* Femtocells are becoming more of a reality
Femtocells are getting a lot of attention these days, with companies such as Verizon Wireless offering the new technology to consumers. But if they do take off, they will have an impact on networks.
Femtocells are so-called “mini cell towers” that you would hook up to your home or business Internet connection, much as you connect a wireless LAN router to your Internet connection today. Instead of communicating with wireless computers, these mini cell towers communicate with cell phones within a 5,000-foot radius or so. They then send the cell phone’s voice traffic over the Internet connection.
The benefit to having these would be clearer reception for cell phones in and around the house or business. One potential downside is that there could be interference if there are too many femtocells close together, in an urban area, for instance.
Verizon Wireless is now offering femtocells for $250, a price that some industry observers see as too high to encourage widespread adoption.
One interesting aspect is pointed out in Margery Conner’s PowerSource blog, where she says that femtocells would be a great application for Power over Ethernet technology. Since you’d probably want to stick your femtocell in a place that is out of the way, such as in an attic, it would be good if you had to run just one line to the device, rather than two. So, instead of running both a power line and an Ethernet cable to the femtocell, you would run one cable that carried both power and signal.
