Sign up with GoogleI have created a website that contains this entire thread
in summary form with links and how the whole setup will cost
you R1400 for a Linksys Access Point
http://sawireless.tripod.com/
Register at yahoo groups with the aim of pooling money together
to import Linksys wireless gear in bulk. www.arrowaltech.co.za
might be able to help us.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sawireless
---------------------
Wireless deployment in South-Africa.
Use the word 'wireless' in subject heading or your e-mail to me will bounce. sawireless2000@yahoo.com
Share an ADSL connection via wi-fi.
A 50km point-to-point link between Waterkloof and Sandton for
R150 000
Neighberhood perimeter street monitoring using www.locustworld.com meshboxes with firewire CCD cameras, infra-red spotlight for long distance nightvision and opensource http://oap.sourceforge.net Linux software for advanced intruder motion detection. www.intrancesoftworks.com is used for a Windows based street perimeter monitoring solution.
Why the new 802.16 Wi-Fi standard will make ICASA irrelevant.
Wireless meshes will replace Telco's http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.10/wireless.html
"Ons vlerkies is geknip wat betref wireless..." Andries Matthysen - ICASA 18 February 2004 , direct communication to me
50km backbone link
The cost to individual users to connect to the 50km Sandton-Waterkloof backbone at each respective node, is listed in the table below: Equipment Price Vendor1 Vendor2
Linksys WAP54G Access Point R700 www.buy.com 2
Vagi Antenna 14dBi R300 www.fab-corp.com
http://www.wisp-router.com/index.php?cPath=43
www.poynting.co.za www.cantenna.com
Weatherproof box R100 Mica Hdware store
20 meter ethernet cable R60 Pc outlet
N-Male to RPTNC Cable length/type: 18" LMR 100 R140 http://www.cantenna.com/catalogue/PG01.html www.cantenna.com
Antenna mast R100 Hardware store
Total R1400
An example of a p-t-p link: http://www.d128.com/wireless
A point-to-point link over 50km from Sandton to Waterkloof can be created, using various antenna designs such as yagi, parabolic and vagi.The most used is the Parabolic obtainable from www.poynting.co.za and www.fab-corp.com With a beamwidth of 8 degrees an Icasa approved D-link Access point (100mw) can transmit a signal over 21km. It is a directional beam so there is no interference to other transmitters.
The cost of a base station or node is R7500 if installed on a roof. A Waterkloof - Sandton backbone link could cost anywhere between R75 000 and R150 000 depending on the number of LOS issues. The repeater node cost is shared by the local users at that node. The cost of a highsite R7500 is shared by the users at that node. So for 50 users each would have to pay R150 to get a highsite up and running. Hundreds of users can be connected to each backbone node. The participants in each initial node can become a mini-ISP and sell internet bandwidth to their neighbours.
If only 200 users participate to establish this 50km backbone, it would cost each a measly R750 plus the additional R1400 for the Access Point on his own house. This is an opensource initiative, but nothing forbids the node owners from making money out of it.
Such a point-to-point link is known as the wireless backbone. The 802.11b local meshnetworks connect to this backbone. The backbone terminates in a www.is.co.za peering point.
With direct line of sight (LOS) only two tower-setups are needed. If there is no direct line of sight(LOS) one or mulitple repeater stations are installed. The 802.11g (2.4ghz band) or 802.11a (5.8ghz band) are used for the p-t-p link. 802.11g provides effective bandwidth of 22meg as does 802.11a. 802.11a's antenna's and AP are a bit more expensive. Two netgear 802.11a AP's can be combined to create an effective bandwidth of 50meg on a p-t-p link.
This 50km link would need at least 20 hops or base-stations with Access Point and repeater gear on each. A node station has a repeater(back-to-back antenna) and an Access Point along the 50km route. Each meshnetwork/council connects to the basestation closest to them.
Selection for the base station gear is between boxed AP like www.d-link.co.za, Linksys , Trendnet or Netgear. The other option is to use www.locustworld.com meshboxes. The meshbox motherboard must be at least Pentium III to deal with video compression. Taiwan's VIA technologies www.via.com.tw mini-ITX motherboards are popular with www.locustworld.com and usually deployed to form a local mesh of interconnecting nodes. The Senao 200mw PCI wi-fi cards are popular with locustworld. You can view them at www.ultramesh.com Help with installing free Linux locustworld software can be obtained from the Tuks Linux users group and many other.
Let's deal with the www.locustworld.com first. It is the most efficient solution. Every hop on the 50km backbone needs a repeater. To create a repeater you place two Locustworld meshboxes back to back. Each box has a parabolic antenna. The signal is received by the first parabolic and relayed to the meshbox besides it via cat5 ethernet cable. The second box sends this signal to the next node with each node/hop repeating the signal. Or a single motherboard with two PCI slots can be used on each basestation/hop. Each slot of the motherboard takes a PCI-wi-fi adapter card. A parabolic is connected to each wi-fi card with LM-400 microwave cable. The parabolics are mounted back-to-back.
On the multi-hop p-t-p link only the PC's at Waterkloof and Sandton can communicate thus far. To allow users to connect to each repeater node (Randburg, Valhalla) along the length of the backbone an extra PC with it's own Yagi/omni antenna at each of the 20 node's are added. So you will have three antenna's at each node. Two for a back-to-back repeater pair, the third is used to uplink the users at that relevant node.
There are various options with the free www.locustworld.com software
Three meshboxes with two back-to-back and one meshbox as the uplink to the surounding users at the respective node. All three PC's are interconnected via ethernet.
Two PC's one with two PCI slots and one mini-ITX motherboard. Both PC's connected via Ethernet. The PC with two PCI slots has a PCI AP inserted in each, with a parabolic antenna connected to each Access point. The parabolic antenna's on the one PC with two Access Points are mounted back-to-back, this forms the repeater.
One PC with three PCI slots. Each PCI slot has a PCI Access Point, with each Access point connected to an Antenna. Two Antenna's, back-to-back (parabolic) form the repeater , the third (Yagi, 90 degree sectorised or Omni) provides the uplink for the users at the relevant node (Randburg).
Costwise One PC with with three PCI wi-fi cards is the preferred solution.
Cost analysis P-T-P repeater node with www.locustworld.com mesh boxes. Equipment Price
One Pentium PC, three PCI slots running Locustworld opensource Linux software.
www.locustworld.com 1500
LM-400 microwave cable. This cable connects the Access Point to the Antenna. After paying customs it works out to R13,61 /m. Obtain from www.fab-corp.com The db loss per meter is 0.22db. A 10 meter run of cable attenuates the signal by 2.2dB In most cases basestation PC need not be installed on roof. 123
Three RP-SMA connectors. This is the pigtail connector to the antenna at R85 each.
http://nocat.net/connectors.html
This http://www.cantenna.com
site has a query form to provide all connector combinations for any Access Point. http://www.connectorcity.com/cdocs/m_cat.php3?cat=1
255
N-Male connects to Access point, three of these at R50 each 150
Three PCI Access Points at R800 each 2400
One Weatherproof box for PentiumIII PC 240
Weatherproof box clamps 100
Three antenna clamps. Two for the parabolics and one for the yagi local node. R100 + R100 + R80
280
Two parabolic antenna's at R500 each and one Yagi local node antenna for R500. R500 + R500 + R500.
5.8ghz and 2.4ghz parabolics can be obtained from
http://www.wisp-router.com/index.php?cPath=43
www.poynting.co.za
www.fab-corp.com
1500
AC power cable
100
Highsite on top of a roof is much cheaper than constructing a tower.
600
R 7500
To reduce costs even further custom Access Points like Linksys WAP11, D-link, Netgear is used to connect to the backbone Meshboxes. 30 users connects to one Linksys. This Linksys can't interface directly to a Locust meshbox, but interfaces to another Liksys connected via ethernet to a PC. This PC interfaces via ethernet into the Locust Meshbox for back-bone access. It is R1400 more expensive per user to use a meshbox for every single user. This solution where 30 users connect to a Linksys WAP 11, makes initial costs dirt cheap.
A backbone link can also be created using ICASA approved D-link Access Points. http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=22 The D-Link DWL-900AP+ Enhanced 2.4GHz (802.11b) Wireless Access Point is popular in South-Africa. www.d-link.co.za The D-link AP is placed in repeater mode with two AP connected back-to-back with ethernet cable. You will have to add a PC to enable local node uploads. Compare local prices with www.buy.com or www.pricewatch.com Pricewatch is the best place to look for companies that does international shipping. To justify the shipping cost of an Access Point, add motherboards that you would have bought locally.
A D-link/Locust combination can be used to create up to 100 nodes from Waterkloof to Sandton with low power Omni-directional and directional antenna's like Vagi's. Each Access point introduces a lag of 5ms. VoIP can still function with lag of 400ms. Dropped packets are more of a problem, the Locust Mesh Linux software solves this.
The further nodes are appart the more the signal is attenuated. Use parabolics to obtain max bitrate. Parabolic is the prefered antenna to reduce interference because it's beamwidth is so tight.
Article on building a local repeater http://www.pcchatshow.com/articles/showarticle.php?ArticleID=287
To create a repeater node with Linksys WAP11 connect them back-to-back each on a different channel with crossover ethernet cable
http://www.radio-active.net.au/web/80211/repeater.html .
Perimeter street security
Neighberhood perimeter street monitoring using www.locustworld.com meshboxes with firewire CCD cameras, infra-red spotlight for long distance nightvision and opensource www.oap.sourceforge.net Linux software for advanced intruder motion detection. www.intrancesoftworks.com is used for a Windows based street perimeter monitoring solution.
Four meshboxes are deployed at the street corners. Each box has one Omni-directional antenna, with a camera eye on the street behind, in front and at the sides of your home. All four boxes communicate with each other via Locust software. A security company watches the streets with a wi-fi uplink. The fact that a camera is recording all activity in the street is huge deterrent against crime. Just watching your own stoep with closed circuit wont work. Protect your neighbour and you protect yourself.
The video motion detection software is advanced enough to detect motion past the camera, alert the security company with an alarm and a real-time picture.
A CCD or charge coupled device camera has nightvision capabilities in the presence of an Infra-red illumination source. LED's only provide a distance of 10m. An invisible infra-red spotlight provides a 100 meters , better than expensive Russian nightvision goggles.
The infra-red spotlight can be obtained from www.amazing1.com
ICASA and 802.16
To deploy a wireless network and shift the legal blame to somebody else: Establish a commercial WISP company. This company 'sells' you a service (at cost of course) installs the equipment and takes full legal responsibility. The regulator has a case against the commercial providers, not against the subscribers to their service. So if an opensource mesh establishes their own 'commercial' company with Joe Soap as the director.... , then poor 'Joe' will have to take the rap , if there is ever a clamp down on the commercial providers.
In my discussion with Andries Matthysen he confirmed that if any action would be taken against www.wisp.co.za it will only be against the directors, not the subscribers.
Icasa recommended that the directors of Megawan be prosecuted not their subscribers. (The police and prosecutors ignored Icasa) There is no legal difference between subscribing to Joe Soap's commercial wisp or to our present commercial wisp's.
The ANC is more concerned with connecting the disadvantaged outlying communities to the Internet than protecting Telkom eternally. The whole idea with the multi-billion Rand roll out of copper wires to their constituency was to empower the poor. It was an abysmal failure that saddled Telkom with massive debts. All government achieved was to introduced many to the metallurgical industry. Telkom has withdrawn all services to them. It is this void that wi-fi and specifically 802.16 can fill. The government has made a long term strategic decision to allow Wi-Fi , as they get rid of their Telkom shares. It is for this reason that they will not rewrite the law to squash Wi-Fi and why the prosecutors will not pursue anybody under as existing legislation as it is to vague. (As long as you don't stuff up Telkom's highsites).
The new 802.16e/d Wi-Fi technology can be used to leapfrog over fiber deployment and set up a phone network. 802.16e provides 70meg bandwidth over 50km radius, Non-line of site from a single Omni-directional antenna in the 2.4ghz band. The main innovation is the Non-line of site. http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20030714S0037
in summary form with links and how the whole setup will cost
you R1400 for a Linksys Access Point
http://sawireless.tripod.com/
Register at yahoo groups with the aim of pooling money together
to import Linksys wireless gear in bulk. www.arrowaltech.co.za
might be able to help us.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sawireless
---------------------
Wireless deployment in South-Africa.
Use the word 'wireless' in subject heading or your e-mail to me will bounce. sawireless2000@yahoo.com
Share an ADSL connection via wi-fi.
A 50km point-to-point link between Waterkloof and Sandton for
R150 000
Neighberhood perimeter street monitoring using www.locustworld.com meshboxes with firewire CCD cameras, infra-red spotlight for long distance nightvision and opensource http://oap.sourceforge.net Linux software for advanced intruder motion detection. www.intrancesoftworks.com is used for a Windows based street perimeter monitoring solution.
Why the new 802.16 Wi-Fi standard will make ICASA irrelevant.
Wireless meshes will replace Telco's http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.10/wireless.html
"Ons vlerkies is geknip wat betref wireless..." Andries Matthysen - ICASA 18 February 2004 , direct communication to me
50km backbone link
The cost to individual users to connect to the 50km Sandton-Waterkloof backbone at each respective node, is listed in the table below: Equipment Price Vendor1 Vendor2
Linksys WAP54G Access Point R700 www.buy.com 2
Vagi Antenna 14dBi R300 www.fab-corp.com
http://www.wisp-router.com/index.php?cPath=43
www.poynting.co.za www.cantenna.com
Weatherproof box R100 Mica Hdware store
20 meter ethernet cable R60 Pc outlet
N-Male to RPTNC Cable length/type: 18" LMR 100 R140 http://www.cantenna.com/catalogue/PG01.html www.cantenna.com
Antenna mast R100 Hardware store
Total R1400
An example of a p-t-p link: http://www.d128.com/wireless
A point-to-point link over 50km from Sandton to Waterkloof can be created, using various antenna designs such as yagi, parabolic and vagi.The most used is the Parabolic obtainable from www.poynting.co.za and www.fab-corp.com With a beamwidth of 8 degrees an Icasa approved D-link Access point (100mw) can transmit a signal over 21km. It is a directional beam so there is no interference to other transmitters.
The cost of a base station or node is R7500 if installed on a roof. A Waterkloof - Sandton backbone link could cost anywhere between R75 000 and R150 000 depending on the number of LOS issues. The repeater node cost is shared by the local users at that node. The cost of a highsite R7500 is shared by the users at that node. So for 50 users each would have to pay R150 to get a highsite up and running. Hundreds of users can be connected to each backbone node. The participants in each initial node can become a mini-ISP and sell internet bandwidth to their neighbours.
If only 200 users participate to establish this 50km backbone, it would cost each a measly R750 plus the additional R1400 for the Access Point on his own house. This is an opensource initiative, but nothing forbids the node owners from making money out of it.
Such a point-to-point link is known as the wireless backbone. The 802.11b local meshnetworks connect to this backbone. The backbone terminates in a www.is.co.za peering point.
With direct line of sight (LOS) only two tower-setups are needed. If there is no direct line of sight(LOS) one or mulitple repeater stations are installed. The 802.11g (2.4ghz band) or 802.11a (5.8ghz band) are used for the p-t-p link. 802.11g provides effective bandwidth of 22meg as does 802.11a. 802.11a's antenna's and AP are a bit more expensive. Two netgear 802.11a AP's can be combined to create an effective bandwidth of 50meg on a p-t-p link.
This 50km link would need at least 20 hops or base-stations with Access Point and repeater gear on each. A node station has a repeater(back-to-back antenna) and an Access Point along the 50km route. Each meshnetwork/council connects to the basestation closest to them.
Selection for the base station gear is between boxed AP like www.d-link.co.za, Linksys , Trendnet or Netgear. The other option is to use www.locustworld.com meshboxes. The meshbox motherboard must be at least Pentium III to deal with video compression. Taiwan's VIA technologies www.via.com.tw mini-ITX motherboards are popular with www.locustworld.com and usually deployed to form a local mesh of interconnecting nodes. The Senao 200mw PCI wi-fi cards are popular with locustworld. You can view them at www.ultramesh.com Help with installing free Linux locustworld software can be obtained from the Tuks Linux users group and many other.
Let's deal with the www.locustworld.com first. It is the most efficient solution. Every hop on the 50km backbone needs a repeater. To create a repeater you place two Locustworld meshboxes back to back. Each box has a parabolic antenna. The signal is received by the first parabolic and relayed to the meshbox besides it via cat5 ethernet cable. The second box sends this signal to the next node with each node/hop repeating the signal. Or a single motherboard with two PCI slots can be used on each basestation/hop. Each slot of the motherboard takes a PCI-wi-fi adapter card. A parabolic is connected to each wi-fi card with LM-400 microwave cable. The parabolics are mounted back-to-back.
On the multi-hop p-t-p link only the PC's at Waterkloof and Sandton can communicate thus far. To allow users to connect to each repeater node (Randburg, Valhalla) along the length of the backbone an extra PC with it's own Yagi/omni antenna at each of the 20 node's are added. So you will have three antenna's at each node. Two for a back-to-back repeater pair, the third is used to uplink the users at that relevant node.
There are various options with the free www.locustworld.com software
Three meshboxes with two back-to-back and one meshbox as the uplink to the surounding users at the respective node. All three PC's are interconnected via ethernet.
Two PC's one with two PCI slots and one mini-ITX motherboard. Both PC's connected via Ethernet. The PC with two PCI slots has a PCI AP inserted in each, with a parabolic antenna connected to each Access point. The parabolic antenna's on the one PC with two Access Points are mounted back-to-back, this forms the repeater.
One PC with three PCI slots. Each PCI slot has a PCI Access Point, with each Access point connected to an Antenna. Two Antenna's, back-to-back (parabolic) form the repeater , the third (Yagi, 90 degree sectorised or Omni) provides the uplink for the users at the relevant node (Randburg).
Costwise One PC with with three PCI wi-fi cards is the preferred solution.
Cost analysis P-T-P repeater node with www.locustworld.com mesh boxes. Equipment Price
One Pentium PC, three PCI slots running Locustworld opensource Linux software.
www.locustworld.com 1500
LM-400 microwave cable. This cable connects the Access Point to the Antenna. After paying customs it works out to R13,61 /m. Obtain from www.fab-corp.com The db loss per meter is 0.22db. A 10 meter run of cable attenuates the signal by 2.2dB In most cases basestation PC need not be installed on roof. 123
Three RP-SMA connectors. This is the pigtail connector to the antenna at R85 each.
http://nocat.net/connectors.html
This http://www.cantenna.com
site has a query form to provide all connector combinations for any Access Point. http://www.connectorcity.com/cdocs/m_cat.php3?cat=1
255
N-Male connects to Access point, three of these at R50 each 150
Three PCI Access Points at R800 each 2400
One Weatherproof box for PentiumIII PC 240
Weatherproof box clamps 100
Three antenna clamps. Two for the parabolics and one for the yagi local node. R100 + R100 + R80
280
Two parabolic antenna's at R500 each and one Yagi local node antenna for R500. R500 + R500 + R500.
5.8ghz and 2.4ghz parabolics can be obtained from
http://www.wisp-router.com/index.php?cPath=43
www.poynting.co.za
www.fab-corp.com
1500
AC power cable
100
Highsite on top of a roof is much cheaper than constructing a tower.
600
R 7500
To reduce costs even further custom Access Points like Linksys WAP11, D-link, Netgear is used to connect to the backbone Meshboxes. 30 users connects to one Linksys. This Linksys can't interface directly to a Locust meshbox, but interfaces to another Liksys connected via ethernet to a PC. This PC interfaces via ethernet into the Locust Meshbox for back-bone access. It is R1400 more expensive per user to use a meshbox for every single user. This solution where 30 users connect to a Linksys WAP 11, makes initial costs dirt cheap.
A backbone link can also be created using ICASA approved D-link Access Points. http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=22 The D-Link DWL-900AP+ Enhanced 2.4GHz (802.11b) Wireless Access Point is popular in South-Africa. www.d-link.co.za The D-link AP is placed in repeater mode with two AP connected back-to-back with ethernet cable. You will have to add a PC to enable local node uploads. Compare local prices with www.buy.com or www.pricewatch.com Pricewatch is the best place to look for companies that does international shipping. To justify the shipping cost of an Access Point, add motherboards that you would have bought locally.
A D-link/Locust combination can be used to create up to 100 nodes from Waterkloof to Sandton with low power Omni-directional and directional antenna's like Vagi's. Each Access point introduces a lag of 5ms. VoIP can still function with lag of 400ms. Dropped packets are more of a problem, the Locust Mesh Linux software solves this.
The further nodes are appart the more the signal is attenuated. Use parabolics to obtain max bitrate. Parabolic is the prefered antenna to reduce interference because it's beamwidth is so tight.
Article on building a local repeater http://www.pcchatshow.com/articles/showarticle.php?ArticleID=287
To create a repeater node with Linksys WAP11 connect them back-to-back each on a different channel with crossover ethernet cable
http://www.radio-active.net.au/web/80211/repeater.html .
Perimeter street security
Neighberhood perimeter street monitoring using www.locustworld.com meshboxes with firewire CCD cameras, infra-red spotlight for long distance nightvision and opensource www.oap.sourceforge.net Linux software for advanced intruder motion detection. www.intrancesoftworks.com is used for a Windows based street perimeter monitoring solution.
Four meshboxes are deployed at the street corners. Each box has one Omni-directional antenna, with a camera eye on the street behind, in front and at the sides of your home. All four boxes communicate with each other via Locust software. A security company watches the streets with a wi-fi uplink. The fact that a camera is recording all activity in the street is huge deterrent against crime. Just watching your own stoep with closed circuit wont work. Protect your neighbour and you protect yourself.
The video motion detection software is advanced enough to detect motion past the camera, alert the security company with an alarm and a real-time picture.
A CCD or charge coupled device camera has nightvision capabilities in the presence of an Infra-red illumination source. LED's only provide a distance of 10m. An invisible infra-red spotlight provides a 100 meters , better than expensive Russian nightvision goggles.
The infra-red spotlight can be obtained from www.amazing1.com
ICASA and 802.16
To deploy a wireless network and shift the legal blame to somebody else: Establish a commercial WISP company. This company 'sells' you a service (at cost of course) installs the equipment and takes full legal responsibility. The regulator has a case against the commercial providers, not against the subscribers to their service. So if an opensource mesh establishes their own 'commercial' company with Joe Soap as the director.... , then poor 'Joe' will have to take the rap , if there is ever a clamp down on the commercial providers.
In my discussion with Andries Matthysen he confirmed that if any action would be taken against www.wisp.co.za it will only be against the directors, not the subscribers.
Icasa recommended that the directors of Megawan be prosecuted not their subscribers. (The police and prosecutors ignored Icasa) There is no legal difference between subscribing to Joe Soap's commercial wisp or to our present commercial wisp's.
The ANC is more concerned with connecting the disadvantaged outlying communities to the Internet than protecting Telkom eternally. The whole idea with the multi-billion Rand roll out of copper wires to their constituency was to empower the poor. It was an abysmal failure that saddled Telkom with massive debts. All government achieved was to introduced many to the metallurgical industry. Telkom has withdrawn all services to them. It is this void that wi-fi and specifically 802.16 can fill. The government has made a long term strategic decision to allow Wi-Fi , as they get rid of their Telkom shares. It is for this reason that they will not rewrite the law to squash Wi-Fi and why the prosecutors will not pursue anybody under as existing legislation as it is to vague. (As long as you don't stuff up Telkom's highsites).
The new 802.16e/d Wi-Fi technology can be used to leapfrog over fiber deployment and set up a phone network. 802.16e provides 70meg bandwidth over 50km radius, Non-line of site from a single Omni-directional antenna in the 2.4ghz band. The main innovation is the Non-line of site. http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20030714S0037
]