Wireless broadband

Living out in the sticks, it seems the only viable option for my village is
to talk to wireless broadband providers, and there are two that seem to be
locally touting for business.

Their approach seems to be a 2Mb/s leased line to a central point in the
village, and then all subscribers take a signal from that central point.

The services are offered at 256 Kb/s and 512 Kb/s downstream with 256 Kb/s.

Does anyone have any experience at all with similar services?

I guess I'm looking to understand:
* is the technology suitable to provide a reliable service?
* is the business model appropriate for a long-term solution?
* what negatives are there to this approach?
* what user experience am I likely to have?
* will weather kill signal quality, like it does for BSkyB?

Many thanks to anyone and everyone who can give me a little insight here.

Cheers,
Chris




Chris Walters

Chris Walters wrote:

> Living out in the sticks, it seems the only viable option for my village is
> to talk to wireless broadband providers, and there are two that seem to be
> locally touting for business.
>
> Their approach seems to be a 2Mb/s leased line to a central point in the
> village, and then all subscribers take a signal from that central point.
>
> The services are offered at 256 Kb/s and 512 Kb/s downstream with 256 Kb/s.


That seems strange. see below.


>
> Does anyone have any experience at all with similar services?
>


Yes, but I am biassed, since I am helping possibly one such of thos
companies.


> I guess I'm looking to understand:
> * is the technology suitable to provide a reliable service?


Up to a point yes. Typical installations are wifi type technology at low
power and 2.4Ghz. This is very reliable with LINE OF SIGHT up to about
250m with no special antennae, and up to 600-700m with flat plate, or in
extreme case , a small Yagi type array. If bothe ends use directional
antennae, up to 2km is possible for a point-to-point link.

The main drawback is that 2.5Ghz is bang in the abosrption spectrum of
water. Which means that very heavy rain, and trees, present huge
attentuation. In village situations multipath reflection off buildings -
particularly any with steel in them - seems to create a complex
reception pattern, and sometmes recpetion can be drastically altered by
moving the customer antenna a few inches or feet.

Normnally tho, it either works, reliably, or not at all, with one other
proviso. The inexpensive curstomer premise equipment typically used is
not rated for high temperature use - direct sunlight on the cases seems
to be able to knock it off tune enough to render it inoperative. The
answer is to put the antenna, not the receiver, in the window and use a
short downlead :-)



> * is the business model appropriate for a long-term solution?


Thats a harder case to answer. My own calculatins suggest that between
30 and 100 customners per 2Mbps backhaul is teh range between which it
is viable on the longer term, and not worth e.g. BT coming in annd
upgrading the exchange etc. At 2Mbps 100 people is 1Mbps at 50:1
contention if you like - significantly faster than ADSL and normally
fully symmetrical. Since the dominant recurring cost is the actual BT
backhaul itself, there is little point in throttling the link to save on
ISP upstream costs, and little point - due to BT pricing polocy - in
taking less than a 2Mbps link. The actual WiFi setup is normally
equivalent to a 10Mbps LAN, so contention occurs at the backhaul itself.

The optimum location is where there is e.g., a small commercial park in
the village that will take a few higher priced conections to fund teh
domestic customers the traffic patterns actually complement each other
with domestic being mainly weekends and evenings, and business usage
working hours..even better is the possibility of using BT copper, short
hail private fiber, or a poo8int to point radio link to extend the range
of teh expebnsive backahaul to other locations.

The largest commercial problem is that if the setup proves very
successful, it is likely that the local exchange would get upgraded
anyway and BT would come in and take over the market, and if unusccesful
the setup would prove not viable even forgetting the capital expense, on
simply a cash flw baisis. You HAVE to be able to fund the backhaul and
upstream ISP charges.


> * what negatives are there to this approach?


Like any overground line of sight, things can get in the way. It is
expensive compared with BT because they have adopted a 'one price fits
all' policy, and simply won't do the job at all if revenues don't meet
targets


> * what user experience am I likely to have?


Once up and running, very good I would say, depending on upstream
providers by and large.


> * will weather kill signal quality, like it does for BSkyB?


Covered already, but yes, if reception is marginal, rain makes it worse.
However trees seem to be the worst thing of all, and waving trees that
get in the way probably more likely a problem than actual rain.

If these guys are not someone you have talked to, talk to them.

www.ukbroadband.net




>
> Many thanks to anyone and everyone who can give me a little insight here.
>
> Cheers,
> Chris
>
>
>

"The Natural Philosopher" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> Chris Walters wrote:
>
> > Living out in the sticks, it seems the only viable option for my village
is
> > to talk to wireless broadband providers, and there are two that seem to
be
> > locally touting for business.
> >
> > Their approach seems to be a 2Mb/s leased line to a central point in the
> > village, and then all subscribers take a signal from that central point.
> >
> > The services are offered at 256 Kb/s and 512 Kb/s downstream with 256
Kb/s.

<snip>

Many thanks for your thoughts!

Cheers,
Chris

>
>> Living out in the sticks, it seems the only viable option for my village is
>> to talk to wireless broadband providers, and there are two that seem to be
>> locally touting for business.
>> Their approach seems to be a 2Mb/s leased line to a central point in
>>the
>> village, and then all subscribers take a signal from that central point.
>> The services are offered at 256 Kb/s and 512 Kb/s downstream with
>>256 Kb/s.
>
>

If you would like to get in touch direct I can recommend a company which
has done an installation for us in a village in Nottinghamshire. I
would just say that Satellite Wireless Broadband is only just acceptable
when compared with beaming a broadband signal in from a nearby village
which is what we have.

The results are stunning.

CHRIS


--
Chris Wilkinson - Dubna Systems
Due to virus bombardment please note that any email containing a virus will be
automatically deleted and therefore not read.

Martin Underwood wrote:

> "Chris Wilkinson" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
> news:40o5qMRpzRI$(E-Mail Removed)...
>
>>>>Living out in the sticks, it seems the only viable option for my
>>>>
> village is
>
>>>>to talk to wireless broadband providers, and there are two that seem to
>>>>
> be
>
>>>>locally touting for business.
>>>> Their approach seems to be a 2Mb/s leased line to a central point in
>>>>the
>>>>village, and then all subscribers take a signal from that central
>>>>
> point.
>
>>>> The services are offered at 256 Kb/s and 512 Kb/s downstream with
>>>>256 Kb/s.
>>>>
>>>
>>If you would like to get in touch direct I can recommend a company which
>>has done an installation for us in a village in Nottinghamshire. I
>>would just say that Satellite Wireless Broadband is only just acceptable
>>when compared with beaming a broadband signal in from a nearby village
>>which is what we have.
>>
>>The results are stunning.
>>
>
> My village is slightly behind that: we've got an estimate from a company
> (Invisible Networks) to provide the service to several neighbouring villages
> in Oxfordshire and are waiting until we've got the necessary number of firm
> orders. Invisible are quoting thoretical maximum figures of 2 Mbps to the
> Internet (both for upload and for download) and 5 Mbps within our community
> network.
>
> Blewbury and district in Oxfordshire are already up and running with this
> scheme.
>
>
>

Also contact www.ukbroadband.net who are somewhat easier to deal with
than Invisible. And ong more or less teh same thing, but without the
desire to own everything that you have paid for