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Re: Wireless links

From: Eric Laforest <>
Date: Fri, 2 Mar 2001 08:32:29 -0500

On Fri, Mar 02, 2001 at 05:01:28AM -0800, Sarah Nordstrom thus spake:
> About packet over FRS.... has anyone looked into that?  It sounds silly, but I don't see any reason that it *wouldn't* work, other than regulations against it (i haven't read any of the stuff on FRS myself), or really limited bandwidth...
> Something to think about, anyway.
> 
>  -- Sarah

hmm....I'm in Canada, so the rules may be slightly different.
I read them once (not sure if they were the CAN or US or both ones)
and what they distill down to is that you cannot alter the radio
(they all have the same power/antenna gain configuration it seems)
and autopatch (connecting to the phone system) is verboten.

So if some FRS radio offered headphone/mic jacks, you could inject the
signal you need to get data through and still be legal...
HOWEVER, you'd have to watch the bandwidth of the signal so it doesn't
spill over or quiet adjacent channels.
Also, I don't know if *continuous* use of FRS is acceptable.

Finally, from using FRS radios, the S/N ratio may not be the most stellar.
So < 9600bps is tops I guess.

This could be used for short/mid-range links between wearables with
(they do have a range of ~2-3 miles in free-space)
some having faster links to the 'net proper with gatewaying.
Like an impromptu collective at a club or mall or resort, with a few having
CDPD/Ricochet/802.11 links to the outside.

Eric LaForest, VE3LNX
(who now thinks he'll add a pair of FRS xceivers to his future platform)

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