One of the new technologies on the way for mobile phones is NFC, the near-field communication chip. This has been a staple of phones in Asia for a number of years now, it is a short-ranged 13.56 MHz signal, useful over a range usually around 4 cm but up to 20 cm, used to swipe the phone to make payments, for example it will allow your phone to be used as a credit card or to buy bus or train tickets at a turn stile. This is how it has been used in Asia and it has been touted as the biggest technology to hit Europe and US mobile phones for years; however until now this has not happened.
The infrastructure needed to use the chip in Europe and the US is not in place as yet, with many retailers unwilling to invest in expensive equipment that would only be used by small numbers of their customers. A number of companies have now decided to push the issue so adoption begins to become more widespread.
One of the best features of NFC is the way it uses an initiator and a target, the initiator could be the ticket machine or paying point in a shop whilst the target can be an unpowered chip, allowing it to be included in items such as cards, keychains and so on, enabling it to draw it?s power from the initiator.
The technology is still absent from most newly released phones, so you won?t be seeing it in the likes of the Nokia E6 just yet but it is making an appearance in top of the line phones. Samsung and Google?s Nexus S was an interesting example as the original Galaxy S which the Nexus S is very closely related to lacked this capability, suggesting it was Google who thought it was an important feature to add.
This may also be related to the otherwise strange omission of a microSD slot from the Nexus S, something Android users are accustomed to, to increase their phone?s internal storage and something the Galaxy S did have.
Some technologies revealed at the recent MWC (Mobile World Congress), were focused on the sector generated by the phones like the Samsung Galaxy Ace and HTC Wildfire S lacking NFC tech.
The first of these is from Visa, who, probably like Google, have decided to take steps to drive the adoption of NFC technology. It is a card that fits in to your HTC Wildfire S?s microSD slot and communicates with apps on your phone to give complete NFC functionality. While this denies you the use of the slot at least temporarily the ease with which microSD cards can be swapped, even in phones which do not allow hotswapping, should not make this much of a problem as on most phones you can put lots of your music library on the phone?s storage to keep you going.
The impact of this technology should be significant as almost all retail businesses will very quickly move to allow this option. In addition, services such as public transport will have to build card readers which will make paying for tickets far more efficient for consumers.
Expansys has news, information & deals on the latest gadgets, technology and mobile & contract phones. Check out their website now!
Source: http://www.losangelestelephonesystems.net/2011/06/18/near-field-communication-is-coming/
new zealand earthquake 2011 colorado ymca oxycodone harold camping cdc revelations
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.