4G Wireless Video Communications

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Introduction

1.1 Why 4G?

Before we get into too much technical jargon such as 4G and so on, it would be interesting to take a moment to discuss iPhone, which was named Time magazine's Inventor of the Year in 2007, and which has a significant impact on many consumers' view of the capability and future of mobile phones. It is amazing to see the enthusiasm of customers if you visit Apple's stores which are always crowded. Many customers were lined up at the Apple stores nationwide on iPhone launch day (the stores were closed at 2 p.m. local time in order to prepare for the 6 p.m. iPhone launch) and Apple sold 270 000 iPhones in the first 30 hours on launch weekend and sold 1 million iPhone 3G in its first three days. There are also many other successful mobile phones produced by companies such as Nokia, Motorola, LG, and Samsung and so on.

It is interesting to observe that these new mobile phones, especially smart phones, are much more than just phones. They are really little mobile PCs, as they provide many of the key functionalities of a PC:

• A keyboard, which is virtual and rendered on a touch screen.
• User friendly graphical user interfaces.
• Internet services such as email, web browsing and local Wi-Fi connectivity.
• Built-in camera with image/video capturing.
• Media player with audio and video decoding capability.
• Smart media management tools for songs, photo albums, videos, etc..
• Phone call functionalities including text messaging, visual voicemail, etc.

However, there are also ...