Considering airmax and the airmax used in -AC are two totally different animals, they would have to code in *3* operating modes into AFLTU.
Not worth the time or development cost when you're trying to be cost competitive with custom chipsets (my guess). On Dec 8, 2016 10:03 AM, "Ken Hohhof" <[email protected]> wrote: > Well, that would seem to be less than optimal from a marketing perspective. > > > > “Custom chipset” or not, you have to suspect it follows that typical path > of an analog front end SOC (A/D, D/A, PA, programmable filters, RF switch, > etc.) and an FPGA/CPU chip. Likely they went to one of the usual suspects > like Analog Devices, Altera, etc. and had chips customized to their specs. > Or there are communications oriented fabless design houses that could do > this. My point being it is probably a programmable radio and could be > backward compatible with airMax if they wanted. > > > > I could be wrong, they could have looked at the programmable radio > approach and decided it would be no different from the Canopy/450 approach > and would not allow “disruptive pricing”. And had a chipset made with > dedicated hardware for the various OFDM functions like FFT, coding, clock > recovery, etc. Similar to how an 802.11 chip is designed, but without the > advantage Mimosa had with Quantenna, leveraging the volume of mass market > 802.11 products. In that case, they might have thrown backward > compatibility with their own products overboard to meet cost objectives. > > > > Ubiquiti certainly has their challenges, they are fighting a war on two > fronts – Mimosa and Cambium. > > > > Another question for LTU is frequency bands. We all understand that > 802.11 based radios will be limited to 2.4 and 5 GHz, unless you use > frequency conversion, which never seems to work all that well. But a > custom approach like 450 or airFiber is not limited to WiFi bands. What > bands will Ubiquiti decide to go after, and how will they price it? Look > at AF3x, it demonstrates the flexibility of a custom platform, but it’s > twice the price of AF5x. It’s actually more expensive than Cambium’s 3 GHz > PTP450. So much for disruptive pricing. But if they decide to cherry pick > and only go after 5 GHz and maybe 2.4 GHz, will you use another vendor for > 900 MHz and 3 GHz in your network? Same question I raise regarding AF11x, > or for that matter B11. OK, that’s nice, I have an inexpensive 11 GHz > backhaul product I can buy. But I still need to buy my 6, 18 and 23 GHz > backhauls from someone else like Ceragon/Cambium, SAIE, SAF, Trango, > Dragonwave, Exalt, etc. that offers a full line. I don’t like that, I’d > rather pay a bit more for 11 GHz and be able to use the same vendor for all > my licensed links. But I also don’t like going to WalMart for milk, bread > and diapers, Whole Foods for organic meat and vegetables, and a regular > grocery store for everything else. Other people will make the 3 trips. > > > > > > *From:* Af [mailto:[email protected]] *On Behalf Of *Josh Reynolds > *Sent:* Thursday, December 8, 2016 9:33 AM > *To:* [email protected] > *Subject:* Re: [AFMUG] 450m , No News is Good News? > > > > The AFLTU chipset is brand new with no legacy bits. Their 2nd real custom > chipset made at UBNT. Most likely a forklift. > > > > On Dec 8, 2016 9:24 AM, "Ken Hohhof" <[email protected]> wrote: > > AF software features will have to move lightyears ahead for LTU to compete > with 450/450i/450m. > > AF is very barebones, kind of like a licensed backhaul, and can get away > with it because it's just PTP. Cambium has 15 years of adding software > features and pulling all of them forward to the new platforms. Sure, it's > just a Small Matter Of Programming, but even now every time Cambium adds > some features there are some bugs to work out, so trying to bring out a new > PMP platform with all those features on day one would be a monumental > undertaking. > > Also, each PTP links is kind of a one-off, other than spares, training and > network management systems. You can put in an airFiber or Mimosa link, > then decide to use something else for your next link, and that first link > will continue working fine. PMP is different (assuming proprietary > systems), because once you deploy APs, all the CPEs have to match. And > with GPS sync, neighboring towers may have to use the same system. It's a > big decision. Yes, the cost is also a big decision, but you don't want to > deploy a bunch of PMP equipment and then end up hating it or finding the > vendor didn't deliver on the "implemented in future firmware" promises. > > Has anyone mentioned network transitions? Elevate lets you transition an > airMax network to ePMP. Is it fair to assume LTU will do the same? Or is > it a forklift upgrade? > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Af [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Seth Mattinen > Sent: Thursday, December 8, 2016 8:47 AM > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [AFMUG] 450m , No News is Good News? > > On 12/8/16 6:23 AM, Mike Hammett wrote: > > Don't get me wrong, I think LTU will be out next year and I do think > > it'll be a big hit, mitigating a lot of the issues we've seen in their > > AirMax platform. It has just seemed like it takes a lot to get any of > > the groups there to really do what the customers want. > > > Certainly AirMax seems to have some design limitations. Lowly ePMP can do > sync on an Atheros-based platform while AirMax just can't seem to get there > at the same level. > > For me it's UBNT's ADD with abandoning things that makes me nervous. > Every vendor claims things that I'll believe it when it ships, but UBNT > will release something, make some progress, then drop it because it's no > longer new enough to raise stock prices or becomes unsexy long term > maintenance. Like AirControl, then AirControl 2, then cloud-whatever, then > AirCRM, now is it back to AirControl 2 again? I don't even know. I still > have some M gear and ePMP Elevate is tempting just to get away from the > AirControl dumpster fire. > > ~Seth > >
