芯片及電子產(chǎn)品制造商英特爾、英飛凌、德州儀器以及松下公司業(yè)已組建了一個(gè)聯(lián)盟HomeGrid論壇(HomeGrid Forum),來(lái)促進(jìn)使用家居電路傳輸電影、音樂(lè)及圖片的家庭媒體網(wǎng)絡(luò)的發(fā)展。該組織希望盡快制定一種統(tǒng)一的標(biāo)準(zhǔn),使采用該標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的芯片能以超過(guò)Gbps的速率在同軸電纜、電話線或電力線上傳輸數(shù)據(jù)。它們希望首批使用該新標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的產(chǎn)品將于一年后推向市場(chǎng)。
HomeGrid論壇成員希望制定統(tǒng)一的互聯(lián)方案,以此來(lái)替代諸如同軸電纜多媒體聯(lián)盟(Multimedia over Coax Alliance)、家庭電話線聯(lián)網(wǎng)聯(lián)盟(HomePNA Alliance)和家庭電力線聯(lián)盟(HomePlug Powerline Alliance)的所作的工作。
消費(fèi)電子產(chǎn)品及計(jì)算機(jī)制造商一直在探討數(shù)字家庭的發(fā)展前景。但是由于這些設(shè)備制造商之間缺乏統(tǒng)一的互聯(lián)標(biāo)準(zhǔn),從而阻礙了數(shù)字家庭的發(fā)展。目前,業(yè)界已經(jīng)開(kāi)發(fā)了使用Wi-Fi把各種家庭設(shè)備連接在一起的通用無(wú)線標(biāo)準(zhǔn),Wi-Fi聯(lián)盟也在致力于推廣其標(biāo)準(zhǔn)。不過(guò),有線網(wǎng)絡(luò)具有很大的優(yōu)勢(shì),穩(wěn)定性和性能都優(yōu)于無(wú)線網(wǎng)絡(luò),并且目前大多數(shù)家庭都擁有必須的基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施構(gòu)件。
這個(gè)新成立的HomeGrid論壇總裁、英特爾的Matt Theall表示:“目前的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的確是太多,而大多數(shù)廠商希望得到一個(gè)統(tǒng)一的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)。”這四家HomeGrid論壇主要成員公司稱,它們將與國(guó)際電信聯(lián)盟合作,促進(jìn)、測(cè)試和致力于發(fā)展國(guó)際電信聯(lián)盟正在開(kāi)發(fā)的ITU-T 標(biāo)準(zhǔn)。據(jù)悉,目前HomeGrid論壇的三大工作目標(biāo),便是強(qiáng)化ITU-T 標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的技術(shù)?熱蕁⒕嚀迓涫?ITU-T 標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的商用化、并且支持ITU-T 標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的產(chǎn)品互通性更加完善。
“ITU非常強(qiáng)大,這對(duì)制定一個(gè)統(tǒng)一的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)十分有利。”ITU 標(biāo)準(zhǔn)組的主席,同時(shí)也是英飛凌高級(jí)標(biāo)準(zhǔn)經(jīng)理Les Brown表示。
支持者也看到ITU制定的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)通常都是非常具有爭(zhēng)議的,比如說(shuō)DSL標(biāo)準(zhǔn)。“這非常具有挑戰(zhàn)性,不過(guò)只有ITU才配做這樣的事情。”標(biāo)準(zhǔn)組高級(jí)系統(tǒng)工程師,來(lái)自Intel的Barry O'Mahony表示。
Theall表示,目前已經(jīng)有35家公司參與標(biāo)準(zhǔn)工作,包括支持電力線的DS2、Intellon和Panasonic,還有設(shè)計(jì)HPNA芯片的CopperGate公司。
HomeGrid論壇創(chuàng)始成員共有11家公司,另外7家成員公司分別是Aware、DS2、Pulse link、Ikanos、Sigma Designs、Westell、Gigle半導(dǎo)體公司。
英特爾、英飛凌、德州儀器和松下將組建該論壇的董事會(huì),它們表示正在芯片制造商、服務(wù)提供商以及消費(fèi)電子產(chǎn)品及個(gè)人電腦制造商中發(fā)展新成員。
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Group drives Gbit home network effort
HomeGrid hopes to accelerate ITU's work
Eleven companies officially launch a new consortium today (April 29) to accelerate work on a way to unify the fragmented world of home networking. The HomeGrid Forum hopes to speed up work on a standard to define chips that can carry data at rates up to a gigabit per second across coax, phone or power lines.
HomeGrid aims to help the International Telecommunication Union's committee deliver a specification for physical layer and media access control chips within a year. They believe the spec could replace separate efforts by groups such as the Multimedia over Coax Alliance, the HomePNA Alliance and the HomePlug Powerline Alliance.
"We are all aware there is a fragmented wired [home networking] market today, and a number of companies would like to get to a common technology," said Matthew Theall, president of HomeGrid and a technology strategist at Intel. "This technology could be embedded in hundreds of millions of products some day," he added.
HomeGrid will host weekly technical work sessions to speed up progress on the ITU effort which conducts face-to-face meetings just once a quarter. In addition, it aims to take on marketing and certification roles to make sure the resulting standard is adopted.
"We believe today's announcement is an important step towards eliminating fragmentation in the industry and achieving the vision of a networked home," said Kurt Scherf, analyst with market watcher Parks Associates, speaking in a prepared statement.
"This is ambitious, but I think its necessary otherwise consumers might face the prospect of home networking products that not only don't interoperate but actually interfere with each other," said Les Brown, chairman of the ITU group and a senior standards manager for Infineon.
"The ITU is a very powerful group for unifying the industry so we think we have a chance for success," Brown added.
Backers note the ITU helped settle contentious debates on standards such as DSL. "It is challenging, but if any one can do it, it's the ITU," said Barry O'Mahony, a senior staff systems engineer at Intel, working with the group that got its start in 2006.
It's not clear whether HomeGrid or has backing from the wide group of chip, system and service companies who drive home networking standards.
about 35 companies now participate in , said Theall of Intel. They include several powerline network players such as DS2, Intellon and Panasonic as well as CopperGate which designs chips for the HPNA standard.
HomeGrid is just starting to court members broadly. "We expect many of the members will also join this effort," said Theall.
After the HomeGrid launch we will reach out to more people to create the momentum and critical mass we need," said Imran Hajiumusa, vice president of broadband access at Infineon Technologies North America.
HomeGrid was founded by Infineon, Intel, Panasonic and Texas Instruments. Initial members include Aware Inc., DS2, Gigle Semiconductor, Ikanos, Pulse link, Sigma Designs and Westell.
Inside the effort
The ITU takes a piece-by-piece approach to writing standards. The committee has nailed down many technical decisions, especially for its physical layer chip. But many issues are still outstanding, particularly in the MAC.
One of the more important decisions to date has been to target a maximum data rate of a Gbit/s as part of a proposal from the companies who founded HomeGrid. The committee also accepted a target of supporting 400 Mbits/s on at least 99 percent of coax lines and 250 Mbits/s on 95 percent of powerline connections.
"We did not want [] to be a duplication of existing technologies, rather we wanted to position it as a next-generation with performance beyond MoCA, HomePlug and the others," said O'Mahony of Intel.
The group has decided to use a discrete Fourier transform version of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing as its modulation scheme. In addition, it will embrace both parameterized and prioritized quality-of-service approaches.
"There's a bunch of heavy lifting still ahead," said O'Mahony.
For example the group has yet to define the number of bands it will support and which frequencies it will use on different mediums.
"We've done a fair amount of work on the PHY layer, but we have much more to do on the MAC," said Brown. "We are talking about a two-phased approach where we focus on the PHY this year and the MAC next year," he added.
Among controller issues, "really there's been no work on security yet and that's a huge hole left to fill," said O'Mahony.
