The technical term for customer premise equipment (CPE) is subscriber station. The generally accepted marketing terms now focus on either "indoor CPE" or "outdoor CPE". There are advantages and disadvantages to both deployment schemes as described below.
Outdoor CPE
Figure 15: An outdoor CPE device
Outdoor CPE, very simply put, offers somewhat better performance over indoor CPE given that WiMAX reception is not impeded by walls of concrete or brick, RF blocking glass or steel in the building's walls. In many cases the subscriber may wish to utilize an outdoor CPE in order to maximize reception via a line of sight connection to the base sta-tion not possible with indoor CPE. Outdoor CPE will cost more than indoor CPE due to a number of factors including extra measures necessary to make outdoor CPE weather re-sistant.
Indoor CPE
Figure 16: Indoor WiMAX CPE, courtesy Motorola
The most significant advantage of indoor over outdoor CPE is that it is installed by the subscriber. This frees the service provider from the expense of "truck roll" or installation. In addition, it can be sold online or in a retail facility thus sparing the service provider a trip to the customer site. Indoor CPE also allows a certain instant gratification for the subscriber in that there is no wait time for installation by the service provider. Currently, many telephone companies require a one month wait between placement of order and in-stallation of T1 or E1 services. In addition, an instant delivery of service is very appeal-ing to the business subscriber in the event of a network outage by the incumbent service provider.
