Thoughts 14 Dec 2007 03:17 pm
Xbox vs Wireless Lans
Microsoft’s Xbox 360 game console can create a strong signal that disrupts wireless LANs.
Evidently the Xbox is capable of disrupting not only your wireless lan but your phone’s bluetooth earpiece. In fact it should to one degree or another interfere with anything that runs in the 2.4ghz band.
M$ is still investigating as are a number of universities. The problem seems to originate with the radio used to communicate with the wireless game controls.
Can you imagine how much fun it must be for the sysadmin in a school with a wireless network and a dorm full of Xboxes.
The signal is described as strange. But it wasn’t discovered until the IT department at Morrisville college in NY ran rf spectrum tests with a Cognio Spectrum Expert.
Not too long after that they wrapped an Xbox 360 in a standard static bag and the interference dropped dramatically.
I bet they can’t wait until right after Christmas.