Sony Killing Us Again - now Wireless USB Under Attack

So after all of Sony's failed proprietary technology platforms that have failed (MiniDisc, Betamax, etc), here comes a battle for the Wireless USB market. Microsoft and others are backing this format - Sony stands alone again. And it only works within 3 centimenters....Wireless USB works over many feet.

www.msnbc.msn.com...

I've reliably tested CWUSB at 10 meters, for the record.

Certified Wireless USB is the future. Hands down. There's a little squabble right now between the WiMedia Alliance, of which I am a member, and the UWB Forum. But we are both recognized by USB-IF. If Sony wants to go off and do their own thing, that's fine. It won't be USB-IF certified. It won't be compatible with the Certified Wireless USB devices already in development and coming onto the market. In the end Sony will be doing what they always do: using technology that only works with their products essentially crippling themselves in the eyes of the consumer. Again.

reply to post by apc


APC - very interesting there. Would this be another case of MSNBC bias? Or just the we hate Sony bias?
W-USB is what I want...and need. I am converting over my pharmacy hardware to laptops with docking stations and using wall mounted LCD's. A W-USB keyboard and mouse would be awesome with it (we have wireless internet with it). The only cable would be the monitor to the docking station (these laptops also go home with us for use).
I will MAKE SURE we AVOID Sony now - I am demoing some laptops now - looks like it's between Dell and HP now.
Thanks for the affirmation that my plan will work!

Soon there will even be wireless USB docking stations AND displays! All that's left is reliable wireless power.

You can't currently run too many different devices on the same host without sacrificing performance though. The speed is about half that of wired USB2.0, but it's improving. The FCC has severely limited the power output for ultra-wideband radio.

There's also several very nice radio kbd/mice combos already on the market. If you used those you could free up the wireless USB resources. There aren't many wireless USB devices besides hub/dongle combos on store shelves yet, but they're coming.

No matter what platform succeeds, WiMedia, UWB Forum or some hybrid compromise, the Certified Wireless USB specification is complete and 100% interoperable. Any device must be able to work with any host to receive certification and be able to use the CWUSB logo.

I've scrubbed my house of wireless transmitters. They were negatively affecting my health. I use powerline networking (homeplug standard) instead and have experienced a noticeable improvement in headaches and other symptoms. Perhaps the higher frequency devices will be safer. But the systems in the unlicensed band and most cell phones bother me.

reply to post by SevenThunders


So the airborne frequencies are bothering you? Does it bother you when you go to places like Starbucks or Borders Book Store or other places with WiFi?

Originally posted by harddrive21
So after all of Sony's failed proprietary technology platforms that have failed (MiniDisc, Betamax, etc), here comes a battle for the Wireless USB market.

I don't think that Sony deserves the air of negativity which you seem to afford it. Sony technologies didn't fail as technologies, they sometimes (sometimes!) failed in the market place. And there were runaway success stories such as three generations of the Playstation, which is obviously a "proprietory technology". Apart from the Memorystick which is indeed proprietory but has many clones, there were private label memory deviced such as XD card... That's not a big deal. In addition, Sony had adapted the firewire format in their consumer devices (branded i.Link) which I think was a fantastic idea.

I don't like the market split among battling formats and I hate the HD vs Bluray saga. At the same time, Sony deserves credit for innovation and guess what, this sometimes involves having new and controversial formats, standards and APIs.

Originally posted by SevenThunders
I've scrubbed my house of wireless transmitters. They were negatively affecting my health. I use powerline networking (homeplug standard) instead and have experienced a noticeable improvement in headaches and other symptoms. Perhaps the higher frequency devices will be safer. But the systems in the unlicensed band and most cell phones bother me.

I like your idea of the powerline networking... It's just that given that the whole house becomes an antenna, I bet there is quite a bit of high-frequency EM radiation is still emitted...

I like being able to roam the house with a laptop, and so do people in my family, so this pretty much resolves the issue for me, in favor of WiFi. By the way, you should be able to tweak the power used by the router and by the WiFI card in your client device, to minimize the exposure.

Buddha - My intention was not to be totally negative on Sony. I personally have enjoyed PS one and PS2 (I will say for their 3rd gen console though is going to be bad - XBox had a 1 year head start and Wii is killing them both). The PS3 was just a way to get a Blu-Ray player in peoples homes.
I do like their tech, but they do things like this that FORCE you to have their standard and not be able to choose based on price, technology or personal preference.
Sony has killed me with MiniDisc's. I had a recorder and recorded all my lectures while in school. Getting the info on and off the discs was impossible (thank you DRM). That started my anger of Sony, and this just had me flashback. I just found a box (about the size of a regular sized desktop computer) full of those damn discs...I think I will use them for target practice now...

reply to post by harddrive21


I'm not sure what MiniDisc recording configuration you chose, but when you are recording your own material, I thought you could disable the DRM altogether. My musician friend was using a Sony MiniDisc console for his projects... They actually worked fine.

reply to post by buddhasystem


Well here is the thing. From what I remember, recording was fine. I think you could download software (not from Sony) to crack the DRM like you can do for copying DVD's and CD's (I do not endorse this). Getting it off the Disk and onto my comp and onto CD (to listen to in car, at home, at school, etc) just wasn't happening and it drove me nuts. I bought a car adapter so I could power it in the cigarette lighter and listen to it in the car. I used the power adapter and the tape thing to listen to it on my stereo at home. I had alot of long classes (and boring classes) and if this worked like my friends digital recorder (not Sony) I would have been really happy.

reply to post by harddrive21


Since you don't need crystal-clear quality in ou lecture recording, I would jsut use the analog outs to copy all your discs to audio files on you PC, using the audio in. Then you can cut them anyway you like and encode at MP3, making it instantly portable.

reply to post by harddrive21


Since you don't need crystal-clear quality in ou lecture recording, I would jsut use the analog outs to copy all your discs to audio files on you PC, using the audio in. Then you can cut them anyway you like and encode at MP3, making it instantly portable.

Buddha - I will give it a shot. I still have all the equipment. It's been 4 years since college....but to be fair, I will try it.

reply to post by buddhasystem


I needed the WiFi signal to pass through 2 floors and thus one user was at the range limit. So in that case the basestation had to be running at full power. It didn't help that my head was about two feet away.