Wi-Fi inside of 20 floor residential building

[xoid]

Hello!

Could you please share with your ideas about how we can distribute Wi-Fi network inside of residential building appartments? They are looks like on the following link:

Last mile provided by wireless backhaul is located at top of building.

Unfortunately, we can't run cables (CAT5E) inside of building. Also please be advised about walls are concrete.

Only way is to set up wireless network to provide Wi-Fi signal coverage inside of apparments.

Thank you in advance!

 

[crashnburn]

I'd like to see how this is solved.

 

[scotty]

I'll throw in my two sense just for shirts and giggles.

First, I would be forced to question why you can't run cat5 cables in the building... If you're doing this as your own pet project I can understand, but it sounds like it's the sort of thing that's sanctioned by the building owners. Running cat5 in buildings, at least to the riser rooms is usually disgustingly easy. You'll already have demarcation from the last mile provider likely in a riser room, so I would obviously question why this is a problem... Riser rooms are typically one on top of the others with cable pipes already installed, so you don't even need to be an expert at fishing.

That said, you can still run various wireless systems, you'll just have to do some sort of point to point wireless distribution system (which you would need anyway). Many of them rely on the access points being hard wired in, but you can still get away with not. What you're looking for is a business grade wireless system that supports peering, repeating, etc. Beyond a handful of access points, you typically want to run a wireless controller of some kind (that centrally controls and manages the whole gambit of AP's). D-Link has a variety of products in this area that aren't too expensive (read: Cisco 4400).

Throw that in with a router of some kind, perhaps one that supports a captive portal (as soon as users connected and open their browser, they have to enter in a username/password to 'connect'). With a captive portal you could then control access to the system very easily. You might also want to look at a router that supports traffic shaping of some kind, so your building's P2P users don't totally flog the connection. You can do all of this for free with something like pfsense (the most popular Linux/BSD based router software - free, easy to install, easy to manage (no command line), and has the features of a $3000+ router). But you'll want a router that supports some features like this. Honestly, pfsense would fit the bill perfectly here (you can run it on just about any hardware).

Personally, I've done a few systems like this, but typically with much higher end gear (Cisco 4400 controllers - about $12,000 a pop). But I've 'seen' a few places that have a slick D-Link setup and it really is slick. The Cisco stuff is slick if you have a budget ($20 - $50K). Mosey on over to D-Link website and have a look at some of their business grade gear, specifically their wireless controllers and that'll start giving you an idea of what you're looking for.

If you're on a super-non-existent budget, you can try getting a boatload of WRT54GL's and putting the alternative f/w on them. I've heard of a friend doing this for a roughly similar setup and supposedly it worked decently (although he's always replacing a dead WRT).

 

[thiggins]

Concrete construction will really make signal distribution difficult. If the building is wired with coax for cable TV, then you should consider a MoCA or coax based network.

Or if there is no coax, consider powerline, at least for floor to floor backbone.

Corinex has systems for multidwelling (MDU) network distribution.

Also try a Google search like this for other companies.

For all wireless, you might be able to do it with a Mesh type network. But throughput might be only a few Mbps due to multiple hops. I have used Strix
systems at tradeshows and they seemed to work well.
http://strixsystems.com/products/iws.asp

 

[msabo]

Several years ago a friend of mine faced a similar issue with a high rise hotel. I suggested he look at an outdoor solution with a directional high gain (19 dBi) antenna I found. This solution worked like a champ and saved a bunch of money over the original architecture. The system is still running, but last I heard it now has several even higher gain antennas for better coverage and more capacity. They connected the system up on a street light in the parking lot. I see from your photo that there is a street light in the picture. If it’s on the property that might work for you as well.

 

[xoid]

First solution:Running CAT5E cables inside of building.
Thank you.
We are not staying on front of choice which equipment or billing/traffic management system to use.
We have system in place, instead of Building itself. Thank you again for technical advice!

Of course it is easy to run CAT5 and install for example, D-Link DES-1228P and DWL-3140AP. In this case we will get good network management. Also we don't need to run electrical cables as DWL-3140AP will be powered by DES-1228P with PoE(power over ethernet) functions.

What we need to do in case length of the CAT5E cable will exceed 120 meters? Also building wasn't supplied with communication wells and we should drill halls in the appartment walls, which is not appreciated by building owner.

***

Second solution
Thanks! This is a good solution. Motorolla offering similar equipment - connecting Network over electricity cables.

***
3rd solution:
I like this solution as well. We can try to direct signal from nearest building, but possibly window glasses will reflect signal and provide poor coverage inside of appartment.

P.S. Once we will complete with project I will inform you about which solution we prefered.

Thanks to everybody again!

 

[Foggy_UK]

I aggree with "Scotty", you need to look out for the riser rooms in a building like this, that's what they are there for. Drop cat5e down to each floor from the back haul location in the roof area, and as your running cable it might as well be a run to each floor wheather you use it or not at the start, you might use it later on and doing now will save a lot of time/money later. Scotty's other points are all very valid so I'm not going to repeate them, but I'll 2nd them !

Concrete construction is going to give you some issues with long wireless hops or hops through muiltple walls, but having a access point on each floor (or every other floor) in the middle of the building should reduce black spots within the apartments.

Phill.

 

[msabo]

In my experience, commercial building glass attenuates 2.4 GHz signals on the order of 7dB, but I've seen coated glass much worse. Obviously the concrete will have very high attenuation. Here's an example of an antenna I was thinking of. I don't know this company or their products, its just an example.
http://www.radiolabs.com/products/antennas/2.4gig/2.4grid.php

You could implement this in a MIMO configuration, by the way.

On the subscriber side, here's an interesting product. Again, I've never used this product, so I can't speak to it's performance. I just think its interesting simple solution for directional gain on the subscriber side.
http://www.hawkingtech.com/products/productlist.php?CatID=32&FamID=60&ProdID=280

Best of luck!

 

[thiggins]

What we need to do in case length of the CAT5E cable will exceed 120 meters?

The cable length limitation is 100M. All you would need to do is put a switch every 100M.

Or use a Ethernet-to-Fiber converter for long runs.

 

[msabo]

In the original post you said, “Unfortunately, we can't run cables (CAT5E) inside of building”. I was therefore assuming you were acting as a “gorilla” service provider to the building tenants because you didn't have access to run cabling.

If you can run cabling, then come from the roof to the 10th floor and connect to a 24 port Ethernet hub. From there run one cat 5 cable to each floor and terminate on a wireless router. That method keeps your Ethernet run lengths within spec and keeps the hops within spec.

 

[MetroWiFi]

Strong bias below, I work for the company.....

BelAir Networks makes equipment designed for this application. We have nodes with multiple radios so you can link from the roof to radios on poles around the building and using separate access radios and internal high gain antennas, beam into the apartments. No Ethernet to run, real, supported solution.

http://www.belairnetworks.com

I think our closest rep is in Turkey.

email Bill Cuming for details bcuming@belairnetworks.com