Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

On September 25, 2023, Huawei officially launched the MATE60 series of mobile phones, which attracted the attention of the whole society.

This phone not only has a mysterious 5G chip, but also supports unique satellite calls, which is the focus of heated discussion.

In today's article, Xiao Zaojun does not talk about chips or satellite calls. What I want to introduce is another low-key but important feature of MATE60-Starflash.

What is █? it is officially called NearLink. It is a new wireless communication technology specially used for short-distance data transmission.

It has carried out a large number of innovative upgrades to the traditional technologies such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi (but also introduced some 5G key technologies), and realized the overall improvement of speed, delay, transmission distance, security and reliability.

In other words, Starflash is actually an enhanced "Wi-Fi + Bluetooth" hybrid.

The development of █ Starflash before introducing the technical details of Starflash, let's review its birth background and development process.

As we all know, Starflash is derived from Huawei's technology. However, Huawei launched Starflash that year, more out of helplessness. In other words, Star Flash is a forced technology.

On May 15, 2019, the U.S. Department of Commerce added Huawei to the "entity list" and imposed sanctions and blockades on it.

As soon as the news came out, many international technical organizations, including Bluetooth Technology Alliance, Wi-Fi Alliance, SD Alliance, International solid State Technology Alliance, USB Alliance, and other international technical organizations, whether they were fooling around or under pressure from the United States, also went to the bottom of the well and joined the ranks of the blockade.

Almost at the same time, they announced the suspension of Huawei's membership-not only removing Huawei's name from its website, but also canceling its technology license.

You know, Huawei is not a simple beneficiary of these technology organizations, but an important and long-term technology contributor and a core member.

After the incident, it soon caused an uproar. We have finally seen clearly the true face of these organizations. The so-called "fairness, openness and borderless" are in fact lies, and there is politics behind them.

In the face of the crackdown, Huawei did not sit idly by. A few days later, they came up with their own counterattack plan, a technology called Super Bluetooth (X-BT).

This technology not only covers all the functions of traditional Bluetooth, but also has the functions of electromagnetic environment, perceived power, self-adaptation and so on.

Huawei officially unveiled the technology at the Honor 20 mobile phone launch event in London, England, on May 21, 2019.

I don't know if it's a mockery of Bluetooth. Huawei also nicknamed the technology "Green teeth".

Interestingly, seeing Huawei set up the stove, the day before the press conference, industry organizations such as Wi-Fi Alliance and Bluetooth Alliance reinstated Huawei's membership. This kind of behavior is simply speechless.

This "de-listing" incident has sounded the alarm for all Chinese science and technology enterprises-- technical standards, and must not blindly rely on the International Technical Standards Organization.

After the incident came to an end, Huawei decided to press ahead with the Super Bluetooth project.

They know very well that it is impossible to promote the long-term development of a technology on their own. As a result, they began to call on domestic industrial chain enterprises to join together to form a new technological alliance.

This move has received strong support from the government. In 2020, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology called on domestic enterprises to jointly develop "star flash" technology. On September 22, 2020, the Star Flash Alliance was officially established.

At that time, when the SparkLink Star Flash Alliance was founded, it had 80 member units, including China Institute of Information and Communication, China Institute of Standardization, China Mobile, BAIC, Huawei, Lenovo, Xiaomi, OPPO, MediaTek, Ziguang Zhanrui, Datang, ZTE and so on.

The chairman of the alliance is Zhang Xiaogang, former chairman of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The vice chairman is Wang Zhiqin, vice president of China Information Communications Institute. The director of the Alliance expert Committee is Wu Hequan, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

After the establishment of the Star Flash Alliance, it began to concentrate on the formulation of relevant standards and specifications.

In November 2022, Star Flash Alliance officially released version 1.0 of Star Flash. Soon after, in April 2023, version 1.1 came out.

On August 4, 2023, at Huawei HDC.Together2023 developer Conference, Huawei terminal CEO Yu Chengdong officially announced that Xingshen would be included in Hongmeng Ecology.

This move officially opened the prelude to Starflash business.

Next, let's take a detailed look at the technical architecture and characteristics of █ Starflash.

As we mentioned earlier, Starflash is an enhanced version of "Wi-Fi + Bluetooth". In order to achieve these two different features, Starflash uses a special architectural design:

The system framework of Starflash technology (source: "White Paper on industrialization Promotion of Starflash Wireless short distance Communication Technology (SparkLink1.0)"), we can see that the system is divided into three layers, from top to bottom: basic application layer, basic service layer, Starflash access layer.

The basic application layer is used to realize all kinds of application functions, including automobile, home, audio and video and other different scenarios.

The basic service layer includes many basic functional units, through which the upper application functions and system management and maintenance are supported.

The star flash access layer is the most special. It provides two communication interfaces, SLB (basic access) and SLE (low Power access), which correspond to the requirements of two different types of network scenarios: Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

The underlying technologies of the two interfaces are not the same, and the performance indicators are also different. Let's take a look at this separately:

SLB (basic access) SLB, Wi-Fi alignment, the pursuit of large bandwidth, large capacity, high precision.

SLB supports single carrier / multicarrier, working in the unauthorized band of 5GHz, minimum single carrier bandwidth 20MHz, upwards supporting 40/60/80/100/160/320MHz, and modulation modes supporting QPSK, 16QAM, 64QAM, 256QAM and 1024QAM.

SLB adopts many technologies, such as ultra-short frame, multipoint synchronization, two-way authentication, fast interference coordination, two-way authentication encryption, cross-layer scheduling optimization, etc., and integrates a large number of 5G technologies, including asynchronous HARQ (hybrid automatic repeat request) technology similar to 5G, frequency domain scheduling design and frame structure similar to 5G, in order to improve communication performance.

SLB performance index (source: "Star Flash Wireless short distance Communication Technology (SparkLink1.0) industrialization Promotion White Paper") SLE (low power access) SLE, the standard Bluetooth, the pursuit of low power consumption, low delay, high reliability.

SLE uses single carrier transmission, the working frequency band is in the unauthorized band of 2.4GHz, the bandwidth supports 1MHz, 2MHz and 4MHz, and the modulation supports GFSK, BPSK, QPSK and 8PSK.

SLE supports 1-to-many reliable multicast, 4KHz short delay mutual, secure pairing, privacy protection and other features, while ensuring transmission efficiency as much as possible, while fully taking into account energy-saving factors.

SLE performance indicator (source: "Starflash Wireless short distance Communication Technology (SparkLink1.0) industrialization Promotion White Paper") in the group network, Starflash is similar to traditional technology, but also point-to-point (P2P) or point-to-multipoint (P2MP).

Star flash node is divided into management node (G node, Grant) and terminal node (T node, Terminal). Among them, the G node provides access layer services such as connection management, resource allocation, information security and so on. A single G node and the T node connected to it form a communication domain.

Let's talk about security.

Starflash uses a variety of security mechanisms to protect security and privacy. For example, a 128bit AES encryption algorithm is used to encrypt and decrypt data to prevent data from being stolen or tampered with. For example, two-way authentication and key agreement mechanism are used to ensure authentication and key generation between devices.

All in all, we can see that the ability of Starflash is obviously better than that of Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Individual indicators can be said to be "far ahead".

Comparison of technical parameters (complex background conditions, for reference only) the application scene of █ star flash is short-distance wireless communication technology. Its application scenarios are still aligned with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

However, its technical performance has been greatly improved, so it can bring users a better experience and expand the application scene.

After the consumer electronics scene star flash standard is determined, the first commercial landing is the consumer electronics scene, such as mobile phones, tablets, mice, keyboards, headphones, speakers, stylus and so on.

The low power consumption of star flash technology can greatly reduce the power consumption of the equipment, increase the standby time, and avoid frequent charging.

The high speed and low delay of star flash make high-quality multi-channel lossless audio transmission possible. The current Bluetooth can only support stereo HD.

Wireless mouse connections based on Starflash technology have greatly improved the rate of return.

The Star Flash technology mouse shown earlier has an average refresh rate of 4KHz, which is four times that of the traditional 2.4GHz mouse, and the average transmission delay is 413.14 μ s, which is the same as that of the 2.4G mouse. For gamers, this can significantly improve the user experience.

The refresh rate of Star Flash mouse shows that Star Flash has strong anti-interference. In subway, high-speed rail, airport and other complex electromagnetic environment, it can work more stably, reduce transmission jitter and even drop the line.

Nowadays, many users like to use wireless screen and multi-screen collaboration. This involves the wireless transmission of video signals.

Making use of the high-speed advantage of star flash technology, the remote screen with 4K resolution can be easily completed. Multi-screen cooperation at the same time, with the star flash microsecond delay, you can quickly identify focus devices to achieve seamless experience.

The number of connections in the smart home scene has reached a hundred levels, which is necessary for more and more smart home terminals. Users can connect more devices without having to worry about interference with each other.

The communication distance of the star flash is twice that of Bluetooth, which is conducive to the realization of no dead corner coverage of the whole house.

Now many families have living room entertainment and somatosensory games. Starflash can support multiple handle controllers and somatosensory sensors at the same time, allowing more family members to participate, but also bring a more perfect gaming experience.

The industrial manufacturing scene is now the era of the Internet of everything. in addition to the consumer Internet, the industry Internet is also developing rapidly.

We have been talking about the industry empowerment of 5G. In fact, short-range wireless technologies such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi are also widely used in enterprises and parks.

Star flash has better performance than Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, and has significant advantages in bandwidth, delay, number of connections, security and reliability, which is more suitable for vertical industry scenarios.

As soon as the smart car scene Starflash starts, there are already car companies to join. This shows that there is a strong demand for wireless technology in automobile internal communication. Car-machine interconnection, in-car audio and video, radar sensing and so on, all need reliable wireless technology to support.

At the beginning of the establishment of █ Star Flash Alliance and Star Flash Standard Star Flash Alliance, it has 80 member units. Today, after three years of development, the number has exceeded 320.

These members include scientific research institutes, colleges and universities, as well as operators, equipment manufacturers, semiconductor manufacturers, mobile phone manufacturers, and some enterprises from vertical industries such as automobiles.

They work together to promote the ecological construction of Starflash, forming end-to-end coverage from chips, modules to application scenarios.

As we mentioned earlier, Starflash's version 1.1 specification was released in April 2023. Now, Star Flash Alliance is stepping up the standardization of version 2.0.

Source: it is understood that version 2.0 of the White Paper on promoting the industrialization of Starflash Wireless short-range Communication Technology will focus on enhancements in high-precision positioning, perception, coverage enhancement, mesh networking, and QoS enhancement. It will also focus on defining native applications, man-machine interfaces, and open interfaces for third-party applications.

The Star Flash Alliance has high hopes for this new version. The real take-off of Starflash technology is likely to begin with version 2.0.

The future technical performance of █ Star Sparkle is amazing. However, we also need to realize that the road in front of the stars is full of thorns and unknown.

Technical indicators have never been the first factor in the success of a communication technology. Whether we can get the support of the industrial chain is the key.

The Star Flash Alliance has more than 300 members, almost all of them are domestic enterprises. So, what is the attitude of foreign enterprises? Are we the only ones to play with this technology? Relying solely on domestic strength, can we make it a real world standard?

The Bluetooth Technology Alliance (with more than 36000 members) and the Wi-Fi Alliance (with more than 850 members) are deeply rooted after more than 20 years of painstaking management. It is conceivable that it is difficult to shake their position.

Ideally, Starflash will gain global recognition, completely replacing Bluetooth and Wi-Fi (or at least Bluetooth).

If it cannot be replaced, can it coexist?

It's hard.

Nowadays, terminal devices pay attention to extremely low power consumption and small body activity. To increase the support for a wireless technology is not as simple as adding a chip, the baseband radio frequency and other aspects have to be changed, and the overall design has to be changed to affect the whole body.

Therefore, the transition may be possible, and in the long run, terminals are unlikely to support two communication technologies that have the same function and are quite different.

If two technological routes are formed, then there will be the problem of forcing the global industrial chain to "choose one of the two". It is impossible to design two versions of all products in the future: a star flash version and a Bluetooth version.

At the end of █ 's conclusion, I would like to say a few more words about my personal views.

First of all, I think we have to go on this road.

In the current international situation, the existence of star flash technology is extremely necessary. In the key areas of technology application, we need to have technology that can be controlled by ourselves, otherwise we will be controlled by others and get stuck.

Secondly, the emergence of Xingshang has proved the strength of Chinese communication enterprises.

The advantage of Starflash lies in its technical performance. Its emergence reflects that domestic enterprises have the ability to launch international advanced communication technology standards. We should still be proud of this.

Third, the star flash technology is full of bright spots, which shows that there is still much room for innovation in communication technology.

All along, we have been emphasizing the unity of standards. As a matter of fact, uniform standards are not all benefits.

In standards organizations, for example, the right to speak and the right to vote are often in the hands of giants. The innovation of a small number of enterprises, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, is often ignored. Within the standards organization, there will be a large number of compromises and deals over time.

The original spirit of challenge is gradually fading away. A young dragon slayer becomes an evil dragon in the end.

Does the standard have to be right? Certainly not.

The application scenarios and requirements of communication are complex. This is especially true for short-range wireless communication technology. Complex scenes call for a variety of technologies. Small technologies tend to be lighter, more concise, and more efficient.

There is an old Chinese saying: if you divide for a long time, you must be together, and for a long time you will be divided. Perhaps allowing multiple standard routes to run side by side, even for a few years, will stimulate greater technological progress.

All right, that's all for today's article. Thank you for your patience in reading. I'll see you next time!

-- The End--

Reference:

1. "White Paper on the industrialization of Star Sparkle Wireless short distance Communication Technology (SparkLink1.0)"

2. "the all-wireless era is coming!" Huawei Star Flash let Bluetooth completely defeat, what on earth can it do? "Ray Science and Technology

3. "kill Bluetooth in seconds! What on earth is Huawei's "Star Flash"? "Oh, flash.

4. "Starshine: connecting the intelligent world at hand", brain polar body

5. "Star Flash Alliance air port technology is not completely compared with 5G and WiFi, Chinese version of 3GPP+IEEE?", paper plane, Zhihu

6. "Starshine has arrived, lighting up the new possibilities of the Internet of everything", CICC Research

7. Huawei developer Conference and Xingshen's official website.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: fresh Jujube classroom (ID:xzclasscom), author: Xiaozaojun

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