Creating a Hotspot over a large area

Evening all,

I am currently looking at providing internet access to users over a large area. The area is Approx 8 square miles of fairly even ground.

I'm in the process of pricing up leased lines to provide the required bandwidth, but there are two 2 question that are left unanswered and was wondering if anyone could possibly help?

1. what bandwidth would be required for 3500 users (approx)?

2. What equipment would be needed to cover this area and how could it be implemented?

Any help on this matter would be greatly apprieciated.

Many Thanks

Pete.

Where are you gonna throw this? 3500 users would be a New Zealand record - all at once? wow! Not even Telecom or CafeNet would get a fraction of that on a daily basis...

Who are you potential customers? What contention ratio are you thinking of offering? how much international bandwidth are you gonna need? are you going to peer at APE or WIX or peer at all? Are you running mesh? or just simply a bunch of unconnected hotspots?

Big job here mate! hope your pockets are deep!

3500 users on a single wireless network would be a nightmare, even if you had a lot of low power access points with a wired backbone it would still be a nightmare. Hell, even 3500 clients on a wired network is hard.

As far as bandwidth required, how long is a piece of string? It depends on whether the users are checking their emails, or leeching ISOs. If you work it to be a contention ratio of something like 50:1 and supply each user "2Mbit" it would work out to be ~140Mbit, which you could never deliver over 1 access point. This is assuming all the users are connected at once, or on a regular basis. Work out how many users are to be connected at once and use that number, rather than total number of users.

As for equipment, I'd try to run an access point with external antenna for every square mile to start with. Link the access points together with a 100Mbit network. This is quite a big job you've got here and I can't offer much more advice as I've never implemented anything near the size you're trying to do.

Many thanks for your help guy's.

I am looking at supplying service to miltary personnel in the UK. I understand that this is a heavy task but it is one that i am looking quite seriously as the potential of users could easly rise t 8000+.

The Lease line providers have quoted me for 150M bandwidth MAX for each line, so it looks like i need a leased line of each access point.

Noddles - you stated that i would need and access point for each square mile, would repeaters not do the job or can top of the range access points not handle the bandwith?

A 150Mbit/s line per access point would be a waste, if you're using 802.11g then you can only get a theoritical maximum of 54Mbit out of an access point.

I'd do something like this:

AP's connected via 100Mbit network to a network center where you connect your leased lines, handle internet caching, DNS, DHCP etc

repeaters would not handle the job as they would just be repeating the AP's signal and you cannot connect that many people to an access point. When you add more access points in, then you can connect more people.

Peter Hi : I run a wireless business in Canada - And you have to do some major planning for this type of project -- Step 1 -- 3500 People is a huge # however in my business if 3500 pleople wnated the service I would only be able to get a quality signal to maybe 20-40% of them . Hard to promise things with #'s like that - However an 8Sqr Mile area could be serviced by a strategically placed tower - Testing heights in the area are imparative As wireless signal are not like radio waves - shadows are created on far sides of hills - forests and big buildings. A mulitple tower approach mite be best but like the BroadBand Guy Says U had better be a millionair or be backed by the governemnt - You say the area is fairly flat - so towers of extreem height may not be needed good locations must be strategically planned - One bad tower placement could mean alot of lost revenue. Anyway be sure you can hit everyone who absolutly needs it and that you have the ability to get access to go locations within range of them -- Range is not an issue If you didnt have to worry about shaddowing you could simply put up a big tower and get signal to everyone - OUR longets shot is 16.5 KM 10Miles so in a 8Sqr mile area ( If it was the Desert _ you could hit everyone --- In that sanario however The masses of peole you rae talking about Military installations or large Business or complexes Access points are not going to like that much action It also mite be better in the planning stages to set up some smaller Internl networks. Lemme know what stages your in and maybe we can talk some more through email if your still intersted and the $ factor hasnet csared u off yet. Bandy