Off-roading in a Formula One Race Car
Formula One: Built for Speed
Formula One (F1) race cars are insanely powerful and incredibly precise machines. They can accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in as low as 1.7 seconds. That’s absurdly fast. Cornering hard in one of these boxes of speed can generate a g-force of 4 gs. That’s a jet on wheels.
But what happens if you take one of these fantastically built, and genuinely jaw-dropping F1 race cars off-road? It starts to look a little ridiculous.
As soon as the terrain even gets a little soft, the dirt a little rocky, and the brush more obstructive? Our incredible car is suddenly useless. And that’s the lesson, the race car relies heavily on near perfect race track where access is
highly controlled and the surface completely unobstructed. The car is still an amazing car, the design still impeccable and the potential still there, but without the right track it cannot be used in the way it was designed to be used.
LTE: Formula One of the Wireless World
LTE is the Formula One race car of the wireless world. It’s fast and powerful and can go from 1MB to 100MB in less than 1.7 seconds. It can be absurdly fast. Like F1 race cars, LTE is a highly sophisticated technology. But that sophistication comes at a cost. It needs crystal clear spectrum. Throw LTE into wireless spectrum with obstructions, like the ISM bands and it suffers drastically. LTE is a phenomenal technology, but just like the F1 race car, it also requires a well-scrubbed environment, clear of any interference. They are both powerful, but sensitive to obstructions.
4x4s: Built for Robustness
Contrast the F1 with the classic 4×4 off road vehicle. A 4×4 will never beat an F1 in a race…or will it? Take that race off road, and suddenly the 4×4 has the advantage. Rocks, foliage, boulders, crevasses, sand dunes, logs, mud, trees, you name it, some 4×4 enthusiast has overcome it in their trusty 4×4. Where the 4×4 is rugged, the F1 is sensitive. Where the 4×4 thrives, the F1 fails. Both the 4×4 and the F1 race car have their place. Try to use them in the wrong place, and they seem to fail, despite the fact that in their own element they are the best tool for the job.
RPMA: 4×4 of the Wireless World
In the same way that a 4×4 is built for and thrives in an off-roading environment, RPMA is built for the 2.4 GHz ISM band. In the same way that 4x4s are built and prepared for the rocks and boulders, the logs and foliage, the mud and sand, RPMA is built for the interference present in the 2.4 band. That is where it thrives.
RPMA is Built for Robust Performance, like 4x4s
And so, when many hear that RPMA uses the 2.4 GHz ISM band, they often wonder, what about the interference? Many are thinking about LTE, the formula one race car, because that is what we use every day on our smartphones.