New IrDA Spec Shoots for 100Mbit/s Data Rate

An anonymous reader writes "According to an article at DeviceForge, the Infrared Data Association has adopted a new high speed IR communications protocol. This new protocol promises to deliver possible speed up to 100Mbit/s transfer rates. From the article: 'Of note, existing IrDA-enabled devices can be upgraded to the new protocol, thus offering the opportunity to accelerate the IrDA data transfer rates of devices in the field via a software update.'"

Good, but...

[Poromenos1]

Although it's quite fast it's still line-of-sight, and very short range. So, what can I do with this, transfer 12.5 MB/sec off my mobile phone? To connect my PCs I have wifi or LAN, I wouldn't use IrDA anyway for that.

nice

[bart416]

Nice speed, this is handy for people that need to connect their mobile phone with their computer or something like that. Since bluetooth isn't that fast...

irda is more secure than bluetooth

[circletimessquare]

bluetooth and irda have the same range

bluetooth is more convenient since irda requires line of sight

well, we always talk about a trade off between convenience and security, and there is the tradeoff right there

so i think broadband irda has a blockbuster future

because security concerns are nothing to sniff at in a marketplace full of it departments spooked by security scares

Isn't IR outdated?

[Sonic McTails]

Most devices made now adays don't even have IR ports. Apple stopped equiping their devices with IRda ages again (the titamium PowerBook G4 700MHz I think was the laste one), and it's very rare when I see a laptop with it. IR on cell phones is even rarer - I think Nokia is the only company that still really sells phones with IRda, and Palm is the only company still really pushing behind IRda. What was the point of updating a protocal that has be replaced in the computer world?

Re:I think this is quite cool

[glesga_kiss]

I can do it with bluetooth, but I have to pair it first (grrrr). In the bad old days of ir, all he had to do was point his phone at my laptop press send, then I accepted the transmission and it magically appeared on my desktop. Sweet.

That is a gross over-simplification. IR doesn't "just work", except perhaps in Windows XP. Even if you do get it going, it's still limited to modem-like speeds. Getting "Fast IR" (4meg) working is a joke; I once worked in a laptop factory and had to monitor the IRDA testing setup down on the production lines. In controlled-conditions, with single-tasking custom testing software, we still had problems getting reliable communication from otherwise perfect built products. I investigated things like distance, ambient light etc in order to bring down the high erronous failure rate. In the end I think 7 inches was the opimum distance for Fast IR.

So, this is me, in a lab with two laptops (one known-good) hooked up on a specially designed test harness. And it still is unreliable! Good luck getting it to work reliably on the street!

Granted, newer OS's make this all easier and it runs "out-of-the-box", but IRDA has thoroughly earned it's "piece of shit" ranking in my mind. Maybe I'm just bitter at it's complete imcompatibility with "consumer IR" protocols; if it could interface with TV's etc and input stimulus from other remotes, it might have had a use over the years. This simple functionality was omitted for some reason or other. Now, BT and WiFi kick it's butt up and down the ball-park in the things that matter; speed and reliability. IR will have to nail both of these to stand a chance however I don't think your "fire and forget" use will be popular enough to make it mainstreem.

Re:Good, but...

[darmey]

damn right you are! I was always wondering, why can I control my TV no matter what direction IR Remote is facing, and irda is not even close to this.