whatever you do, however you do it, make sure that you: 1: do your homework - you're doing that now which is really nice. 2: Do not be tempted to cover the 'whole place' at once with wifi. Really good solutions may seem expensive upfront but you're better off starting small then adding AP's as opposed to going for a crap solution covering the whole place and dealing with support issues daily (which is why I advice you go for mesh AP's). Im not sure what role you're playing at the resort but if budgets are tight, don't make do with just any solution. 3: Unless you are offering free wifi. Think of a solution that integrates well with billing/splash screens etc. On WDS - it works very well if handled by someone that has worked well with it. can be messy too if badly planned. just note the 'halving bandwidth issue; you have to use static wep keys; and if you try interoperability, issues might crop up you're not ready for. If this were my deployment i'd probably be out looking for 'mesh AP's'. WHY? because I can scale them easilly and can start small. most will support 802.1n (even for wds, go for this standard), most self configure and 'self heal' and are cool. I also like the idea Michuki floated of running 'local fiber' at various points. Might seem expensive but in the long run it would pay off... Gitau On Thu, Feb 9, 2012 at 8:24 PM, Michuki Mwangi <michuki@swiftkenya.com>wrote:
On 2/9/12 7:38 PM, Job Muriuki wrote:
I have nothing personal against WDS repeating just don like its operation. First for every WDS hop you half the available bandwidth since the radio (AP) has to work twice as much.
Thats if you are using the same frequency i.e 2.4GHz for both.
However, if you have a decent radio with both 2.4GHz and 5.8GHz you can use the 5.8GHz for the bridge/repeater and users can associate on the 2.4GHz radio.
Secondly the technology is not standardized across vendors it will work on same equipment and my or my not work in a mixed vendor environment.
+1
Then there is the issue of self interference considering for WDS to work all APs need to be on the same channel and run same encryption.
Likely, but depends on the design/placement of the AP's.
Here's my observation.
I belive that the cottages/villas have service infrastructure on the ground like Power, water, sewerage, etc. If thats the case, you can easily install fiber cables along the same path and restore the grounds back to the same status.
That way if you have fiber at the cottages/villas it will definitely reduce your wifi build out and improve on quality of service.
Still the question on distances and quality of service to be offered remains unanswered. Therefore we are not assisting you but just throwing ideas at you. :).
Regards,
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