Different Types of Wireless Network
A "Wireless Solutions Fast Start" Article

Although we use the term wireless network loosely, there are in fact three different types of network.

• Wide area networks that the cellular carriers create,
• Wireless local area networks, that you create, and
• Personal area networks, that create themselves.

They all have a part to play in developing wireless solutions, separately or in various combinations. This article describes these different types of network, and explains where each can add value.

Wide Area Networks 

Wide Area Networks include the networks provided by the cell phone carriers such as Bell Mobility, Telus Mobility and Rogers Wireless. Originally providing cellular voice services, the carriers added data services as well, at first by overlaying digital data services on top of the early analogue voice services, and later by building out brand new generation voice-plus-data networks. Suffice it to say, wireless data services are available just about everywhere you can use a voice cell phone (Another article describes the types of service that are available).

The carriers determine where to provide coverage based on their business strategy, and they also control Quality of Service (QoS). If you are a very large, powerful organization, the carriers may add additional network resources in your corporate tower, especially if you buy a large number of cell phones from them.

Where would you use WANs? You would use WANs when reach is the most important aspect of your solution, and speed is less important. Reach is important if you are providing wireless solutions to the public at large, for example, or you want to give your employees wireless access to your corporate data, whether they are in the office, across town, out of town, or (in some cases) in other countries.

You can't get too far in your study of wireless without running into technical terms. Here are some to start with:

• GSM/GPRS - the voice plus data network technology offered by Rogers Wireless, updated to EDGE in 2004
• 1XRTT (usually called 1X) - the latest voice plus data network technology offered by Bell Mobility and Telus Mobility

Both of these networks are completely incompatible with one another.

Wireless Local Area Networks 

Wireless LANs are networks are set up to provide wireless connectivity within a finite coverage area. Typical coverage areas might be a hospital (for patient care systems), a university, the airport, or a gas plant. They usually have a well-known audience in mind, for example health care providers, students, or field maintenance staff. You would use WLANS when high data-transfer rate is the most important aspect of your solution, and reach is restricted. For example, in a hospital setting, you would require a high data rate to send patient X-rays wirelessly to a doctor, provided he is on the hospital premises.

Wireless LANS work in an unregulated part of the spectrum, so anyone can create their own wireless LAN, say in their home or office. In principle, you have complete control over where coverage is provided. In practice, coverage spills over into the street outside exposing you to a particular range of vulnerabilities. Deliberately seeking WLAN vulnerabilities is called wardriving. Our region has its share of wardrivers, and a later article will describe our adventures during an International Wardriving Day. 

Wireless LANs have their own share of terminology, including:

• 802.11 - this is the network technology used in wireless LANs. In fact, it is a family of technologies such as 802.11a. 802.11b, etc., differing in speed and other attributes
• WiFi - a common name for the early 802.11b standard.

In addition to creating your own private WLAN, some organizations (Starbucks) and some carriers (Telus Mobility) are providing high speed WLAN internet access to the public at certain locations. These locations are called hotspots, and for a price you can browse the internet at speeds about 20 times greater than you could get over your cell phone.

Personal Area Networks 

These are networks that provide wireless connectivity over distances of up to 10m or so. At first this seems ridiculously small, but this range allows a computer to be connected wirelessly to a nearby printer, or a cell phone's hands-free headset to be connected wirelessly to the cell phone. The most talked about (and most hyped) technology is called Bluetooth. 

Personal Area Networks are a bit different than WANs and WLANs in one important respect. In the WAN and WLAN cases, networks are set up first, which devices then use. In the Personal Area Network case, there is no independent pre-existing network. The participating devices establish an ad-hoc network when they are within range, and the network is dissolved when the devices pass out of range. If you ever use Infrared (IR) to exchange data between laptops, you will be doing something similar. This idea of wireless devices discovering each other is a very important one, and appears in many guises in the evolving wireless world.

PAN technologies add value to other wireless technologies, although they wouldn't be the primary driver for a wireless business solution. For example, a wireless LAN in a hospital may allow a doctor to see a patient's chart on a handheld device. If the doctor's handheld was also Bluetooth enabled, he could walk to within range of the nearest Bluetooth enabled printer and print the chart.

What's Next?

The networks described above make a trade off between speed and coverage. Much work is being done on ways to get both coverage and speed. A later article will describe some truly innovative ways of getting the best of all worlds.

 

Martin Stares is a respected speaker, author and coach in the field of wireless solutions and strategy for business, helping companies find innovative wireless solutions for their organizations. For more information and resources, visit Greyfriars Consulting Group at www.greyfriars.net. Read other articles in this series This article is one of a series call Wireless Solutions Fast Start, a course helping companies and individuals understand the business uses of wireless technologies. Visit www.greyfriars.net for other articles in this course. Free content for your web site Would you like to add this article and many others to your web site at no cost? The Greyfriars Wireless Solutions articles may be used on your site as long as the following conditions are met. The full content and links of each article must be used. The author and copyright notice must stay intact. The last paragraph describing the author and their business along with the link to their web site must be intact. If you do use one of our articles, drop us a line at enquiries@greyfriars.net so we can visit your site.