Broadband in the bushveld and fibre close to the North Pole

You got to do, what you got to do! I'm still trying to find a way to get fibre to my house..
 
It's called digital migration... people will follow where there is decent connectivity especially in nice rural settings , way out of the cities.

It's happening around the world, but not near the same pace here in SA of course.

The issues are un-knowledgeable and incompetent ministers and the ruling party's system to keep it's voter base uneducated and ignorant.
 
A great innovation.

Fortunate, though, that the typical rural thief doesn't browse mybb - three solar panels AND a free SIM subscription could prove too tempting.
 
Also, I avoided the OOB monster, by asking Vodacom to make the plan purely "prepaid" even though it is on contract, thus no OOB. Apparently that is an option these days. Finally.
 
entrepr said:
A great innovation.
Click to expand...

Not so much an innovation as it was "execution". The stuff exists, off the shelf, and we just had to put it together to make it all work.

I give props to the Belanet guys in the region, who pretty much use this kind of setup to build their WISP backbone network in the area.
 
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What's the power use like on the 3G router?

What happens to the site after three or four cloudy days?

How much performance are you losing from shade caused by the nearby trees and bushes?
 
The 3G USB + Mikrotik draws about 10 watts, which can make the battery last up to 25 hours, given zero charge from the panels.

The trees you see are actually not affecting the panels as they are north facing and the shadow of them doesn't fall on the panels. Picking the location and orientation was important. Also, trees in the bush can be sorted out pronto with a bit of labour.

Given the 90 watts of the combined panels, which will still probably eke out at least 5-6 watts during terribly cloudy days, and low power usage at night due to not much traffic, I'd guess the system will probably last for at least a week, before choking.

After which, a secondary battery or tertiary battery will probably keep the thing alive for way longer.
 
At least it's relatively easy to get to. Not six hours in low range just to deliver new batteries.

I like what you've done. A lot.

If you're happy that the panels and battery will hold charge, then my only personal concern would be security.

If it were me, I'd add a GSM Commander with a Centurion gate remote to deactivate it when the door's opened, a couple of digital tamper switches from Regal Security, a moerse siren and pepper gas. If you're feeling really windgat, ACDC do some nice LED floodlights that don't use much power and scare intruders off. The key here is those digital tamper switches. If somebody as much as touches a padlock on our remote sites, we know about it and can then start switching lights on and doing nice things with sirens and gas.
 
One last question. Again, I like this a lot...

This link is obviously stable. Can you legally and physically run voip on it? The legal part concerns me.
 
portcullis said:
If you're happy that the panels and battery will hold charge, then my only personal concern would be security.
Click to expand...

Fortunately, not that much of a concern in this location, but yes, one could go quite vigorous with the security. Considering the capital outlay though, and the time to intervene if it were six hours away, you have to live with the risks.
 
portcullis said:
One last question. Again, I like this a lot...

This link is obviously stable. Can you legally and physically run voip on it? The legal part concerns me.
Click to expand...

Can you run Skype-Out over HSDPA ? Is that illegal? The EU just declared all traffic equal, and if you use a little bit of encryption there is no way VC or MTN could even detect it. Even a basic VPN setup will defeat their efforts. As for the physical part -- latency and everything else certainly allows for numerous calls.


Supplying VOIP services is not illegal, as long as it's within the ambit of the law. VC and MTN may try to charge "extra" for VOIP calls, but it's a battle they cannot win.

It would be similar to VC and MTN banning Whatsapp, or charging per Whatsapp message, because it's eating into their ridiculous SMS revenue. Their concerns about Voice revenue is just that. A concern established 15 years ago, which hasn't kept abreast of the times.

But they all know that OTT is going to eat their OOB. As a contract subscriber for 18+ years I've always been at the arse end of operator policies. Maybe it's time they get a feel of the arse end too.
 
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