Internet access on a farm in Mpumalanga

[shrick]

Hi there

I'm planning to moving from Cape Town to a farm in Mpumalanga Province. The nearest town that has ADSL and 3G is about 50km away - straight line. Only available communication on the farm is a very bad Telkom land line and very slow GPRS, obviously not suitable for proper internet access.

My needs are at least 512k connection with 10GB traffic per month.

Telkom VSAT Satellite internet will cost me a fortune. Its just unbelievable what they charge for it. Heres a quick calculation of what it will cost me per month. Lets say I pay the installation cost up front (R3100). Then per month its going to cost me:

1. Rental, that includes 3GB 'data volume' - R1300
2. Additional 'data volume' to get it to 10GB - R475 x 6 = R2850
3. ISP bandwidth cost +- R500

Thus, total of R4650!

My other option is to try and get ADSL relayed to the farm via some kind of wireless technology like microwave antennas. I'll get somebody in the nearest town that has ADSL, fit the first antenna there. The first line of sight point is about 25km away. Will fit the 2nd antenna there. The last point is on the farm, another 25km away. I'm waiting for a quote for installing such a setup, but it looks like its going to cost anything between R10k and R25k. With this option the biggest cost is up from, but at least I'll have a proper internet connection with low latency. Are there Any concerns with the microwave antennas that I must be aware of?

I think a third option is probably to go with some international VSAT Satellite provider? But I don't know how to go about here?

Anyway, any suggestions will be appreciated. The frustration of getting communication in remote areas is such a pain!

Any advice will be much appreciated.

Thanks

 

[|tera|]

I live in Mpumalanga

Generally, I would suggest getting two sim cards to test, a Vodacom and MTN.

For instance, I'm away from home at the moment and where I am MTN signal is full strength, but Voda, CellC and Virgin gives me 1 bar at this moment.

If you say you can get a GPRS signal there, I'm pretty sure if you test both Voda and MTN and see where you can get a good enough signal, it could be possible to get a data modem and some data bundles.

I'm sure where I am right now (a few k's from Sabie in the mountains) it will be possible to get 3G here or even HSDPA with MTN's signal, but my phone only supports GPRS.

You'll have to find out the legal aspects of transmitting ADSL over a distance like you're planning, I'm not sure, but I think it's illegal.

Anyways, just a few thoughts, hope some of the guys has more

 

[medicnick83]

The frustration of getting communication in remote areas is such a pain!

Move into the city

 

[Yotch]

I would agree with tera on first trying to receive HSDPA. If the signal is weak you could either try to connect using an external grid antenna or a Yagi. According to this link some of the 2.4GHz WiFi grid antennas will also work very well at lower frequencies such as 2.1GHz (HSDPA). Maybe you can e-mail somebody at Miro (www.miro.co.za) to enquire whether or not any of their grid antennae might be suitable.
http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/tutorials/print.php/3713661
Cantenna design for HSDPA at 2.1GHz
http://www.rfshop.com.au/ContactUs/Bloggs/tabid/648/EntryID/2/Default.aspx
Long Whirlpool discussion on HSDPA antennae
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm/799422.html

Alternatively you could either modify this 850MHz design for an OWA Yagi for 2.1GHz (shouldn't cost more than ~R100 to construct) which apparently performs very well
http://www.perite.com/vk7jj/NextGYagi.htm
or purchase something suitable from Poynting (probably quite expensive though).
http://www.poynting.co.za/products/brochure/POYNTING - YAGI-A0016.pdf
http://www.poynting.co.za/products/brochure/POYNTING - LPDA-A0021.pdf

 

[[OUPA]MrNutz]

yip...go 2.4ghz wireless..

i've worked with Telkom VSAT/Cybertrade VSAT - don't waste your money.

packetloss / poor latency / poor performance and EXPENSIVE.

build your own wireless link...u'll be MUCH happier and even with proper administration can get a farmer/home or 2 hooked to help out with rent (paying back for equipment)

 

[The_Unbeliever]

Ahhh..... this so brings back the memories of living in Machadodorp - having only a 16k radio link for dialups which drops regularly the moment any kind of car drove past your house

Or, if you want a proper connection, then you have to get an ISDN line. Telkom techie tole myself that it's either wireless for analogue dialup, or wired ISDN lines.

Bah, humbug. Not much you can do with a 16k link, except watching your money being sucked up.

Like Tera said, try out both MTN and Vodacom data cards and see if your transfer rate'll be good enough.

Good luck.

 

[shrick]

Guys, thanks for the info... very much appreciated.

With regards to cell phone providers. The signal with Vodacom is basically non-existent. Only MTN gives a very slow GPRS connection. 40k down and 5k up! Thus, cell phone network - not an option.

Very glad to hear that satellite is a waste of money. Thats exactly what I was afraid of, paying all that money and getting nothing for it.

I'm definitely continueing with the wireless network option.

Yotch, thanks for all the links and info. Gonna look into them ASAP and will get in contact with Miro.

We did some geographical research this weekend. We'll be able to do the network with 1 hop in the middel. Thus, 1st antenna at a house giving the 4mbit ADSL access. The hop will be about 20km away, on top of grain silos - very secure and excellent line of sight. The last site is the roof of the storage building on the farm, about 25km away, also with excellent line of sight.

Will keep you up to date.

Thanks again.

 

[ajax]

Seeing that you will be making hops, I thought I'd just add a few comments from my side. I am sharing an ADSL connection with 2 other friends via 2.4 GHz links. After getting at best about 500 kbit/sec transfer when trying to copy a file over the network to another friend on our "network" I googled a bit. It turns out that these links suffer from a "hidden transmitter" problem and a rule of thumb is that each hop halves the max speed you can get. After playing around with RTS values we were able to get a max speed of 1 Mbit/sec.

My point is that I think if you have not installed the ADSL line yet, maybe start off with a 384k line and then test the local speed on the links first. If you can't get more than few hundred kbits/sec anyway then what's the point in using a 4Mbit ADSL line?

 

[johannlemmer]

Internet access everywhere

If any one want internet access in the country site they should contact one of the CompuMission networks. In Mpumalanga you should contact Petrus von Wiellich at 0829482610 for fast and effective internet and phone services that really works excellent. CompuMission is generally available on 0861114207 during office hours.

 

[MickeyD]

If any one want internet access in the country site they should contact one of the CompuMission networks. In Mpumalanga you should contact Petrus von Wiellich at 0829482610 for fast and effective internet and phone services that really works excellent. CompuMission is generally available on 0861114207 during office hours.

You are 3 years too late...

RAS

 

[protzkrog]

rofl

 

[Venomous]

You are 3 years too late...

RAS

What he said!

 

[willemvdm]

Oh, started reading the thread intently, just to find its an old thread. Can't MBB implement some sort of system that will highlight threads started more than say 6 months ogo or better yet, some user selectable time value.