Baseband Vs. Broadband

Baseband uses digital signaling over a single frequency. Transmits bi-directionally.

Broadband Uses analog signaling over a range of frequencies. Transmits uni-directionally. Uses amplifiers for signal regeneration.

The previous poster kinda has it backwards. Baseband is digital. It will send a signal (a 0 or 1) in one direction at a time as the signal uses either the whole bandwidth or none of it as it's message. Broadband on the other hand will use many frequencies along the same path. Broadband is analogue. It can handle many 1's and 0's travelling down its path at any one time in either direction.
Baseband is used in most cabled networks such as in an office while broadband is used in satelite, phoneline access(dial-up, dsl). For an example, look at cable tv, you do get lots of channels but you can only watch one at a time...that is baseband, for broadband, look what can be done with a phone line..you can use the phone, fax and internet all at the same time.

Mike

MDL3,

At the risk of REALLY confusing you...

Baseband is indeed digital. Only one signal can be transmitted from point A to point B on a single wire on any given time. Baseband is very limited in its usage. An Ethernet LAN is baseband.

Broadband is analog. Using different frequencies, multiple signals can travel on a single wire. The phone in your house is broadband. When you are talking to someone on the phone and your call-waiting goes off, that means that two signals were on the line at the same time.

DSL uses broadband. That is why you can be surfing the Internet and talk on the phone using the same phone line.

And contrary to the previous answer, cable television is also broadband. Lets say you have 100 channels. All 100 channels are coming into the back of your TV. Each channel is broadcast on the same wire, but all have different frequencies. Your tv has what is called a demultiplexer. By selecting a channel, the demultiplexer pipes a single frequency to your screen. If you have picture-in-picture on your tv, you can get two signals transmitted to your screen.

Net Tek;
did I get it correct? is that how it is?
any other comments will be wellcome!
Thanks again!
MDL3

Let me clearify some misinformation that you have been given.

Baseband uses a digital signal. Signals are transmitted without frequency shifting. There is typically only one channel available for use. In the case of 10BaseT, it uses 7.5MHz. (just an FYI)

Most common use for Baseband is Ethernet. Such flavors would be:
10Base2, 10Base5, 10BaseT, 100BaseT, 100BaseT4,100BaseTX, and a plethora more. The "Base" in all of these indicate Baseband. The media that caries these signals could be Cat3,Cat4,Cat5, Cat5e,Various Coaxes, Fiber Optic cable, Wireless communitcations in several different forms.

Baseband primarily uses a bus type of topology.
Bluetooth uses baseband Technology.
Communication is Bi-directional.

Broadband is analog or digital.
Communication is unidirectional.
It is capable of multiple channels across a single tranmission medium. Each channel having its own specfic frequency range. (frequency division multiplexing)
Topology can be bus or tree.
Broadband is used for a lot of things. Cable TV, Telephone, DSL, Cable Modems, and YES, Ethernet.

Phone companies use MUXes (multiplexers) to carry multiple phone lines on a given media. If not for this, there would have to be a pair of copper for EVERY phone line in the world. Not very practical.

To contradict what one answer said, ethernet can use broadband. Though the technology that uses it is pretty much dead. TO say ethernet is only baseband is blatently wrong. I won't hand you the answer to this one, but search for 10Broad-36. ;-)

Cellphones use broadband technology.
CDMA (code division multiple access)
TDMA (time domain multiple access)
GSM (Global System for Mobile communications)

What else do you want to know? Sorry if this ia all confusing. I was having fun writing it.

Let keep this simple. A signal you use as is is baseband. A multiplexed signal is broadband. Both may be either unidirectinal or bidirectional. The multiplexing may be either FDM ( seperate freqency for each signal - ie cable TV) or TDM (Seperate Timeslot for each signal ie SONET). SDM does not count. Nor does digital/analog. For those who think cable TV is only unidirectional, they do not have upgraded digital systems which use a return path for PPV, VOD, voice and yes cable modems. Also, Callwaiting is baseband - there is only ONE signal on the line at at time.
fyi - the FCC has stated their definition of broadband is anything greater than a BRI.