TrueReuse™ is an Extricom-patented technology that can multiply the aggregate capacity of each Channel Blanket. Without TrueReuse, each blanket can be regarded as a single collision domain that is shared by all users within the blanket. While the blanket provides coverage, mobility, and link resilience benefits, TrueReuse introduces a way to boost the aggregate capacity of that blanket.

Click on the screen below to view the launch demo of TrueReuse at the DEMO2006 conference.

How's It Done?

TrueReuse essentially takes the concept of frequency reuse and actually delivers the benefit that had long been hoped-for in cell planning topologies. To increase the capacity of the channel, the Extricom switch uses its real-time knowledge of the entire system to decide when to permit multiple APs to simultaneously transmit on the same channel, to different clients, without causing co-channel interference. In essence, TrueReuse takes a single collision domain and dynamically splits it into sub-collision domains, thereby multiplying aggregate capacity.

The system dynamically measures the RF reception quality from each client on a packet-by-packet basis. These measurements enable the switch to know the link differences between every client and every AP, thereby creating a high granularity real-time map of co-channel interference throughout the deployment. With this map, the switch is able to determine when the client-to-AP isolation is such that up to multiple clients can be simultaneously served by different same-channel APs, without causing co-channel interference. Furthermore, the switch overrides the CCA mechanism on the downlink to permit simultaneous transmissions to the clients.

The net result is a multiplication of the aggregate capacity of the Channel Blanket. This is then added to the "stacking" effect of overlapping multiple Channel Blankets.