WIFI Hotspot for Holiday Park

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AndrewThomas

1 post

Wannabe Geek

#86766 13-Jul-2011 06:42

Hi

I'm looking to have a Wifi Hotspot installed for our guests to use.

I'm looking for Wifi to cover a range of about 800 yards at 180 degrees. The transmitter could go on our house roof.

We have an apple Mac.

Our current connection is with BT, but it is very slow, and as we live in Cornwall (the part that has got a fast connection yet) our bandwidth is very limited.

If I set up WIFI my self, would it be unusable due to our slow connection?

If I went via a company like www.wifispark.com do they still use our bandwidth, or does it go via a faster connection?

It must be possible as other holiday parks in the area have WIFI.

Any hints, recommendations welcome.

thank you for any help

raytaylor

3833 posts

Uber Geek

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#493148 14-Jul-2011 00:28

You can do it yourself with a ZyXel hotspot gateway unit, but i suggest you should ask other parks and find out what they use, and get a professional company to provide the service. The ZyXel units are very popular with motels, but wont provide enough coverage.

Planning outdoor wifi generally requires some knowledge of channeling plans, range and how radio waves will move through the air.

180 yards sounds like a rather large caravan park and so one transmitter on the house roof wont be enough. You will need a few repeaters that are properly planned. A professional company nearby should be able to consult with you on the types of repeaters (dual radio / WDS) and types of antennas you will need.

Wifi spark would be a good place to go. They look like they do consulting work as well as sell a good range of gear so they should know what they are doing (since they are currently rolling out their service in 17 parks)
If they install a seperate connection, or use one you provide, i dont know. When i setup a wifi system, i install the backhaul to one of my hill top repeaters instead of use the DSL or park owners own broadband connection.

Ray Taylor

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MaiTechnoKiwi

26 posts

Geek
Inactive user

#497834 26-Jul-2011 01:08

Not trying to push our own products but check out www.maiwifi.co.nz we had products that can do this for you at affordable costs. If I stepped over the line I am sorry but you are looking for an answer, right.

raytaylor

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#497835 26-Jul-2011 01:11

MaiTechnoKiwi: Not trying to push our own products but check out www.maiwifi.co.nz we had products that can do this for you at affordable costs. If I stepped over the line I am sorry but you are looking for an answer, right.

Would probably be cheaper to buy from within the UK because of the shipping cost.

Ray Taylor

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MaiTechnoKiwi

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#497838 26-Jul-2011 01:15

Agree, I misread, thought they said they were from Cromwell in NZ not Cornwall
Thanks...

MaiTechnoKiwi

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Geek
Inactive user

#497840 26-Jul-2011 01:26

This is off the topic abit, but Ray from ruralkiwi.
I looked at your site, you do what Ubernetworks do here in Whangarei, WiFi from the hills, they do most of Northland now. I have partnered with a company that does satillite here to further the signal to more than one house through my routers and hotspot software. Have you concidered this? You have no email contact on your site, I would of used that.

Just editing this, as I see an email link on your profile. will try that. Sorry again.

Clayton, maiwifi

raytaylor

3833 posts

Uber Geek

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#497841 26-Jul-2011 01:30

I too have just misread - I was thinking 800 yards as in 800 sites for campervans and tents.

It might be worth noting that a laptop without much other interference, will go up to 500m direct line of sight from a semi decent access point - at the most.

A smartphone is probably about 100-200m as they have much smaller internal antennas.

And then a laptop / smartphone inside a caravan is going to be around 50-70m if it was only passing through one wall - direct line of sight.

So if i work out that 800 yards = 731 metres, then we add in a whole bunch of caravans in the middle, we arent looking too good. And because caravans are metallic, you are going to have signals bouncing around all over the place creating multipath effects, which will lower the speed, and the effective range to even less.

Ray Taylor

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freitasm

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#497849 26-Jul-2011 07:51

A few off topics replies, which makes confusing reading. So to make it a bit clearer: you will probably need more than one access point to cover the whole area.

Second, most solutions will use your broadband service. I think some may have an option of installing their own stuff (gear, broadband) but that would probably be dependent on number of users and revenue generation forecast for that service.

Your best bet is contact one of these providers because it seems you will need a custom solution.

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MaiTechnoKiwi

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#497884 26-Jul-2011 09:28

800 yards is a very big area to cover.
I would also have to agree you will have to have many routers positioned to cover this area.
Routers can be set up in what is called Mesh mode, allowing them to repeat the signal.

The other cheaper option would be to start by offering a small communial area that could be setup with one router, and extend it from there once ready. At least people would have somewhere to access interent and that is the main point, even if they have to leave their cavavan etc.

Good Luck

Wi-Fi is a complicated game, after 6 years for me I am still learning.
For this reason I would really suggest you go with a provider who can set things up for you and offer
support for your customers.... You will be hopping back and forth sorting peoples connection issues...

MaiTechnoKiwi

26 posts

Geek
Inactive user

#497887 26-Jul-2011 09:34

If I set up WIFI my self, would it be unusable due to our slow connection?

Most setups as mentioned share your existing connection, as you mentioned it is slow for you this
could become a problem if shared with many users at once.
See if a provider can offer a faster connection, would be best..