Industry Forums > Wireless Service Providers > Outdoor Meraki test

Outdoor Meraki test

reply to dallash
Dallash;
How did you supply power to the outdoor units, were they close enough to buildings that it wasn't an issue?
Frank
--
"The Secret is in the RITHMATIC" Henry Hudson

reply to dallash
Pretty Cool! Was the new wireless heavily advertised before the game? If not Im just curious why so many folks brought their laptops to the game. Can you give us the approximate measurment of the area that is covered? And what equipment did you use? Indoor units in a box or the standard outdoor units? Standard antennas or add ons? Im assumming its a free network. Will money be made from ads? TIA, Joe

reply to dallash
Awesome info, Dallas. Thx much for sharing. And, thanks also to you both, Frank and Joe, for your insightful comments.

I've received the green light to look into deploying a non-profit muni project. I've been heavily researching the Meraki units and came across some additional websites, one of which might particularly be of interest for those considering Meraki deployments:

»www.phaster.com/golden_hill_free···r_meraki

Great way of converting an indoor unit into outdoor use as well as additional modifications, i.e. power, etc.

I'll share more too as I begin the pilot over the next couple of weeks.

Regards,
Kory
--
WISP Directory : WISP News : Start a WISP

reply to dallash
I wish we had advertised before the game (doh). Even still, with word of mouth, we had over 50 users connect in the first 24 hours.

We used 4x4 Nema boxes for the POEs, then we ran a short bit of outdoor cat5 out to the Meraki mini outdoors. On a couple of them, we had the electricians put the outlet so close, we didn't even need to use the injectors.

The network is totally free, but we have the splash page (pimping our wireless product), and we get one redirect on the way out. We currently have them going to our "business services" page.

So far, so good. I found one guy that had latched on and downloaded almost 2 GB in a day, so I was easily able to block his MAC address. I'm impressed at how seamlessly these little 60mw units mesh. I can walk around the park roaming from one AP to the next, and I drop 2 packets at most during the swap.

I'll try to scare up some pictures.

We are also doing a neighborhood project to see how well it performs in a residential environment. That's looks promising so far as well.

D

reply to dallash
Meraki hardware have quite low power consumption too.

I am thinking a small 10-15W solar panel with camcorder battery could be used for packaging a very discrete "self-powered" mesh radio.

reply to dallash
I've read somewhere that someone already assembles and sells a fully self-contained solar powered Meraki.

If they will actually go 10 hops as they say, that could be significant in terms of a best-effort say, $10 per month, kind of service.

Dallas

reply to dallash
That link I mentioned above also has solar powered Meraki designs on it, FYI.

Regards,
Kory

reply to dallash
Dallas-

how far apart did you have the Meraki units?

So, If I have a gateway node on my office roof and say I install a mini next door can I plug in to the ethernet port of the one next door?

reply to dallash
My understanding is that you can plug into the Ethernet port of any Meraki (although I've not tested it yet).

If you look at the formation, the southern-most radio is the gateway node. It's mounted on the backstop above center field. The right and left-most nodes are in the stands directly up from 3rd and 1st base, respectively. I guess they are about 10 rows from field level. I put one at the same level over home plate for good measure (probably overkill).

The AP farthest north is actually an indoor Meraki inside a restaurant. We wanted to make sure it was covered well because it's open all the time, whether or not the team is in town.

An interesting note is that each node meshes directly to the gateway. Even the unit inside the restaurant is one hop away from the gateway with good throughput.

Regards,

Dallas

As an aside, I should place the nodes a little more accurately on the map. When Google Earth updates their sat image for that area, I'll be able to be much more exact.
The current image was taken right before construction began.

Ill try to check that tomorrow. I got three of them lil buggers up and running. They really are plugnplay. Dashboard is pretty cool to play with. I wish they were a little more powerfull but in a outdoor case with a 9db omni they might just work in a rv park or similar application. Im going to test them in a hotel but I got a feeling they are not going to cut it. Open areas would be a great application for them. Still testing though. I activated the pay to use feature and I am going to test that tomorrow as well.

Polk5.... Do they have ACK adjustment? I am guessing not.

I have 3 arriving today and I am going to take them to 630mW TX and -98dbm receive gain (if they are at -84 by default) to see how far in open air they will go. I will post SA graphs of the output. If the radio is clean at 18dB they will be very clean at 28dB / 630mW as the 1 watt linear booster won't be anywhere near saturation.

Rich

reply to polk5

I think the Mini Wall Plug Repeater is an awesome idea! I am one that hates wires of any type. The down side is most wall plugs are about 12" off the floor and not an ideal place for getting wifi reception.

I have heard that Meraki is releasing an outdoor unit with a higher gain antenna and another company is amping them for resale in a nicer outdoor enclosure so I guess their may be a need for a higher power unit.

Rich

reply to dallash
Does anyone knows the power requirements of this little radio?(voltage and current)

I helped a friend do some tests with a home-brew solar setup with 6V battery. The power consumption ranges between 2.2 to 2.7 Watts in repeater mode which is excellent.