Suggestions for Deployment

[kipcrist]

My company is bringing wireless internet to a subdivision of about 300 homes over approximately .35 square miles (2000'x4000') with no point further than 2000' from the gateway address. The only trees are one small line about 500' south of the main gateway; the foliage is about 30 feet deep, 70' high, and relatively sparse (can easily see the houses on the other side). Other than that, the subdivision has no more than a 10' change in elevation from all the residences.
We were initially going to use Cisco APs but ran into some funding issues. The rep recommended Ubiquiti products (or a combination of Cisco backhaul w/Ubiquiti repeaters) and so here I am. We have a site survey scheduled in a couple weeks and I'm looking for some ideas on how to best deploy the network (either 100% Ubiquiti, or the combination as listed above).
Some of the limitations:
Must use residences as attachment points for APs.
Can only have one gateway AP to the internet.
Ability for most users to need no additional equipment other than their built in cards.

I'm also very interested in the differences between deploying as Mesh or just using the APs as repeaters....and whatever other options exist.

Thank you very much for your responses!

[WHT]

Ability for most users to need no additional equipment other than their built in cards. Blogs and newsgroups are flooded with people trying to get a wireless connection MERELY to the other side of their house.

The point I'm trying to make is you need an AP at least every five hundred feet or so. Earthlink and other mesh dreams found out how hard it is to get a signal indoors to a laptop.

Figure on about eight APs that WDS back to a central AP., assuming each AP only needs to support 30 to 35 actively connected users, i.e using the internet.

[kipcrist]

We planned to try an AP every 500 feet. But I still need to know what the best way is to do this using Ubiquiti products.

[WHT]

Figure on about eight APs that WDS back to a central AP., assuming each AP only needs to support 30 to 35 actively connected users, i.e using the internet.

[kipcrist]

I've included an image of the subdivision with APs marked. Each circle has a radius of 500 feet. Anyone have any suggestions for what each of these APs should have as their hardware? There is less than a 15' change in topography throughout the entire subdivision and it is only possible to have one Gateway.

http://www.casualcomputing.net/Subdivision.jpg

[WHT]

Nanostation 2 with external 14 dBi antenna (after circuit board trace loss it would be a 12 dBi gain). Also cut out the hole to the SMA connector fully seats.

One good quality router would work as a gateway, not a $49 Linksys that will choke past a dozen users.

[pshakanet]

The problem that you're going to run into with this is that your central AP/gateway unit that's hosting the other APs is going to be a prime Point of Failure (POF), which will cripple the entire network each time it goes down.

Make sure that your WDS hops are reliable and functional; a hop that isn't stable will become a sore thumb once you realize that the distance is too far, and you can't move it around.

Also, be sure to bring in a high-speed line to support it. At 35 users/AP, a 3 MB line isn't going to cut it.

In the end, more APs is better in cases like this one, as it gives you more reliability in cases of failure.

[WHT]

The problem that you're going to run into with this is that your central AP/gateway unit that's hosting the other APs is going to be a prime Point of Failure (POF)No different than a backhaul link. and that's done all the time. There really isn't anyway around that, other than spare radios and a warm jacket.

[rconaway]

Some gateways support failover. However, 3Mbps may or may not support your users depending on the type of user they are. In one community I have 260 users on 7.5Mbps and they rarely average over 1 Mbps.

Instead of NS2's, why wouldn't you use Bullets?

[WHT]

Instead of NS2's, why wouldn't you use Bullets?
The 6 dBi antenna thing... GRRRRRRRR

[rconaway]

Oh yea, rules. My bad.

[WHT]

My sarcasm detection meter just went off the scale. :lol:

[rconaway]

At least we know the reason for the rule.