Comparison of Long Range Wi-Fi and I 802.22 for Marine Connectivity

Providing low cost and reliable connectivity for marine fishermen has been a topic of research for a long time. The use of long range Wi-Fi as a backhaul in providing connectivity at deep sea is the most affordable one seen among various solutions offered. A range of nearly 50 km could be obtained by this without any intermediate hops. As the ISM bands gets crowded day by day there is a need to switch to alternate technologies to provide seamless connectivity with less interference. TVWS (Television white space) refers to the unused frequencies in the television spectrum. Due to advent of digital television and the presence of underutilized spectrum white space standards are developed to provide connectivity utilizing TVWS. Owing to its lower frequency range TVWS standards are expected to cover twice the distance covered by long range Wi-Fi standards. The feasibility in using TVWS standards in place of long range Wi Fi to provide marine connectivity is being analyzed in this work. 802.22 and 802.11n are the standards chosen among the various TVWS and long range Wi-Fi standards. Both the standards are compared based on their architecture, application and other parameters.