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Mid-Range Wireless Deployment for the Home User?
ronin78 asks: "My father just bought a five-acre farm with multiple buildings. I am looking for a way to set up a WLAN that covers the entire property. All I have been able to find are commercial solutions from various providers, all of which are close to or above a thousand dollars and measure coverage area in miles. Do Slashdot readers know how to provide wireless access for more than one house without blanketing the entire neighborhood (hopefully for a reasonable price)? Are there single, high-powered routers that will do the job?"
I have a five acre farm, and the wireless from my airport in the house makes it to my sheds, etc., about 100 ft. away - I do, however, have the external antenna.
I strongly suspect that, if you simply put a standard, commodity wireless access point w/antenna on the top of a mast, that will give you most of the coverage you're looking for - at least as long as you have line of site to the mast.
Alternatively, you can plant an access point anywhere there's power and link them together. But I doubt it's necessary.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
without blanketing the entire neighborhood
This is the part of your request that you're going to have a bit of trouble with. RF energy is a bit like water: it goes where it wants.
Sure, if you were spraying water instead of RF energy, you could put a different nozzle on the hose to change the spray pattern, change the flow rate to control how far you spray, dig ditches to direct the water, etc.
With the RF all you can do is put a different nozzle (antenna) on the hose (access point) and adjust the flow rate (power output). Unfortunatly there are no easy ditches to dig for e-mag waves!
The above only considers one approach to keeping your neighbors off of your network, which I assume is your end goal really. There are lots of other options that I don't know as much about. Things like WPA and captive portals.
Hope this hepls some,
Brett
I'd follow the use the cheap LinkSys gear (or build something fancy with a Soekris box) but also pick up some old 100M MultiMode(MM) transcievers that have a FE on one side and fiber on the other. Since you've got 5 acres (not that big honestly), i'd stick to wired for everything possible, it will also provide you the best reliability. Use some pvc pipe or conduit to keep it weatherproof outside and you'll be done and have reliable networking that can be upgraded in the future to gigabit and faster as needed.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&cate gory=61816&item=5768462963&rd=1
we use them to cover the out side of out buildings. coupled with the correct airport they should go a couple of miles line of sight.
You might want to check out some of the Pre-N wireless comming on the market.
Pre-N Wireless Router Model WGM124 NETGEAR's Pre-N Wireless Router is the best performing router based on Airgo True MIMO(TM) available with up to 8x the wireless coverage and speed than standard 802.11g.
Belkin Wireless Pre-N Router 800% greater coverage than standard 802.11g - Belkin Pre-N provides the industry's best wireless coverage, extending your range with improved reliability and fewer drops.
The FCC limits 802.11 power so buying expensive access points isn't going increase your range.
soekris boards, if you can afford them, have the advantage of "power over ethernet" and no moving parts, plus they fit nicely into a weather proof boxes so can be mounted high up. If you don't need these advantages any old sub $50 access points should work.
If you're really on a budget you can build your own.
Mostly, it's all about the antennas. In some experimetns I've read about, directional antennas have enabled signals to broadcast and receive across several kilometers (line of site). Check out these guys to see what's available as far as antennas go.
Also, sign up for the bay area wireless mailing list while you're building this. This is one of the better lists I've been on. There are some people that really know their stuff and you'll get lots of help and advice.
Hope that helps.
I've currently set up a network in my neighbourhood with 4 other houses, distances of about 50-100m (I'm only capable of using the metric system), with walls and such, and have succeeded quite easily using WRT54G's in every apartment, using a custom firmware (sveasoft) with both WDS capability, and ability to alter the transmission power (I have doubled it to about 50mw), and this works like a charm with speeds varying from 1 - 2Mbs. The whole thing is rather cheap (~70$ for each WRT54G) and works like a charm for 8 months now, and with WDS you can build a grid of access points...
---- Fear the mighty TsEA
Forget linksys for this job - if you want coverage. Their radios are the worst in aspects of sensitivity and power output - *both* are very important. If you modify the firmware and up the power they tend to run hot - and still at only a third as strong as better ones. I don't know why the IT industry is so slow to wake up to this. Go with SMC Elite Connect or Senao/Engenious for your AP. You can get a Seneo for around $150 and with a good antennae it will probably cover almost the whole area. They are the legal maximum for power output and have better sensitivity than either cisco or orinoco. SMC is practically just as good. Don't even ask how they compare with linksys. They also do wds so if you want to expand or add later then you can. In addition the build quality of these things is excellent, much nicer than linksys and much more value for your money, IMO.
But take my word for it, check it out for yourself or take a suggestion from seattle wireless. Ask the pros what they use.
While five acres is small by almost any standard for a farm, a lot of a farm's productivity has to do with where it's located. Having grown up in the (very fertile) Willamette Valley in Oregon, I can tell you that a five acre "gentleman's farm" can be productive enough to generate a meager income if managed right, and certainly is large enough for sustinence living. Three acres in alfalfa (hay), an acre for small livestock (goats, chickens, sheep, pigs, etc.), half an acre in vegetable garden, and the remaining half an acre for living space and outbuidings is a good model for income (mostly on hay, eggs and vegetables). Carve another two acres out of the hay field for more garden and/or livestock area, and you've got a sustinence farm that will support two or three families quite well.
OTOH, five acres in the Eastern Oregon high desert makes for a good barrier between you and your neighbors and not much else.
The Spoon
Updated 6/28/2011
If for some reason you really want to keep your signals, for the most part, on the property, you could add some reflectors behind the antennas of whatever radios you end up using. They'll get you some increase in strength on the property and really cut down on 'escapee' radiation.
If you did high school physics and remember raytracing and interference from the optics portion, you can easily design your own reflectors.
If not, use your favorite search engine to find the hyperphysics book at gsu.edu I forget the exact link.
Another option for keeping the signal on te property requires wire in the form of a 'leaky line' antenna. This is a transmission line that is designed to leak some portion of the applied power/unit of length. Some research will get you the design parameters.
Here, I just run a wide open AP. Karmic balance sought as I make use of any opens I find when away from home.