Re: WBZ's On-Air Glitches

[Garrett Wollman <wollman>]

<<On Fri, 30 Jul 1999 10:24:07 -0400, "Bill O'Neill" <billo@erols.com> said:

> We may want to thank digital wireless technology for that.  It seems
> the old analog ones, although perhaps a bit less clear, were more
> forgiving as the signal strength dipped before the voter would switch
> the hop.

The coverage area of all of the digital systems in the area is much
smaller than that of the analog AMPS systems.  (That's why they can
afford to practically give airtime away.)  For people using PCS
systems (i.e., everyone except BAM, SBC/CellOne, and Nextel) there's
the additional challenge of operating in the 1.9-GHz PCS band instead
of the 900-MHz cellular band.  The major difference, however, between
the digital and analog transmission methods is that analog degrades
gracefully, whereas digital simply stops working.  (Of course, the
digital technology which makes it that way is also responsible for
several of the important upsides as well.)

People interested in continuing this sort of discussion are urged to
check out TELECOM Digest in the USENET group comp.dcom.telecom.

- -GAWollman

- --
Garrett A. Wollman   | O Siem / We are all family / O Siem / We're all the same
wollman@lcs.mit.edu  | O Siem / The fires of freedom 
Opinions not those of| Dance in the burning flame
MIT, LCS, CRS, or NSA|                     - Susan Aglukark and Chad Irschick

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