JP2003174453A - Access pointer - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an access pointer which realizes a wireless connection corresponding to two systems in the same area and which prevents the interference between two systems. <P>SOLUTION: The access pointer has first circuit parts 26A and 28A for performing media access control and baseband processing of a first standard, second circuit parts 26B and 28B for performing media access control and baseband processing of a second standard, first radio connection means S8 and S15 for connecting radio terminals (13 to 15) of the first standard by radio by using the first circuit parts, and second radio connection means (S20, S24 and S26) for connecting radio terminals 16-18 of the second standard by radio by using the second circuit parts. By temporally separately operating the first wireless connection means and the second wireless connection means, the wireless connection corresponding to two systems of the first standard and the second standard can be performed in the same area so that the interference between two systems can be prevented. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2003,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an access point device, and more particularly to an access point device that constitutes a wireless LAN system.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, as a means for realizing short-distance wireless communication, a wireless LAN of the IEEE802.11b standard (hereinafter simply referred to as "802.11b wireless LAN").
Products) and Bluetooth products are manufactured and sold. In the 802.11b wireless LAN, an access point device for connecting to the backbone of the wireless LAN system has been commercialized, and in Bluetooth, an access point device for internet access via the backbone has also been commercialized. There is.

[0003]

Since both 802.11b wireless LAN and Bluetooth products use the same frequency 2.4G band, they interfere with each other when they are used simultaneously within the reach of each other's radio waves. As a result of evaluation by each company, it has become clear that performance is degraded. In particular, it is said that the deterioration of performance on the 802.11b wireless LAN side is severe due to the difference in carrier sense function.

Due to the widespread use of 802.11b wireless LAN and Bluetooth, this access point device has been installed at airports, hotels, and shops, and has been used for laptop personal computers (PC) compatible with 802.11b wireless LAN and mobile phones supporting Bluetooth. Applications such as Internet access are being considered.

Although it is possible to make a division by using only one of them in a company or at home, such division is not possible in an area where a large number of unspecified users are targeted. Depending on the time and case, the user may select which method. Therefore, simply 80
2.11b When a wireless LAN compatible access point device and a Bluetooth compatible access point device are installed in the same area, there is a problem that performance degradation due to interference cannot be avoided because an unspecified user makes access. .

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and it is an object of the present invention to provide an access point device capable of performing wireless connection corresponding to two systems in the same area and preventing interference between the two systems. To aim.

[0007]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, in an access point device which is installed on the backbone (10) side and wirelessly connects to a wireless terminal, a medium access control of the first standard is performed. And a first circuit unit (26A, 28A) for performing baseband processing, a second circuit unit (26B, 28B) for performing media access control and baseband processing of the second standard, and the first circuit unit (26
A, 28A) and wireless terminals of the first standard (13 to 1)
5) First wireless connection means (S8, S) for wireless connection with
15) and second wireless connection means (S20, S24, S26) for wirelessly connecting between the second standard wireless terminals (16-18) using the second circuit section (26B, 28B). The first wireless connection means (S8, S15) and the second wireless connection means.
By operating the wireless connection means (S20, S24, S26) separated in time, it is possible to perform wireless connection corresponding to the two systems of the first standard and the second standard in the same area. The system interference can be prevented.

The invention according to claim 2 is the access point apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the first wireless connection means (S8, S15) is one or more wireless terminals (13 to 15) of the first standard. By polling the wireless terminals (13 to 15) of the first standard can be connected.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the access point device according to the first or second aspect, the second wireless connection means (S20, S24) is one or more wireless terminals of the second standard (16 to By controlling the transmission of 18), it is possible to connect a plurality of second standard wireless terminals (16 to 18).

It should be noted that the reference numerals in the above parentheses are given for easy understanding and are merely examples, and the present invention is not limited to the illustrated modes.

[0011]

1 is a system configuration diagram of an embodiment of a wireless LAN system to which an access point device of the present invention is applied. In the figure, the backbone 10 is, for example, Ethernet or ADSL / Cable Modem, and the access point device 1 is provided on the backbone 10 side.
2 is installed.

The access point device 12 includes a mobile phone 13 for Bluetooth and a PDA for Bluetooth.
(Personal Digital Assistant
nts) 14, Bluetooth compatible notebook PC 15,
And 802.11b wireless LAN compatible notebook PC
Each of the wireless terminals 16 to 18 is wirelessly connected.

FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of an embodiment of the access point device of the present invention. In the figure, a MAC (medium access control) controller 20 is connected to the backbone 10, and is also connected to the control CPU 22, the data buffer memory 24, and the common terminal of the switch 25. The switch 25 has one fixed contact having a Bluetooth (Media Access Control) MAC.
l) It is connected to the MAC processing circuit 26A that performs processing, and the other fixed contact is connected to the MAC processing circuit 26B that performs MAC processing according to the IEEE802.11b standard. The switch 25 controls the MAC processing circuit 26 under the control of the control CPU 22.
Either A or 26B is selected.

The MAC processing circuit 26A performs MAC (medium access control) processing defined by the Bluetooth standard, and is GFSK defined by the Bluetooth standard.
Baseband processing circuit 28 that performs modulation / demodulation by a modulation method
The MAC processing circuit 26B is connected to A and the IEEE80
It performs MAC (medium access control) processing specified in 2.11 and is IEEE802.11, IEEE80.
DSSB (Direct Se) specified in 2.11b
sequence Spread Spectrum) and C
CK (Complementzary Code Ke
Ying) baseband processing circuit 28B that performs modulation / demodulation by a modulation method. The baseband processing circuits 28A and 28B are respectively connected to the two fixed contacts of the switch 29, and the common contact of the switch 29 is connected to the transmission / reception circuit 30 of the frequency 2.4 GHz band.
The transmission / reception circuit 30 performs transmission / reception using the antenna 32.
The switch 25 is a switch 29 under the control of the control CPU 22.
One of the baseband processing circuits 28A and 28B is selected in conjunction with.

Here, an 802.11b wireless LAN
In the protocol, as shown in FIG.
MA / CA (Carrier Sense Multi)
ple Access with Collision
CP that performs transmission according to the Detection method
(Content Period) period and CFP (Content Free) in which each wireless terminal transmits according to polling from the access point device.
Period) is defined.

The start of the CFP period is notified to each wireless terminal by transmitting a beacon frame from the access point device, and switching to the CP period is performed by transmitting the CF-END signal from the access point device 12.

In the beacon frame, as shown in FIG. 4, a CF parameter (CF Par) indicating the start of CFP is set.
Amate Set) is included. The CF parameter is an element I indicating that this is a CF parameter.
D, element length, CFP count time (CFP Count) indicating the number of DTIM until the next CFP, CFP period (DF indicating the number of DTIM included before the start of CFP)
P Period, the longest CFP duration (CFP
MaxDuration), remaining CFP time (CF
P DurRemaining).

In the present invention, 802.11b wireless L
CSMA / CA during CP period on AN protocol
The notebook PCs 16 to 18 compatible with 802.11b wireless LAN are caused to perform transmission according to the method. And 80
In the CFP period of the 2.11b wireless LAN protocol, according to the polling from the access point device 12, the Bluetooth compatible mobile phone 13, the Bluetooth compatible PDA 14, the Bluetooth compatible notebook PC 1
5 to send.

FIG. 5 shows a flow chart of an embodiment of the switching control processing executed by the control CPU 22. In the figure,
First, in step S2, the switches 25 and 29 are set to IEEE8.
The MAC processing circuit 26B and the baseband processing circuit 28B of the 02.11b standard are switched to be selected, and step S
The beacon is transmitted at 4.

Next, in steps S6, the switches 25, 29
Switches to select the Bluetooth MAC processing circuit 26A and the baseband processing circuit 28A of Bluetooth, and step S
At 8, polling of a wireless terminal supporting Bluetooth is performed. When the beacon transmission timing comes, step S
In 10 the switches 25 and 29 are the MAC processing circuit 26B and the baseband processing circuit 28 of the IEEE 802.11b standard.
B is switched to be selected, and a beacon indicating that the CFP period is being executed is transmitted in step S12. Further, in step S14, the switches 25 and 29 are set to the Bluetooth M
The AC processing circuit 26A and the baseband processing circuit 28A are switched so as to be selected, and in step S15, the wireless terminal compatible with Bluetooth is polled.

After that, when the switching timing comes, the switches 25 and 29 are set to IEEE802.1 in step S16.
The 1b standard MAC processing circuit 26B and the baseband processing circuit 28B are switched to be selected, and C is selected in step S18.
Send a CF-END signal indicating that the FP is over.

Next, in steps S20, S24 and S26, transmission control of the 802.11b compatible wireless terminal, that is, the 802.11b wireless LAN compatible notebook PCs 16 to 18 is performed according to the CSMA / CA method. Also, when the beacon transmission timing comes, a beacon indicating that it is during the CP period is transmitted in steps S22 and S25. After that, at the switching timing, a beacon indicating the start of the CFP period is transmitted in step S27, and then the process proceeds to step S6, and steps S6 to S27 are repeated.

That is, steps S8 to S15
Is the period during which a wireless terminal supporting Bluetooth is supported, and steps S20 to S26 are I
This is a period during which a wireless terminal compatible with EEE 802.11b is supported.

According to the standard of 802.11b wireless LAN, the start point and the end point of the CFP period are
Since it can be determined by the access point device, the ratio between the CFP period and the CP period is changed according to the number of wireless terminals supporting Bluetooth and the number of wireless terminals supporting 802.11b that the access point device 12 must support. It is possible.

In general, a Bluetooth access point device needs to have high sensitivity and high output (100 mW output in Bluetooth class 1) in order to secure a service area. In order to realize this high sensitivity and high output. The antenna 32 and the transmission / reception circuit 30 of the
Since they are already prepared in the 1b wireless LAN, they can be shared.

As described above, the existing standard of 802.1
Since it is not necessary to make any changes to the 1b wireless LAN and Bluetooth standards, it is possible to use Bluetooth-compatible wireless terminals and 802.11b-compatible wireless terminals that comply with the current standards. In addition, since the wireless terminal supporting Bluetooth and the wireless terminal supporting IEEE802.11b are temporally separated and polled,
No interference occurs between the 2.11b wireless LAN and Bluetooth, performance degradation due to interference can be prevented, and both 802.11b wireless LAN and Bluetooth services can be supported.

Note that Bluetooth is the first aspect of the invention.
Compliant with the standard, 802.11b wireless LAN is the second
Corresponds to the standard.

[0028]

As described above, the invention according to claim 1 is
A first circuit unit for performing media access control and baseband processing of the first standard, a second circuit unit for performing media access control and baseband processing of the second standard, and a wireless communication of the first standard using the first circuit unit. First to establish a wireless connection with a terminal
It has a wireless connection means and a second wireless connection means for wirelessly connecting a wireless terminal of the second standard using the second circuit section, and the first wireless connection means and the second wireless connection means are temporally connected. By operating them separately, the first standard and second standard can be used in the same area.
The wireless connection corresponding to the two standard systems can be performed, and the interference between the two systems can be prevented.

According to the second aspect of the invention, the first wireless connection means can connect a plurality of first standard wireless terminals by polling one or a plurality of first standard wireless terminals.

According to the third aspect of the invention, the second wireless connection means can connect the plurality of second standard wireless terminals by controlling the transmission of one or more second standard wireless terminals. it can.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram of an embodiment of a wireless LAN system to which an access point device of the present invention is applied.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an embodiment of an access point device of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating CP and CFP of an 802.11b wireless LAN protocol.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a format of a beacon frame.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of an example of a switching control process executed by a control CPU.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 backbone 12 Access point device 13 Bluetooth compatible mobile phones 14 Bluetooth compatible PDA 15 Bluetooth compatible laptop 16-18 Wireless LAN compatible notebook PC 20 MAC controller 22 Control CPU 24 data buffer memory 25,29 switch 26A, 26B MAC processing circuit 28A, 28B baseband processing circuit 30 transmitter / receiver circuit 32 antenna

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. An access point device installed on the backbone side for wirelessly connecting to a wireless terminal, wherein a first circuit unit for performing media access control and baseband processing of the first standard, and a second circuit unit of the second standard. A second circuit unit that performs media access control and baseband processing, a first wireless connection unit that wirelessly connects the first standard wireless terminal using the first circuit unit, and the second circuit unit Second wireless connection means for wirelessly connecting to a second standard wireless terminal, and the first wireless connection means and the second wireless connection means are operated while being temporally separated from each other. And access point equipment. 2. The access point device according to claim 1, wherein the first wireless connection unit polls one or more wireless terminals of the first standard. 3. The access point device according to claim 1, wherein the second wireless connection unit controls transmission of one or a plurality of second standard wireless terminals.