Product category:
Communications ICs (Wireless)
News Release from: Intersil | Subject: Prism Indigo 5GHz chipset
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 05 July 2001
The future's Indigo for 5GHz wireless
LANs
Intersil has announced the industry's first complete chipset to deliver 54Mbit/s datarates for higher speed, broadband wireless connectivity for business and home networking.
Intersil has announced the industry's first complete chipset to deliver 54Mbit/s datarates for higher speed, broadband wireless connectivity for business and home networking Intersil expects its new Prism Indigo 5GHz chipset, designed to conform to the latest IEEE 802.11a standard for 54Mbit/s operation at 5GHz, to significantly boost growth in the networking market by complementing existing 2.4GHz WLAN systems and opening up many new applications including multimedia and video conferencing
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 8 Jan 2001 at 8.00am (UK)
Related stories
Ultra-low-power MOSFETs prolong battery life
Intersil has launched its advanced new DenseTrench power MOSFET family of discrete power devices designed for higher-efficiency low-voltage power switching applications.
Programmable up-converter simplifies basestations
Intersil has added a new highly integrated quad up-convertor to its CommLinkT family of digital radio ICs for fixed basestation applications.
Prism Indigo can also operate in parallel with existing 2.4GHz IEEE 802.11b-based WLANs with no interference, eg to boost network performance.
The Prism Indigo 5GHz chip set solution will begin sampling in the fourth quarter of this year at a targeted price of $35 in 100K quantities In enterprise networking, Intersil's new Prism Indigo's 54Mbit/s performance supports broadband applications including building-to-building wireless network bridging and backplanes as well as high bandwidth end-user applications such as videoconferencing and very fast Internet access.
In the home, Prism Indigo can provide simultaneous multi-channel video, voice and CD-quality audio throughout the home as well as fast broadband access to the Internet or gaming from anywhere in the home.
Further reading
Intersil and Sony develop new wireless TV solution
Intersil has worked with Sony to develop Point Co-ordination Function (PCF) technology based on Intersil's latest Prism 2.5 wireless LAN chipset solution.
Wireless LAN technology for the workplace
Intersil is introducing a new brand of wireless products called Prism/work specifically designed to meet the growing need for wireless LANs in the workplace.
Rad hard power-up microprocessor reset circuit
Intersil has introduced a new radiation hardened (rad hard) power-up microprocessor reset circuit.
"Wireless connectivity is a killer application in networking, yielding significant business productivity improvements and fast return on investment", said Greg Williams, Intersil's president and CEO.
"We see 5GHz as a complementary technology to the large installed base of 2.4GHz systems; the two can co-exist with 5GHz providing the higher bandwidth for backplanes, bridging and subnetworks or data-intensive applications", he added.
The Prism Indigo chipset uses orthogonal frequency division multiplex (OFDM) technology designed to comply with the latest IEEE 802.11a standard for 5GHz operation.
It is also engineered to meet WECA's 5 GHz interoperability guidelines for Wi-Fi approval.
Prism Indigo couples high-performance wireless operation with low power consumption enabling a complete WLAN adapter card to be manufactured for just $60 based on a projected chipset price of $35.
Indigo is a complete solution including a reference design, developer's kit and application software.
Intersil is also incorporating the IEEE's new Security and Quality of Service (QoS) enhancements for deployment of video streaming, voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) and multimedia related services for the home and enterprise.
The enhancements will provide several levels of performance specifically tailored to take maximum advantage of all available datarates from 6 to 54Mbit/s.
Indigo uses a highly integrated chipset that includes an advanced IC combining baseband processor and an ARM-based MAC, and has both a CardBus32 and PCI interface for miniPCI applications.
Working with the IEEE 802.11 Task Group, Intersil is leading the effort to develop a standard that will bring the same OFDM technology used by the latest 5GHz 802.11a systems to the existing 2.4GHz band while preserving backward compatibility with existing IEEE 802.11b Complementary Code Keying (CCK) systems.
The Prism Indigo chip set includes all the ICs required to implement a complete 5GHz WLAN system.
These include a power amplifier and detector, RF to IF convertor, IF to baseband convertor and VCO (IF/BB) and combined baseband processor/medium access controller (BBP/MAC).
The ISL3987 is a 3-stage SiGe, 5-6GHz power amplifier is designed to maximise battery life while yielding the transmit power necessary for high performance, 802.11a-compliant, 54Mbit/s wireless networking systems while operating in a high-density enterprise environment.
Advanced micro lead frame (MLF) packaging and sophisticated SiGe technology leads to smaller size and greater power efficiency.
The ISL3687 is a highly integrated SiGe half-duplex RF/IF convertor including synthesiser and VCO.
The ISL3687 directly interfaces with the ISL3787 IF/BB convertor through a single SAW filter for both transmit and receive functions.
The ISL3687 combines all the necessary RF front-end functions into a small form factor MLF plastic package.
The ISL3787 is a half duplex IF-to-baseband convertor including AGC, synthesiser and on-chip VCO.
The ISL3787 connects to the ISL3877 digital BBP/MAC by way of a low IF bandpass interface.
The ISL 3787 also utilises advanced MLF packaging and is manufactured in Intersil's proprietary low-cost UHF2 communications process.
The ISL3877 is a highly integrated, single-chip BBP/MAC for use in IEEE 802.11a standard-based systems.
The ISL3877 combines an OFDM baseband processor with an ARM core MAC and has 2Mbit of on-chip SRAM.
It has a CardBus32 and PCI interface for miniPCI applications.
• Intersil: contact details and other news
• Email this article to a colleague
• Register for the free Electronicstalk email newsletter
• Electronicstalk Home Page
Search the Pro-Talk network of sites
