Research on HFC network broadband access using WLAN technology

Current broadband access system such as ADSL can not satisfy the network applications as the development of network services. In this paper, we proposed to use WLAN technology on the HFC network as a terminal broadband access plan. First of all, theoretical analysis is given to support the feasibility of using WLAN technology on the HFC network. Then, transmission experiments and results of the proposed plan are described in this paper. The key point of the plan is to use a WLAN access point device as a modem to modulate the baseband Ethernet signal into 2.4GHz WLAN signal which then be transmitted via coaxial cable(COAX). The experimental results show that the average traffic throughput of the system could reach to approximate 20Mbps which is the theoretical throughput of 802.11g WLAN transmission. And the transmission throughput has no remarkable change no matter there is CATV signal in the system or not. Finally, conclusions are drawn out: The proposed system can work properly. WLAN signal is quite suitable to be transmitted in the coaxial cable. CATV signal and WLAN signal are not interfering with each other in the system. Using WLAN on the existing coaxial cable which has already accessed to thousands of people's home could be a cost-effective plan for broadband access on the HFC network.