We are looking for a recommendation on the equipment to use for deploying a
WiFi network.

We have a T1 at our location and we only use 512 at most. We are looking at
allowing other people in our complex use the internet access, for a small
fee.

Anybody have experience with WiFi equipment that they are happy with and is
easy to setup. We are on a budget like everybody.

Thanks in advance.

How many users are you expecting to sign up? How large is your complex? And
what is your budget approximately?

Becuase you can use anything from a Linksys Router + custom firmware, to
higher end Cisco hardware.

We have about 50 people, each building has about 15 units and the buildings
are about 50' apart.

Thanks for the reply.


Show quoteHide quote

Show quote Hide quote The T1 maybe a problem... A WiFi Access Point (802.11b) can sustain
about 5mbps and that would saturate your T1 5x over. So make sure your
router or access point has the ability to throttle the connection down
to 512kbps.

Since the buildings are 50' apart, do you have the ability to run
cabling between the buildings? Depending on the size of these buildingss
and the types of walls, 1 access point per building may work... or in
another case, you might need 1 access point PER unit!

For something like this... you'll probably need a consultant who can do
a site survey for you.

As for equipment, I'll leave that someone else in the group : )

Lucas Tam wrote:

Show quoteHide quoteWhat in blue blazes are you talking about? If the T1 is slower than the
AP, I don't think any throttling is going to be necessary. How do you
saturate a 5 meg network with half a meg of bandwidth?

Now you're talking sense.

Rôgêr <ab***@your.isp.com> wrote in news:9uudnU_KBePVKrXfRVn-
p*@pghconnect.com:

A T1 = 1.5mbps
802.11b AP = ~5mbps

5mbps / 1.5mbps = 3x

The WiFi network will saturate the T1.

What in blue blazes are YOU talking about?

Lucas Tam wrote:
Show quoteHide quoteYes, that means there is room for 3 T1s on that network. Having less
than the maximum doesn't saturate it.

I know you mean well, but you really are looking at this backwards. The
data stream coming in at 1.54Mbs is not going to get saturated by having
5-7Mbs of bandwidth headroom. If you want to look at the old standby
plumbing analogy, this is like saying a 3/4" water supply pipe is going
to overload a 2" pipe because the 2" pipe is much bigger.

Rôgêr <ab***@your.isp.com> wrote in news:IcOdnZViCOhfYrXfRVn-
u*@pghconnect.com:

I think we're looking from different directions - I'm looking it from the
direction of the WiFi clients. The WiFi clients will gobble up all the
bandwidth on the T1 that there will be nothing left for the OP - hence that
is why I said an AP would "saturate your T1 5x over".

Lucas Tam wrote:

Okay, I'm starting to see your point of view. However, in the real world
that usually only happens when you have everyone trying to use the
maximum bandwidth of the T1 at the same time. A full T1 (1.54Mb) can
usually feed 50 customers at broadband speeds in real life. This is
because out of 50 customers there is likely to be only two or three
actively doing a download or upload at the same time, many times it's
really only one or nobody doing it. Where this falls apart is primarily
in file sharing, where someone can hook up three or four computers to a
wireless client and line up a zillion songs to be downloaded on each
using PTP. Not only are their downloads eating the bandwidth, all their
new songs in their "My Shared Documents" folder are now getting uploaded
to other file sharers. Video streaming, VOIP and other applications can
be killers too, but in *normal* situations, a T1 will feed a bunch of
customers. A little bandwidth management can go a long way when it gets
out of hand.

Rôgêr <ab***@your.isp.com> wrote:
Show quoteHide quoteThere is not enough room on the T1 to hold all the potential
traffic originated by the wireless network going towards the
Internet.

As he said, the *T1* will be saturated.

He isn't.

The traffic going out could be as much as 5-7Mbs, and *that*
is going to saturate the 1.5Mbps T1.

Incidentally, to be pedanic, it should never be called
"1.54Mbs".  It actually will deliver a payload of 1.536Mbps,
hence it is commonly rounded off to 1.5Mbps.  The raw data rate
on a T1 is 1.544Mbps, and saying it is 1.54Mbps suggests the raw
rate, not the payload, or framed, rate.  Unframed would deliver
1.544Mbps, but nobody in their right mind does that (which is
to say, only the US Government orders unframed T1 service).

Besides, it isn't a T1 either!  It's a DS1.

(Is that enough pedantry for one afternoon?)

Water pipes are half duplex, and our T1 is full duplex while the
wireless network is simplex.  In other words, there are *two*
3/4" pipes, not one.

In addition to the 3/4" supply, there is a 3/4" backflow pipe.
That 2" pipe has a couple valves and it can drain water from one
pipe, or supply water to the other.  Obviously the 3/4" supply
line won't saturate the 2" pipe... and just as obviously the 2"
line *will* saturate that 3/4" backflow line.

Show quote Hide quote Hi,

I'm not going to join in any hardware discussion/debates, as wifi hardware
preferences tends to be -- well, quite subjective -- however, if you are
looking for software to act as a "Wifi Gateway" in the future then I can't
say enough good things about a program called "ZoneCD".  I just started
using it recently for an open, neighborly, "hot spot" I have and it has
proved to be really cool.  Its free (cost and GNU licensed), open source,
and Linux based.  No Linux knowledge is required though, as it runs straight
of a live CD.  Just burn it onto a CDR, throw it into any box with two NICs,
and it turns that box into a turnkey "Wifi Gateway".

http://www.publicip.net/

Cheers,
-Eric

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