mountainman
New Around Here
I'm in the process of setting up a wifi network for a summer camp. More of a hotspot, really, internet and email only, no computer to computer access.
The original setup as I took it over had a Hughes.net satellite receiver, Sonicwall router, a D-link AP, and another D-Link at a remote location as a repeater (both D-links had RF amplifiers and big (6') stick antennas. User access was controlled by MAC filtering. This system didn't work well, the repeater barely worked at all and the Sonicwall was flaky, constantly dropping clients, and adding a new user (or an existing user's new device) was a big PITA. There are roughly 60 users, usually with less than a dozen online at any one time, sharing the satellite's 15mbps bandwidth.
I'm replacing the Sonicwall with a Zeroshell box (Zeroshell is a custom Linux distro that turns an old PC into a router, with some neat features). ZS allows me to set up a captive portal for users to login, and they can use any device they want. This part seems to work well.
The issue is the wireless. We're looking at distances around 1000' from the main location where the satellite dish is (the only place where there's a clear view of the sky), and the area is hilly and heavily forested.
My plan is this (see the attached image): Place the router and an AP at the building marked "clubhouse" Purchase two pairs of either Ubiquiti Nanobridge M5 or Engenius ENS500 wireless bridges (5ghz so they don't interfere with the 2.4ghz client connections). From the corner of the clubhouse there's a reasonably good line of sight (the blue lines) to "John" and "Pavilion". Pavilion has reasonably good view of all the cabins on the eastern side of the camp (the 11 cabins on the far east aren't part of our camp). "John" has a limited view of other cabins (except for the line of sight to the clubhouse) but within 100' there's a cabin higher on the hill with a good view so a CAT5 cable from the "John" end of the bridge to an AP on the roof of "Krachtus" cabin would cover most of that side. The concentric circles around the APs are 100, 200, 300, & 400' radius, and most of the buildings are within the 400' circle. I would set the three APs on different channels, with different SSIDs to avoid interference.
I'm not particularly worried about security-- the nearest public access is nearly 800' away on the public road across the lake, and it's remote enough that it's extremely unlikely that anybody would be wardriving around there. Between members, I'm not worried either... I may not even encrypt the wifi since the captive portal takes care of access.
My main questions (other than a general "how does this sound?") are comparison between the Engenius and the Nanobridges (leaning toward the latter based on reviews). I'm told 5ghz does less well with tress in the way, but with a max bridge distance of 628' it shouldn't be that bad? I could go with 900mhz Nanobridges, but they're considerably more expensive.
Any other thoughts?
The original setup as I took it over had a Hughes.net satellite receiver, Sonicwall router, a D-link AP, and another D-Link at a remote location as a repeater (both D-links had RF amplifiers and big (6') stick antennas. User access was controlled by MAC filtering. This system didn't work well, the repeater barely worked at all and the Sonicwall was flaky, constantly dropping clients, and adding a new user (or an existing user's new device) was a big PITA. There are roughly 60 users, usually with less than a dozen online at any one time, sharing the satellite's 15mbps bandwidth.
I'm replacing the Sonicwall with a Zeroshell box (Zeroshell is a custom Linux distro that turns an old PC into a router, with some neat features). ZS allows me to set up a captive portal for users to login, and they can use any device they want. This part seems to work well.
The issue is the wireless. We're looking at distances around 1000' from the main location where the satellite dish is (the only place where there's a clear view of the sky), and the area is hilly and heavily forested.
My plan is this (see the attached image): Place the router and an AP at the building marked "clubhouse" Purchase two pairs of either Ubiquiti Nanobridge M5 or Engenius ENS500 wireless bridges (5ghz so they don't interfere with the 2.4ghz client connections). From the corner of the clubhouse there's a reasonably good line of sight (the blue lines) to "John" and "Pavilion". Pavilion has reasonably good view of all the cabins on the eastern side of the camp (the 11 cabins on the far east aren't part of our camp). "John" has a limited view of other cabins (except for the line of sight to the clubhouse) but within 100' there's a cabin higher on the hill with a good view so a CAT5 cable from the "John" end of the bridge to an AP on the roof of "Krachtus" cabin would cover most of that side. The concentric circles around the APs are 100, 200, 300, & 400' radius, and most of the buildings are within the 400' circle. I would set the three APs on different channels, with different SSIDs to avoid interference.
I'm not particularly worried about security-- the nearest public access is nearly 800' away on the public road across the lake, and it's remote enough that it's extremely unlikely that anybody would be wardriving around there. Between members, I'm not worried either... I may not even encrypt the wifi since the captive portal takes care of access.
My main questions (other than a general "how does this sound?") are comparison between the Engenius and the Nanobridges (leaning toward the latter based on reviews). I'm told 5ghz does less well with tress in the way, but with a max bridge distance of 628' it shouldn't be that bad? I could go with 900mhz Nanobridges, but they're considerably more expensive.
Any other thoughts?
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