Wave 18 Brings Few Surprises

Cable Television Laboratories Inc. has wrapped up certification wave 18, granting approval to 17 cable modems for the 1.0 version of the interoperable Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification.

Modems from three vendors — Hitron Technology Inc., Infinite and U.S. Robotics Corp. — were awarded the DOCSIS 1.0 seal for the first time ever.

CableLabs also recertified modems from Ambit, D-Link Co. Ltd., Ericsson Inc., HighSpeed Surfing Inc., Linksys Group Inc., Net & Sys, Thomson Consumer Electronics, Toshiba America Consumer Products and 3Com Corp. The latter company is bailing out of the consumer broadband-modem sector, citing spiraling margins and a glut of equipment vendors in that space.

To date, CableLabs has stamped the DOCSIS 1.0 seal on 149 modems and qualified 22 cable-modem termination systems. Wave 18 concluded on June 15; the results were announced on June 21.

Among the products that did not pass certification wave 18 was a modem from Terayon Communication Systems Inc. based on the company's proprietary S-CDMA (synchronous code vision multiple access) technology.

"We'll certainly resubmit for certification wave 19," a Terayon spokesman said.

S-CDMA is one option CableLabs is considering for advanced PHY, a DOCSIS enhancement aimed at widening a cable-modem's upstream path to improve the two-way traffic loads tied to nascent but bandwidth-intensive applications like peer-to-peer networking and video conferencing.

Meanwhile, silicon makers like Broadcom Corp., Texas Instruments Inc. and Conexant Corp. have backed a standards-based advanced PHY approach called time-division multiple access, or TDMA.

At a briefing in March, CableLabs said it should complete an advanced PHY specification by the third quarter of this year.

As expected, CableLabs did not grant certification or qualification for more advanced DOCSIS 1.1-based cable-modems and CMTS gear, which will form the base platform for the industry's PacketCable infrastructure. DOCSIS 1.1 certification and qualification testing has been considered "ongoing" since wave 17.

Much of that delay is tied to the fact that test procedures for 1.1 are also still evolving.

DOCSIS 1.1 is far more complex than the 1.0 standard. For example, 1.1 has legions of "must" statements that each product must adhere to before CableLabs will give the OK, explained CableLabs executive consultant and DOCSIS project leader Rouzbeh Yassini.

Specifically, the DOCSIS 1.1 spec translates into 5,832 PICS (protocol implementation conformance statements). From there, CableLabs will craft sets of automatic test procedures (ATPs).

In turn, CableLabs, its members and vendor-escort engineers will manipulate the ATP to create an actual Test Execution Plan for DOCSIS 1.1. The ATP's test domains include such elements as media-access control, privacy, consumer interfaces, MAC/PHY integration and quality of service.

Because of the specification's intricacies, CableLabs cannot complete all of the PICS in one fell swoop.

"They're like peeling an onion, layer by layer," Yassini said.

Yassini wouldn't venture a guess as to when all of the 1.1 test plans would be completed.

"What we're not in a position to say yet is what the timeframe for that is, simply because we want to make sure that we have taken all of the right steps on product functionality and maturity to meet all of those requirements," he said.

Still, DOCSIS 1.1 work "is going in two shifts per day, almost seven days a week, restlessly," Yassini said.

CableLabs said DOCSIS 1.1 activities continue to run parallel with DOCSIS 1.0 testing. So far, 12 cable modems and 8 CMTS products are under CableLabs' DOCSIS 1.1 microscope.

That number will likely increase with the start of certification wave 19, which is slated to begin July 23 and wrap up Sept. 21, according to the organization's latest schedule.