTE as the first technology that matched its requirements successfully. 4G Americas, GSMA, UMTS Forum, and other global organizations have reiterated their support of the 3GPP evolution to LTE.  Additionally, the LSTI Trial Initiative has provided support through early co-development and testing of the entire ecosystem from chipset, device and infrastructure vendors.

LTE products have been tested, trialed and commercially announced in the market by manufacturers that are already part of a well-planned LTE eco-system. The LTE ecosystem will build upon the economies of scope and scale of the entire 3GPP family of technologies.

 

LTE uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) on the downlink, which is well suited to achieve high peak data rates in high spectrum bandwidth. WCDMA radio technology is, essentially, as efficient as Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) for delivering peak data rates of about 10 Mbps in 5 MHz of bandwidth. Achieving peak rates in the 100 Mbps range with wider radio channels, however, would result in highly complex terminals and is not practical with current technology. This is where OFDM provides a practical implementation advantage.

The OFDMA approach is also highly flexible in channelization, and LTE will operate in various radio channel sizes ranging from 1.4 to 20 MHz. LTE also boosts spectral efficiency.

On the uplink, however, a pure OFDMA approach results in high Peak to Average Ratio (PAR) of the signal, which compromises power efficiency and, ultimately, battery life. Hence, LTE uses an approach for the uplink called Single Carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA), which is somewhat similar to OFDMA, but has a 2 to 6 dB PAR advantage over the OFDMA method used by other technologies such as WiMAX IEEE 802.16e.

LTE capabilities include:

    Downlink peak data rates up to 326 Mbps with 20 MHz bandwidth

    Uplink peak data rates up to 86.4 Mbps with 20 MHz bandwidth

    Operation in both TDD and FDD modes

    Scalable bandwidth up to 20 MHz, covering 1.4 MHz, 3 MHz, 5 MHz, 10 MHz, 15 MHz, and 20 MHz in the study phase

    Increased spectral efficiency over Release 6 HSPA by two to four times

    Reduced latency, up to 10 milliseconds (ms) round-trip times between user equipment and the base station, and to less than 100 ms transition times from inactive to active

Ferrari 458

A Ferrari Speciale for special emotions.

It’s called the 458 Speciale: it’s Ferrari’s new sportscar, the fruits of the innovation and extreme technological research that have gone into a car as outstanding as the 458 Italia.

The aerodynamic efficiency (an E index of 1.5), a more powerful aspirated V8 engine (605 cv) and the highest power density (135 cv/l) in the history of Ferrari road cars, an extraordinary weight/power ratio (2.13 kg/cv), electronic control of the slip angle (SSC): these are some – but not all – of the characteristics that make this car truly Speciale and that are destined to become standard for the Ferraris of the future. The aptness of the car’s name is easily shown by its performance figures: accelerating from 0-100km/h in 3s (or 9.1s for 0-200km/h) and a best lap time round Fiorano of 1m 23.5s.

The new 8-cylinder mid-engine berlinetta, which will be launched at the Frankfurt Motor Show on September 10, was designed with the target of raising performance and driving emotion to the highest levels, while still guaranteeing ease of control in every situation.

Google Glass: what you need to know

When Google Glass was unveiled, the tech world instantly fell into two camps. Camp one was excited: we're living in the sci-fi future! Camp two, though, wasn't so happy. It's vapourware! some said, while others worried that Google just wanted to plaster ads on the entire world. Is either camp correct? Let's find out.

What is Google's Project Glass?

Google Glass is the attempt to make wearable computing mainstream, and it's effectively a smart pair of glasses with an integrated heads-up display and a battery hidden inside the frame.

Wearable computing is not a new idea, but Google's enormous bank account and can-do attitude means that Project Glass could well be the first product to do significant numbers.

Originally Project Glass was mooted for a public release in 2014 at the earliest but the latest news on the Google Glass release date suggest it's beginning to look like we could seeconsumer units by the end of 2013.

When will it be released?

That's because the prototype Explorer units are becoming an increasingly common site around San Francisco - and Google is even allowing competition 'winners' to pay $1,500 to get these early offerings.

What does Google Glass do?

The core of Google Glass is its tiny prism display which sits not in your eyeline, but a little above it. You can see what is on the display by glancing up. The glasses also have an embedded camera, microphone, GPS and, reportedly, use bone induction to give you sound.

Voice control is used to control the device; you say 'ok glass' to get a range of options including taking pictures, videos, send messages using speech to text, 'hang out' with people or get directions to somewhere. You access these options by saying them out loud.

Most of this functionality is self explanatory; hang out is Google's video conferencing technology and allows you to talk to a people over web cam, and stream them what you are seeing and the directions use Google Maps and the inbuilt GPS to help you find your way.

The results are displayed on the prism - essentially putting data into your view like a head up display (HUD). It's potentially incredibly handy.

People are already developing some rather cool/scary apps for Google Glass - including one that allows you to identify your friends in a crowd.

What are the Google Glass specifications?

An FCC filing in the US revealed many potential details, suggesting that Wi-Fi and Bluetooth would be used to send pictures to the screen, whilst bone-induction may be used for sound, vibrating your skull to communicate the sound into your inner ear. It's not a new technology, but certainly does have critics who suggest that it falls short of traditional headphones.

We don't have a lot of the final details on specs just yet - but expect Google Glass to run modified Android, to sport a decent resolution camera with a decent lens and we'd be fairly certain that the microphone needs to be a good quality.

There will be a GPS chip, and the lightweight and flexible glasses design will come in five colours - Charcoal, Tangerine, Shale, Cotton, Sky. That's black, orange, grey, white and blue for anyone that prefers plain English over marketing speak.

I already wear glasses. Will Google Glasses work for me?

Yes. Google is experimenting with designs that will fit over existing glasses so you don't have to wear two lots of specs.

What is the Project Glass price?

The NYT again: according to "several Google employees familiar with the project who asked not to be named," the glasses are expected "to cost around the price of current smartphones." So that's around $750/£500, then, possibly with the help of a hefty Google subsidy.

The latest hints definitely suggest a price that will make them attractive to technophiles.

The developer versions - traditionally more expensive that the final consumer units - were made available for pre-order for $1,500 (c£966).

As to WHERE you can buy the specs; online will be a certainty, but don't rule out Glass making a debut in a all-new Google Store, with the search giant apparently considering actual shops to showcase the tech to those who haven't been following every development.

Is Project Glass evil?

It could be. Google's business is about making money from advertising, and some people worry that Google Glass is its attempt to monetise your eyeballs by blasting you with ads whenever you look at something.

If you think pop-ups are annoying in a web browser, imagine them in front of your face. The ADmented Reality spoof is one of very many parodies that made us laugh.

Some of the parodies actually make a good point by showing people bumping into stuff: heads-up displays can be distracting, and there may be safety issues too. Until Google ships its self-driving car, the thought of drivers being distracted by their glasses is fairly terrifying.

There are privacy implications too. Never mind your web history: Google Glass might record everything you see and do.

There is a red recording light, but the tech certainly raises some key debates that will become more relevant as this kind of technology surfaces. What are the repercussions from having everything you say potentially taped, turned into text and searchable? What are the repercussions for free speech.

All radically new tech brings new potential for evil. But you have to weigh that against the capacity for good and the progress it brings

Google Glass pre-order customers will get regular updates

Those people who paid Google $1,500 for the privilege of pre-ordering some Project Glass specs will be receiving "private updates" through Google+.