Microsoft scrambles to explain prototype 'white space' device failure

By Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews

February 11, 2008, 7:04 PM

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"The FCC has been testing the Microsoft device for almost a couple of weeks," said Edmond Thomas, a senior policy advisor with the White Spaces Coalition and a senior partner with technology law firm Harris Wilshire & Grannis, in an interview with BetaNews this afternoon. "And it's been doing just fine. It's been detecting cordless microphones and digital TV signals.

"About last Wednesday, the device began exhibiting apparent power problems," Thomas continued. "And by that, I mean it just stopped working. We got a call from the FCC and I went down there to take a look at it. I confirmed that the device was in fact having power problems. And since I visited the FCC, I had to file an ex parte -- a short description for the public record that says [I met with the FCC]."

That ex parte document was picked up by a telecommunications industry newsletter, which then interviewed Thomas. The NAB then got a hold of that story and reprinted it in its statement this morning, along with a quote from a Microsoft engineer on the project who remarked, "It just stopped working."

But it didn't stop completely, Thomas explained to BetaNews. In fact -- and if you think about it, it's pretty ironic -- the system actually just freezes up, but recovers after a cold reboot.

"If you shut the device off and let it cool down and turn it back on, it works just fine," remarked Thomas. "Then after extended use again, it starts exhibiting the same kind of power problems. Shut it down [again], and it works fine. Our belief is that it is, in fact, a power problem."

The big question remains on the table: Did the prototype device fail the test or didn't it? Ed Thomas says no.

"First of all, this device is in no way related to a production product," he told BetaNews. "To give you an example, it's about the size of two cinder blocks side-by-side. It has none of the safety mechanisms you would put in a production product, like self-check capability, monitoring power supplies, excessive temperature compensation, all those kinds of things. It was provided to the FCC so that they can use it as a test set to determine the appropriateness of the operating parameters. So what the FCC is testing is its ability to detect signals. It is not testing anything that is solely a feature which is required of the production product.

The specific power problem at hand, Thomas argued, is "non-decisional" -- which is to say, it's not the kind of failure that the FCC can use to proclaim a device has failed the test, or to use in determining operating parameters for white space devices in the future.

A third Microsoft representative today told BetaNews that the company may not ever use this technology in a product under a Microsoft brand; rather, it is helping its partners to test the viability of a concept, for a product that at some far-future date may involve Microsoft technology.

It's also worth pointing out that, up until today, the NAB's principal argument against white space devices has been that they may interfere with viewers' enjoyment of DTV broadcast signals. Such interference, arguably, could not possibly happen if those devices' power supplies burned out.