IDF: Intel WiMAX demo failed - but it didn't

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Wednesday, 18 April 2007 11:14

Your IT - Entertainment

Indeed, the presenters on stage said that they were ‘ultimately embarrassed’ that the demo didn’t work, and proceeded to try and quickly wrap up and move on to the next thing.

Of course, Warne did try and explain that perhaps it failed because there were hundreds of journalists and conference attendees within, all trying to connect to the Beijing Convention Centre’s rather flakey wireless network, which today actually worked more than it didn’t, which was a welcome relief. Warne also explained that he’d spoken to Intel people who said that it had all worked perfectly yesterday, and he made reference to the fact that maybe Intel has something to answer for with all these Wi-Fi issues we were having, given that they actually make Wi-Fi chipsets.

Ah, live demos. My theory is, if something doesn’t go wrong, it’s not a success.

Anyway, back to the WiMAX demo. What is the real shame here, besides the apparent failure of the demo, is the speed with which the presenters wanted to move on to get past what was an embarrassing moment of WiMAX failure.

What I wish they had done, which they probably would have if they weren’t so worried about moving on, is actually trying again.

Why? Well, because I was intently watching the handheld device in the presenter’s hand – and the WiMAX broadcast video was working perfectly. The screen of the handheld was no longer being beamed up on screen, but all three screens showed the two presenters, and if you looked at the handheld device’s screen, you could see cars driving behind the hapless interviewee, who was probably wondering what was happening.

If only the presenters had paused for a moment, and tried again, it probably would have worked. Of course, it could easily have failed again, given that it had failed the first time in a room packed with Wi-Fi signals all competing for access to the Wi-Fi routers in the keynote hall.

As I watched the small screen and could see video happening, I waited in vain for them to try again. Sadly, they did not. If they had done so, and it had indeed worked this time, it would have mitigated somewhat the fact that it didn’t work the first time around.

Of course, when you’re running a series of keynotes with strict time constraints, you often don’t have time to give it another go. WiMAX technology, despite all the trials going on, is still an immature technology that is rapidly maturing.

So, while the demo demonstrably failed, if you were watching closely, it was actually working. Maybe next time Intel should have a dedicated wireless network, perhaps on a different frequency, to ensure that future such demos have no interference and work as planned.

Anyway it heralds a future where high-def video will be wirelessly streamed from device to device – instead of the lousy 64k video streams 3G mobile phones are capable of today. That, and the much cheaper wireless broadband monthly costs that Intel are promising, are a future that can’t come soon enough!

Alex Zaharov-Reutt travelled to the Beijing IDF as a guest of Intel.