With airborne Net access, if a neighbor grows a rooftop garden that blocks the antenna's line of sight, users lose connectivity. Fixed wireless is looking for a way around that. People who get Internet access delivered through the air instead of through a cable or telephone line know the problem well: They lose the service if their rooftop's antenna isn't in the line of sight of a main antenna miles away.
But a new generation of equipment is taking the "line of sight" requirement out of the equation. Foliage, stucco walls, not even a cookie sheet can stand in the way of Net access now, says one provider of the new technology.
This news is piquing interest in what is known as fixed wireless, a little-used method to deliver high-speed Internet access to homes. The service is available for about $45 a month and is mostly used by people living in rural areas where DSL (digital subscriber line) and cable-modem Internet access is unavailable.
|