by Chano Gomez of Marvell
Last month, without too much fanfare, a new Amendment to the G.hn family of standards was presented for consent, with formal approval planned in the next few months. This amendment will see usage for coaxial frequency increase from 100 MHz to 200 MHz in the base band.
Doubling the frequency also doubles the data rates that can be achieved. We may not have shouted it from the rooftops but it does represent a quiet revolution for home networks that rely on coaxial cable, especially for those who use cable for high speed video streaming, or to provide high-speed connectivity to 802.11ac Wave-2 Wi-Fi Access Points.
To coincide with this new speed increase in the G.hn standard, HomeGrid Forum member and chipmaker Marvell, is providing an early demonstration of the technology, which allows G.hn data rate to increase from 1 Gbps to 2 Gbps. Marvell is showing this technology demo at the CableLabs Summer Conference, currently being held in Keystone, CO. At the same conference multiple carriers and equipment vendors are discussing plans for upgrading their access networks to 10G PON technology, and finding a home-networking technology that can keep up with the access network is a key part of their strategy.
Improving on its current 1Gbps G.hn over Coax product, currently deployed in North America in Multi-Dwelling Unit (MDU) applications, as well as worldwide for In-Home networking and MDUs, this newly launched technology offers even more features making it a very attractive solution for cable operators worldwide.
In addition to the increased 2 Gbps speed, the latest wave of G.hn products will include features such as advanced LDPC Forward Error Correction, automatic detection and retransmission of packets with CRC errors, or remote spectrum management, which have been core features of the standard from day one. These features are particularly important for Multiple-System Operator (MSO) cable operators that need to provide error-free video delivery.
The new G.hn standard uses dramatically less power than current Coax networking standards and Marvell’s 2 Gbps technology also takes up far less space on circuit boards. With extra features built-in from the start, it seems like this new Marvell solution and the G.hn products that will follow are making a strong case for Coax networking to match cable operators’ 10G PON deployments.