jdmarti1
Jack
join:2004-06-15
Oilton, OK
| Hotspot
I have a computer store that is wanting us to setup hotspots for them in some hotels. I have setup the Mikrotik hotspot - that was quite easy (in Winbox). These guys want printed tickets - how can you setup MT to do that? I have never dealt with any hotspot systems, what do you guys use that is simple, and works well. I like the MT because it is so flexible, any way to do what I need? Another system that will work as well or better in this case?
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»magicwisp.com |
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polk5
join:2001-12-29
New Orleans, LA | Handlink makes a solution for this. They are in Taiwan but there are folks around that sell rebadged units as well. They come with printers. Mikrotik H/S is not designed to print tickets. |
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Rahail
join:2005-12-21
Troy, MI | try powernoc  |
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robbin
Premium,MVM
join:2000-09-21
Leander, TX | reply to jdmarti1
ZyXEL G-4100 |
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Airplane777
join:2004-06-20
4 edits | reply to jdmarti1
I used the Dlink DSA 31300 v B with ticket printer at a local large public location in my area. It is working quite well. I use three Senao 2611 CB3+ Delux APs here.
One hotel I did has 12 APs and a DSA 3100 vB. Working very well. Although this place didn't use the ticket printer. This particular hotel sometimes has up to about 30 to 40 people using it a day.
If either of them has problems, it will send me an email. Hardly ever have any problems. The DSA 3100 v B is veeeery stable. Don't use the v A. That model is extremely unstable.
I have installed about 4 or 5 DSA 3100 v B. Dlink is very bad at support on them though. But they finally got the 3100 working relatively well. Still a few bugs in it though, but nothing I couldn't live with.
Zyxel also makes a nice Internet gateway. I just never used it yet. I don't believe it will automatically email you though if there is a problem. But it has some real nice features. Like if you want to take credit cards, I think it does a good job with cr. cards. |
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lutful
Premium
join:2005-06-16
Ottawa, ON
 ·TekSavvy Solutions..
2 edits | reply to jdmarti1
said by jdmarti1  :I like the MT because it is so flexible, any way to do what I need? Another system that will work as well or better in this case? Since you are happy with MT HotSpot solution, there is really no reason for you to switch.
The HotSpot feature in MT is relatively new but a large ISP/WISP customer base has ensured that Mikrotik fixes bugs quickly and adds features to bring it upto par with other HotSpot solutions.
Joe Mahaffy was one of the early MT HotSpot users and wrote a good how-to guide that was used by many early adopters in late 2003. [ fament.com is now wisp-router.com ]
»www.gpsinformation.org/hotspot/m···cle.html
If MT is not meeting someone's needs - there are other options like Sputnik. »www.sputnik.com/
Many choices are available for the APs including DD-WRT, that are managed by Sputnik's server software called Control Center. Carriers can run their own control center for 10,000 hotspots while while a Cafe offering free WiFi could use Sputnik's free service. Most other providers fall in between and can use Sputnik's paid service or purchase their own server. |
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robbin
Premium,MVM
join:2000-09-21
Leander, TX
1 edit | What does he do regarding the need for printed tickets if using Mikrotik?
[Edit] Your last link does not work. |
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lutful
Premium
join:2005-06-16
Ottawa, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| Mikrotik prints a pdf ticket - one per page - but John Eckert showed a cool script that reads Mikrotik internal table and prints out tickets using a Windows application.
But his myadvise.de server in Berlin is down. BEWARE myadvise_dot_com is a trojan site  |
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jdmarti1
Jack
join:2004-06-15
Oilton, OK | Next question - if I use the Zyxel unit, how do I set it up so that I have say 4 AP's on different floors, with just one printer at the office?
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»magicwisp.com |
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robbin
Premium,MVM
join:2000-09-21
Leander, TX
| According to the user manual, it has a four port switch built in. I have not actually used one, although I have used other ZyXEL products. Their documentation is good as is the ZyXEL forum here.
user manual
This should be one of the "rebranded" Handilink units polk5 referred to earlier to in the thread. I believe there are a number of members here using this router or predecessor with good luck (with whatever brand name is on it). |
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polk5
join:2001-12-29
New Orleans, LA
1 edit | Yes, It has 4 hardwired ports on it. I really like the newer handlink unit because you can throttle the users bandwidth. Im not sure if Zyxel carries that one yet. I think its the wg-601 handlink. |
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dongato17
VIP
join:2000-07-28
Atlanta, GA
| reply to jdmarti1
We tried a few gateways that were "off the shelf" for our MDUs but they all eventually choked under the load. We now use MT and pre-print ticket cards ahead of time. One thing to note here is that we have rolled our own RADIUS backend and login/signup pages so this was pretty easy to do for us (the card printing) once we got it set up.
If you plan to do a few of these, I would either sign up with a provider or invest the $$ to brew your own setup. After a few sites, it results in much less pain.
-Hal
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Harold Bledsoe
Deliberant Wireless
»www.deliberant.com |
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polk5
join:2001-12-29
New Orleans, LA
| Like Hal said, MT would be better on some applications. I suggested Handlink because it seemed to fit your bill of simple. With the printer that comes with it everything just plugs in ,simple programming and it works! I run them in the RV parks and coffee shops. I just did a new rv park and used MT since it was a free for use and obviously they do not need printed tickets. |
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jdmarti1
Jack
join:2004-06-15
Oilton, OK
| I appreciate all of the answers. I need to get more specs as to what these guys need. I do not want to deal with a Radius server for customers. I would prefer a plug and play type solution, I want to install it and leave it alone. I am not sure why a hotel would want tickets to be honest. I prefer the sign up page and go from there. The customer gets what they want however.
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»magicwisp.com |
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lutful
Premium
join:2005-06-16
Ottawa, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| reply to dongato17
said by dongato17 :If you plan to do a few of these, I would either sign up with a provider or invest the $$ to brew your own setup. After a few sites, it results in much less pain. Complete agreement with Hal.
We have tracked Sputnik since fall of 2003, and it seems to have a very good "off-the-shelf" solution for both small and largescale hotspot deployments.
Our own "do-it-yourself" solution uses a single WRAP/ m0n0wall box as the hotspot controller and as many off-the-shelf WDS APs as needed to cover a high-rise complex or community.
Since multiple m0n0wall controllers can use a single FreeRadius server hosted on public IP, the cost of the server is spread over a few buildings or villages.
Since WILI manual shows quite advanced hotspot features with full external Radius server support, I am exploring
a WRAP/WILI/802.11bg box to replace the WRAP/m0n0wall + first WDS AP in a building for our own solution. |
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wifimaker
join:2006-04-29
Austin, TX
| reply to jdmarti1
Try using Wifi-soft's hotspot management solution - WiFiLAN. It provides a RADIUS based ticket system so that you can manage all your prepaid tickets centrally. You can generate reports on various parameters including bandwidth usage, session duration, number of days and more. Moreover you can set them up so that your users can reuse the tickets at different locations (roaming) thus would be more likely to purchase them.
Check out »www.wifi-soft.com for more information |
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lutful
Premium
join:2005-06-16
Ottawa, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| reply to jdmarti1
said by jdmarti1 :I am not sure why a hotel would want tickets to be honest. Most hotels I visited will print out a "free" HotSpot ticket for guests. The Radisson in Prague gave a free ticket to any one who bought a beer at the bar. |
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