Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Mid-Range Wireless Deployment for the Home User?

Posted by Cliff on from the wireless-networking-for-estates dept.

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?"

4 of 69 comments (clear)

  1. Previous "Ask Slashdot" by Mendy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/02/03/21 2210&tid=193&tid=222&tid=4 might be of interest

  2. Five Acre Farm? by mrgrey · · Score: 5, Funny

    Did you just call five acres a farm? Hah! What city did you grow up in?

    --
    -Tolerate my intolerance
  3. 5 Acres isn't all that big by Fished · · Score: 5, Informative
    An acre is roughly 40000 square feet, meaning a square acre is only 200 ft on a side. That means that your father's farm, if it's roughly square, is probably only 300 ft from center-to-edge. (Obviously, if the shape varies, that changes.)

    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
  4. Controling where the RF goes by WonderSnatch · · Score: 5, Informative

    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