Guest house wifi access

[Big Jim]

A local business contacted me today and would like me to come and look at setting up wifi access for his guests.

So far what I know
1 - approx 30 rooms
2 - not all rooms in same building
3 - 2 "blocks of rooms" close enough to run cat 5, others much further with a road (private) and "some grass" inbetween.
4 - internet speed currently 0.5mb, owner is looking at satellite, and I have reccomended he look at a company called Zycom who do some kind of funky antenna based internet access
5 - furthest block from main lobby."hotel" is approx 250metres away.

Owner is willing to put in 2 dedicated lines if a single line wouldn't have enough capacity.
Neither of us are sure what kind of data usage a hotel/guesthouse has per room per month
I think the owner was expecting me to do this fully wireless, the only wireless solutions I have ever come across lose half the bandwidth every time you bounce the signal to the next WAP.
How far can you transmit a wireless signal ?
I am wary of the block of buildings that is across a road and a patch of grass, are we in digging the ground up territory here ?
There is a possibility that I can use powerline adapters but I won't know for sure until I get on site, which poses another questions, is there a maximum distance for powerline adapters ?

obviously until I go and inspect the site properly I won't be able to fully gauge exactly what is going on.

Is there anything that I have missed ?

 

[Markverhyden]

.5mb? I would do some actual testing to verify the real WAN performance. But if that really is what they have my recommendation would be to get something better before spending on the LAN build out. Advertising Internet Access but delivering late 1990's speeds is not going to help with customer satisfaction.

 

[glennd]

agreed. that's like dial-up speeds. i'm running a netgear wifi repeater a distance of about 75 metres line of sight with negligible loss in speed and very reliable so don't discount that method to get signal around the various buildings.

 

[katz]

If he's looking at satellite, you better have him ask about the data caps. With 30 rooms, he'll probably reach the limit in a day or two...Sat. internet access is a pain here in the US, especially when trying to share with multiple tenants.

 

[Markverhyden]

agreed. that's like dial-up speeds. i'm running a netgear wifi repeater a distance of about 75 metres line of sight with negligible loss in speed and very reliable so don't discount that method to get signal around the various buildings.

As has been mentioned Ubiquity makes some great stuff. I've done work at some camp grounds using AP's that are a few hundred feet apart and they still deliver respectable performance. Don't remember the brands though. At any rate using certain antenna's, such as a Yagi can help a lot if the devices have a external coax connector.

 

[PCSupportGlasgow]

As others have said ubiquiti a good route to go down

Unifi's for the APs as required and couple of M5s to bridge between the 2 buildings but you will be able to see requirements better once you've inspected the clients premises.

My main concern is internet speed. 0.5 will only lead to constant complaints from guests and satellite broadband will hit caps fairly quickly.

Personally I would see about a solution for his broadband first and foremost before i even thought about installing WiFi (as it will be you he will be constantly blaming for guests slow internet speeds).

 

[wardoursecure]

I am installing Unbiquti today in a 30 room hotel, it should fine for what you need
You can get some decent building to building antenna to extend to the ones further away, I know Solwise and TP Link do some decent CPE ones, I am sure Ubiquiti do also.

I agree get the broadband sorted first of all.
You are not that far from me if you need a hand

 

[Big Jim]

I'm sure he mentioned a 30GB data cap.
I should be visiting this afternoon so can report back *hopefully* with more detail later on

Out of interest, assuming that we block file sharing (not sure how best to do this either at this point) how much bandwidth will they typically use.

a per room basis would be fine, I have googled for some stats but found nothing yet.


If they can't get decent satellite what other options do they have ?
There is a company local to here call Zycomm who do an antenna base w3z broadband service which I believe goes up to 20mb.
which leads to the further question what kind of speed does a 30 room hotel need for broadband ?
would 2 x 20mb cut it ?

and would you keep them separate or load balance them ?


Also using stronger APs like the ones mentioned from Ubiquity do they suffer the same halved bandwidth every time you bridge it to another AP ?

How exactly do the M5s work ?
Do they only talk to each other and other APs or can you have the guests connect to those as well ?

 

[PCSupportGlasgow]

I'm sure he mentioned a 30GB data cap.
I should be visiting this afternoon so can report back *hopefully* with more detail later on

Out of interest, assuming that we block file sharing (not sure how best to do this either at this point) how much bandwidth will they typically use.

a per room basis would be fine, I have googled for some stats but found nothing yet.


If they can't get decent satellite what other options do they have ?
There is a company local to here call Zycomm who do an antenna base w3z broadband service which I believe goes up to 20mb.
which leads to the further question what kind of speed does a 30 room hotel need for broadband ?
would 2 x 20mb cut it ?

and would you keep them separate or load balance them ?


Also using stronger APs like the ones mentioned from Ubiquity do they suffer the same halved bandwidth every time you bridge it to another AP ?

How exactly do the M5s work ?
Do they only talk to each other and other APs or can you have the guests connect to those as well ?

how much bandwidth is a piece of string question as will depend on actual guests browsing habits. we have a couple of hotels who work fine on a 20meg broadband connection but also have others who load balance fibre connections. but on a whole your probably fine with 20meg. having said that if 30gb data cap that not going to cut it as will end up with massive bill every month.

regarding bridge i have a feeling your confusing yourself with repeater mode.

M5s =

obviously you'll be nowhere near the distance but still pretty cool job to get.

 

[Big Jim]

I'm back now.

Have had to go via Google earth to get a decent site layout however.

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In the picture you can see the main building on the right which currently offers guest wifi access, they however want it in the 30 rooms which are all in small clusters of 2 or 3 rooms which are then joined by double car ports into 3 main "structures" (highlighted in red) and the building I have highlighted at the bottom is a separate 5 room guest building that also needs wifi.


Your thoughts would be appreciated

 

[Markverhyden]

Looks like the space is fine given the distances. What is the external and internal wall construction of the buildings? Brick, concrete, stone will cause big signal loss.

As far as limits for users. Pretty much every site similar to your customers that I have seen limit bandwidth to 1mb. That's actually been specified in some the SLA's I've seen. The limits are setup in the AP's from what I have seen. On this side of the pond almost all of the public WLAN's have a Terms and Condition's splash page that the user must agree to before gaining access. Below is one from a local restaurant chain you can look at for reference.

 

[Big Jim]

The main building and the one at th bottom of the site are both constructed of stone (haven't been inside the bottom building though so don't know internal construction) But the owner did mention he had that built himself so I would guess at brick internals.

the other buildings appear to be porta-cabin like in their construction (I could be wrong).

As I am probably pushing my capabilities here I would be extremely appreciative of your help.
What exact equipment would you use ?
What method of "repeating" would you use ?

 

[Markverhyden]

If it was me I would take the time to do a wireless survey. The real thing can cost a lot and be very involved. But, as the saying goes, there is more than one way to skin a cat. All you need is a wireless access point, laptop with wireless, with http://www.inssider.com/inssider4/ installed, and a paper map of the site. The AP can just be a newer residential router. No need for it to connect to the Internet. Just plug it in different spots and walk around with the laptop marking down the signal strength at various locations on the map. And you just keep moving the AP around to different buildings and locations. This will help you build a coverage map which will also give you potential locations for the AP's.

There is also http://www.ekahau.com/wifidesign/ekahau-heatmapper which is much more detailed. There are also iOS and Droid version of wireless signal strength tools available.

 

[NJW]

the other buildings appear to be porta-cabin like in their construction

Beware of metallised film insulation/moisture barrier in the walls. You think they're nicely radio-transparent, but they're really Faraday cages.

 

[wardoursecure]

If you are a NETGEAR partner you could get them to do a free survey, it will at least give you an idea of range and number of APs

 

[Big Jim]

Doing a site survey will be imperative with this site, I think that almost goes without saying. This bit I can handle, it's something I have done before.

The bit I am stuck on is how I link the amount of devices I am going to need.
Are there any particular types of AP that are "super strength" for this type of application to get maximum coverage with minimum devices.

And then of course.
How exactly should I be bridging these things ?
Do I need specific APs to be able to bounce the signal without losing half bandwidth each time ?


Thanks