Lee's Essentials of Wirelesss Communications [Paperback]

William C. Y. Lee (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 2, 2000 | ISBN-10: 0071345426 | ISBN-13: 978-0071345422 | Edition: 1st

ON-THE-MONEY GUIDE TO WIRELESS

If you have to navigate the dangerous waters of wireless, do it with a tech-savvy, predictive manual at your side. That's Lee's Essentials of Wireless Communications, written by the top-selling author in telecom, William C.Y. Lee. Smart wireless choices are not always obvious; a good deal of conventional wisdom is wrong. This expert guide helps you understand and compare CDM, SSB, CT-2, GSM, TDMA, IDEN (MIRS), LEO-Globalstar v. Iridium, IMT-2000, PCS, Wireless Local Loop (WLL), Wideband v. Narrowband, Analog Cellular, Digital Cellular, Radio Capacity, AMPS, ESS, Propagation System Strength Prediction, CDPD, UPR, and Two-Way Paging. Here's everything you need for making wireless decisions that work today (and will still work tomorrow) -- from insider data on coming user demands to the tools for writing glitch-free, foresighted technical specs.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

In the dangerous waters of wireless, you want a lifeboat built by a pro. That's why anyone navigating this fast-changing environment needs this essential, tech-savvy, predictive, business-preserving manual.

Open this book. The job-saving guidance you need is inside. Written by the best-selling author in telecom, Vodafone AirTouch Plc Vice President/Chief Scientist William C.Y. Lee, Lee's Essentials of Wireless Communications brings you mission-critical information you must have to make the right technology choices.

Lee's been making the right moves in wireless for 30 years. Inside, he dissects successful technologies, standards, and strategies to share his working virtual crystal ball. He gives you the same solid information, insightful readings of history, and up-to-date, on-the-money tech perspectives he uses to make winning choices.

Behind the cover of Lee's Essentials of Wireless Communications, find: *Tech savvy you need for strategic decision making *Pros and cons of cellular flavors versus other wireless technology *Tools for making wireless decisions that work today (and will still work tomorrow) *Questions to ask to avoid bad choices such as the picture-phone system and SSB for cellular *Insider data on coming user demands *Tools you need to write glitch-free, foresighted technical specs *Survival lessons from the past's failed systems, standards, and assumptions

Where are the new technologies in the future?

As competition mounts and technology choices multiply, service providers are under tremendous pressure. One wrong tech choice, and you're history. The choices are not always obvious, and a good deal of conventional wisdom is wrong. Don't make a mistake. Error-proofing is inside.

LEARN. COMPARE. AND BEWARE. • CDMA • SSB • CT-2 • GSM • TDMA • IDEN (MIRS) • LEO-Globalstar v. Iridium • IMT-2000 • PCS • Wireless Local Loop (WLL) • Wideband v. Narrowband • Analog Cellular • Radio Capacity • AMPS • ESS • Propagation System Strength Prediction • SSB • Digital Cellular • CDPD • UPR • Two-Way Paging • FCC •

A volume in the McGraw-Hill Telecommunications Series.

Product Details

• Paperback: 318 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1st edition (November 2, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071345426
• ISBN-13: 978-0071345422
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,726,302 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Read it as an autobiography, June 27, 2001

By 

Jack Boyce (Sunnyvale, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lee's Essentials of Wirelesss Communications (Paperback)

Ignore the marketing description for this book! It most definitely is not a general primer on wireless technology, or the selection of such technologies for real-world applications. While the book does contain sections which attempt these goals, there are much better treatments elsewhere. These sections are generally too terse, disorganized, and grammatically bizarre to be pedagogically useful.

The bulk of the book is essentially an oral history of Lee's 30-year involvement in the wireless industry. The subject matter is very interesting: the history of AMPS, how the FCC selected the first-generation digital cellular systems, the development of CDMA at Qualcomm, and so on. A bit of this makes for entertaining reading. After a while, however, it begins to feel that the author is being overwhelmingly self-indulgent; in every story, it turns out that he had the pivotal suggestion, insight, or patent which made things work. This kind of self-aggrandizing is fine if done in the right way (e.g., with humor and an occasional tip of the hat to other contributors), however here I get the vibe that he is soon-to-retire and unfortunately insecure about his legacy.

Bottom line: Buy it if you want an autobiography of Lee, or perhaps if you are interested in the history of the industry. Look elsewhere to learn about wireless technology.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Lots of insight, but lacking in organisation and clarity, May 10, 2001

By 

[e-mail] (Singapore) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lee's Essentials of Wirelesss Communications (Paperback)

The title is somewhat of a misnomer; whereas there is coverage of wireless technologies in general, a substantial portion of this book is devoted to the author's past work in the field. The reader is given insight into projects which the author was intimately involved in, such as the development of the fading model and its application in system design, work done on cellular network capacity, promotion of the first CDMA system and involvement in the OHG for 3G systems. The author's wide experience allows a systems level overview of the technologies involved, which facilitates intuitive understanding. Some portions are ambiguous though, which may or may not be due to the brevity of the text, and the organisation, though novel, is haphazard, with certain items covered in multiple sections. (I hazard that the author's busy schedule has something to do with this, or perhaps this is vindication for an aside on the superior understanding of genuises found in the book!) There are some mistakes, both in the text and the acompanying equations and figures.

Even though the coverage of relevant topics, albeit brief, is comprehensive, I feel that readers new to the field can find better and easier reading elsewhere; the technically-inclined may like a brisk look for the interesting nuggets contained within, such as the reasons for choice of TDMA over FDMA for the first digital systems in the US, and predictions on further developments in the arena.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars An autobiography, not a technical book, December 6, 2001

By 

G. Mitchell "photons_electrons" (Woodinville, WA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Lee's Essentials of Wirelesss Communications (Paperback)

The author has been around. He was at Bell Labs when it was great and held technical leadership positions in cellular industry.

Unfortunately the book is more about the author's career and personal opinions than technical details as the title infers.

Some of the history is interesting but not worth (the price.)