Jonathan Hutchins wrote:
As I understand it, there is the potential for 802.11g cards to disrupt, or at least use, frequencies that are used by the military. Manufactureres have, according to rumor, been pressured not to release information that would allow users to select these frequencies. Open Source software does not provide any means for manufacturers to do this, and aparantly locking down the available frequencies in the hardware is impractical.
This is just rumor - I have seen no confirmation that there has been any pressure on the manufacturers, nor can I confirm that this potential is anythnig more than an excuse to stick to a propietary model.
The answer is almost all of those points. And of course the usual FUD . Open Source coders to my experience are arguably LESS likely to be a problem of disrespecting REAL band usage constraints. Knowing the potentials for havoc makes one cautious in violating hard limits of spectrum separation . True- there are always going to be those who " Bring a gun to a knife fight" but WE have fewer of those .
My personal work with software defined radios-Motorola , Drake , Alinco confirm that "band notching" or "Selective TX Inhibit" causes instability and usability issues compared to cost factors . Snipped of the esoterica -
"Either you can have the gear be cheap-unhackable-or stable pick any 2 ."
Oren
www.campdownunder.com