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Wireless Networking The Internet Hardware

Introducing The Wi-Fi-Mobile 63

Posted by timothy from the beam-me-sideways dept.
tech writer writes "A Twin Cities tech entrepreneur has retrofitted an old TV-station truck to serve as a roving hot spot for Internet access. His technology firm has blanketed the metropolitan area with WiMax transmitters atop local skyscrapers, so all he needs to do is grab bandwidth using the truck's telescoping mast and convert it to Wi-Fi for use in the vehicle's immediate surroundings. The dude happens to be in a band, so his wireless arrangement has been great for streaming outdoor Savage Aural Hotbed performances!"
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Introducing The Wi-Fi-Mobile More

Introducing The Wi-Fi-Mobile

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  • ...high speed WiFi at every single f-ing location. Besides, is this really news? People have been doing this for the past two years, with solar powered carts, eccentric Euro electric vehicles, bicycles, and just about everything in-between.

  • In my current abode, I only have a single WiFi access point which is the wireless router. It seems to work fine, but for times when I'd like to use my laptop downstairs (approx. 2 storeys away) the signal strength is always poor with signal dropping out every now and then. With the least amount of cash outlay, I'd like to get more signal into other parts of the igloo.

    Obviously, this DeVaan guy is a networking whiz. I'd like to replicate this same 'rebroadcasting' of WiFi coverage inside my home. The article does not mention the type of machinery he uses beyond the media van that it's all stored in. Do any of the networking engineers here at Slashdot know of a way to boost the signal strength of my home wireless network?

    • Re:Is this technology adaptable to fixed networks? (Score:5, Informative)

      by RealProgrammer ( 723725 ) on Monday November 01, 2004 @02:32AM (#10683632) Homepage Journal

      The truck is basically a WiMax to WiFi router. It doesn't just act as a WiFi repeater, since WiMax and WiFi are different radio signals. From an Intel site [intel.com]:

      An implementation of the IEEE 802.16 standard, WiMAX provides metropolitan area network connectivity at speeds of up to 75 Mb/sec. WiMAX systems can be used to transmit signal as far as 30 miles. However, on the average a WiMAX base-station installation will likely cover between three to five miles.

      WiFi is IEEE standard 802.11, usually 802.11b or 802.11g. It operates over short distances, usually under a mile. You can get lots further with paired line-of-sight antennae, but most uses are short range.

      The simplest way to add more coverage in your house is connect a second base station by wire.

    • for times when I'd like to use my laptop downstairs (approx. 2 storeys away) the signal strength is always poor with signal dropping out every now and then. With the least amount of cash outlay, I'd like to get more signal into other parts of the igloo.

      Well, you could run some cat5 downstairs to another access point, or if you have a Linksys wireless router, you could purchase another AP and set it up to repeat the signal from one floor below (depending on the model). Barring that, you may have some luck with the Linksys high-gain antenna [linksys.com], or even one of these [freeantennas.com].
      • I was sruggling with poor reception just one floor above my wireless router (unfortunately in the office, where a good signal was quite important) and tried both the Linksys high gain antenna and the "Windsurfer" freetenna. Neither worked, so I ended up purchasing a Linksys wireless AP.

        Well, go figure, the WAP11 just wouldn't go into wireless repeating mode, so I still ended up running a CAT-5 upstairs to the wireless AP. Thankfully, the second floor is now blanketed and I have no more drop-offs - but I
    • Airport Express is a wireless repeater, but it says it only works with AirPort APs to extend the network. Is there something similar, perhaps, for non-Apple networks?
    • How to create a Wifi hotspot truck/van/pinto/clowncar for dummies:

      1. Put together linux box with two interfaces, one being an 802.11g pci card, the other a not-yet standarized possibly 802.16d card. Connect both to rooftop or clown held antannas.
      2. enable dhcp/ip routing/nat between the interfaces, or simply bridge the traffic if possible.
      3. Profit*
      Also, most wifi manufacturers are creating wireless repeiters (basically bridges) which will extend the range of your signal. Purchasing upgraded antan

    • Re:Is this technology adaptable to fixed networks? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by petecarlson ( 457202 ) on Monday November 01, 2004 @05:20AM (#10684089) Homepage Journal
      I don't know what your floors are made of, but right now I am connected to one of my APs which is on top of a building two buildings away and three floors up. The AP is a Seneao CBS+ Deluxe with an 8dbi omni on it. I have a 200mw Seneao card in my laptop on this end. No problem ever. Customers (I sell bandwith) within a one block radius get a cb3, in bridge mode, inside near their computer and customers up to 1.5 miles away get an outdoor mounted 14dbi rootenna with the same cb3 inside of it. A cb3+ deluxe (the deluxe model works in AP mode also) will run you about $115 from wisp-router.com. If you want more gain, add a six dbi antenna available from hyperlinktech. Because you are trying to push your signal up and not out, I wouldn't recomend using an antenna over 8dbi.

      CP
    • Why don't you try something simple and turn your access-point antenna 90 degrees?

      In normal antennas, the strongest signal is perpendicular to it with the weakest above it or below it ( pointing at it or away from it ). This is fine if you point the antenna straight up and you're on the same floor because the strongest reception radiates horizontally out around it. If you're two floors below it, try turning the antenna 90 degrees so the sweet spot aims down toward you.

      If this doesn't work well enough

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Monday November 01, 2004 @02:14AM (#10683547)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • It sounds similar to an ice cream truck.. (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Except instead of "Beware of children" it's "Beware of festering nerds with wifi laptops"

  • What a fantastic Hack! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Johnny Fusion ( 658094 ) <(zenmondo) (at) (gmail.com)> on Monday November 01, 2004 @02:21AM (#10683582) Homepage Journal
    This is some capital out-of-the-box thinking. I am sure it has applications outside of what DeVaan is doing with Da Van. With Wi-Max having a range of 30 miles or so, I am thinking something similar could be used for temporary internet access where needed.

    The first things that pop in mind is ruarl schools can have an "Internet Day" when the truck pulls up in front of the school, or possible military operations, extending internet out into the desert or jungle, or high steppe, or wherever they want to go next.

    • Why not just use a satellite uplink whenever needed instead of affixing expensive hardware on tops of buildings? Besides, isn't the 30 miles range LOS? I'm not very familiar with Wi-Max.

      • Wi-Max, also known by the rfc 802.16, uses somthing like Orthagional Frequency Devisional Multiplexing. These big words give it the ability to do near non line of sight or at least thats what the guys from redline are trying to sell me on at 13Gs per link. A sat uplink has huge latency and costs loads of cash for a fat pipe. 802.16 can push 30-40 Mb/sec of real data over a 10+ mile link. OF course 802.16 isn't finalized yet so there are a bunch of different versions of it out there which may or may not
        • Satellite data services are coming down in price - they're not cheap yet, but they're getting there.

          The internet dishes that RVs use cost ~ $10k for hardware and installation with a monthly service cost starting at $100. See this page about the Internet Archive's bookmobile [archive.org] for details. Here's a photo (small [archive.org], large [archive.org])of their network connection.

          The vendor, Motosat [motosat.com], claims download speeds of 400kb/s and up, with upload speeds of 30-90 kb/s. So you would have enough bandwidth to serve a single high latency

  • I'm from the Twin Cities area, and I have not heard anything about this, I wonder if I would be in range of it :D

  • Wi-max gear retailers (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Wapiti-eater ( 759089 ) on Monday November 01, 2004 @02:28AM (#10683618)
    OK, so who's got links to some places online where a guy could actually buy some of this mystical Wi-max gear? A single, strategicly placed, Wi-max base in my town could easily cover ALL OF IT. Yea, pretty small town. What with the lack of DSL coverage, something like this would make a real invenstment opp for some eager geek (me?!).

    I find one place "Wi-lan.com" via google - but not only are they not in my country (type accepted???), they've got some marketing channels outside of what I'd prefer to use.

    Come on slashdoters - share the 'insight'!

  • ... as the people running behind the truck with their laptops can only get healthier!

    Eric
    How to masquerade your browser [ericgiguere.com] (Hint: Firefox makes it easy)

  • The speed must be nice.. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Myself ( 57572 ) on Monday November 01, 2004 @08:35AM (#10684536) Journal
    I've been doing this for a while with my cellphone and laptop. I was half of a traveling crew some time back, and the job took us to all sorts of towns that were just big enough to have a Wal-mart but not big enough to have wifi at the motel, nor a local dialin to any big ISPs.

    I have the all-you-can-eat data plan on my Nextel, so sharing that connection over wifi meant we could both get online without having to share a laptop or toss the phone back and forth. Nextel's great firewall is horrid (NAT up the wazoo, no UDP, mangles JPEGs on the way in), and the latency makes SSH excruciating, but it's better than nothing.

    The amusing bit was watching people associate. I set the SSID to something like "MySlowPhoneBeNice" and figured anyone who finds it deserves it. It's funny being the only WISP in hickville and finding the only wardriver.

    As far as I can remember, Nextel's AUP only prohibits reselling service, so I was even in the clear for sharing it with a coworker. (The resulting throughput is its own penalty, I guess.)

    I wish like anything that Ricochet was still up, I'd love to have a serious upstream for these antics. I guess WiMax will come someday, but without a unified back-end it'll still be a comedy of overlapping signals and non-roaming. Ugh.
  • WiMax may seem like a promising technology for unfettering WiFi, but it is actually more palatable to the large telcos because of the high setup costs for a MAN-scale network.

    It is, in effect the new frontier for innovation by companies such as Alvarion. Intel is pushing hard in this areas as they see this domain as an untapped area where they can gain traction.

    This article is informational: http://www.dmeurope.com/default.asp%3FArticleID%3 D 3753 [dmeurope.com]

    Of course, WiMax, is being promised as that solution to t

  • What's interesting about this is that WiMAX is available only in licensed spectrum sets for now. It's not yet available for unlicensed frequencies that typical WISPs usually use, i.e. 2.4GHz and 5GHz. There are several manufacturers producting WiMAX gear, however, they're basically not yet usable by the general public unless someone has a license for the freqs they run in.

    It'll be huge, however, once its available to the rest of us. :-)

    Regards,
    Kory
  • I checked in on implex.net. They offer a WiMax internet connection starting at $99/month for about 500k. Not too bad, but I never found out what the initial startup cost was.
  • It appears the truck is using some D-Link equipment on the Wi-Fi end, running at 22Mbps as time if net stumbler capture

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