IEEE P1901 Draft Standard
for Broadband over Power Line Networks: Medium Access Control
and Physical Layer Specifications
Report on the meeting held
in Boston on 15-18 October 2007
The working group continues its rapid progress towards
agreement on a baseline draft standard.
The plan of the working group is to conduct a down selection
process on proposals from each of the following clusters
to form the baseline draft standard:
An in-home cluster that allows low-voltage wiring in
structures to carry digital content
An access cluster that provides for transmission of
broadband content on the medium- and low-voltage power
lines that feed homes
A coexistence and interoperability cluster that ensures
all equipment and devices used on BPL networks are compatible.
In Boston, the latest updates of the remaining proposals
were presented: two in-home proposals, two access proposals,
and two coexistence proposals
One round of elimination voting was then held on the in-home
and access clusters. As a result, a single proposal for
each of these clusters remains under consideration for the
next step (see the results
of voting).
The two surviving in-home and access proposals follow a
similar architecture based on one unified MAC layer and
the possibility to support two Physical layers, a FFT OFDM
PHY and a Wavelet OFDM PHY.
The next step for both proposals is the confirmation vote.
The proposals are required to achieve 75% majority approval
to become part of the baseline of the standard (see the
down
selection process).
For the coexistence and interoperability cluster, an important
change in one proposal was announced during the meeting
and as a result, the working group decided to postpone the
elimination vote until the next meeting. The two proposals
remain candidates.
The proposals are being continuously improved and the latest
updates are expected by 20 November 2007.
The next
meetings are scheduled for 11-14 December 2007 in San
Diego, CA, USA and 3-7 March 2008 in Fukuoka, Japan.
