Recommendations on a large scale WIFI network

[vw-tx]

We have a big out doors fiesta event coming up in April and we are researching to see if there is a way to put a WIFI system for free wifi out in this area for everyone to use without costing too much money? I think this maybe impossible but I thought I would ask.

It's a golf course, and it's very OPEN. But we need it to be around the buildings mainly and the front part of the course closest to the buildings. My guess about 2 football fields in width and length put together.

We are going to be using a clear device for our scanners in the front area so they can use it for the ticket system.

 

[thiggins]

For "not much money", probably not.
Providing good wireless service for a large number of people isn't easy. You would need lots of access points, ability to link them together, ability to handle LOTS of DHCP requests, ability to throttle bandwidth and more.

What is the "clear device" that you plan to use for your scanners? Hope you don't mean an open network. You would be asking for trouble.

 

[sfx2000]

@tim - I think the "clear" device is a Clearwire Wimax Modem or MiFi...

 

[vw-tx]

X2. It's the clear hub express with WIFI which will be locked down for just the scanners (8 total).

 

[icerabbit]

So, you'd want two WiFi network segments.

One restricted with guaranteed bandwidth.
&
One open to the public. With the ability to limit abuse and restrict per user bandwidth.

#1 is easy

#2 could be more costly and trouble than it is worth, especially when you want to cover a large area for hundreds of people.

How many people are attending?

 

[stevech]

solution is driven by what type of user devices you expect... their weak signals govern the AP density and antenna type choices. Have to design for the least common denominator of user devices (omitting the one of a kinds).

smart phones and tablets - some have very low power transmitters for WiFi, and poor antennas due to their nature.

--
DHCP requests should go to a decent SOHO wired-only router, not a consumer WiFi-router combo.

 

[sfx2000]

Keep in mind that most SOHO router/ap's support a limited number of users on the wifi side.

Depending on the venue - I would recommend contracting this out to a company that does this sort of activity - Veriwave was a solid master at these things, not sure if they still do this post IXIA merger... you could always reach out to them and see... they have data models to use that ensure that all of your attendees have the access you want... and most often, they have the gear on hand to actually deploy for a temporary venue/activity that you are looking at.

Most common implementation I've seen is thin dual-band AP's backhauled with 100BaseT to a central WiFi controller/switch with secure and non-secure VLAN's - For RF - commonly see B/G on the 2.4GHz, and A/N on the 5Ghz.

Cisco is most common gear in use, and I've seen Tropos, Aruba, and Ruckus gear out there as well.

As steve mentioned - mobile handsets can be a real problem due to low Tx power and low gain antenna's, and they tend to have more attach/detach signalling as well to save battery. Good news is more of these handhelds are supporting 802.11n (single stream of course), but most are single band to keep the RF solution clean with the 3G and Bluetooth radios.

 

[vw-tx]

We decided against this for now. For 10,000 people this wouldn't work. So we decided that next year, we will contact AT&T or Verizon or both, and see if we can work a deal with them to sponsor the event and be there with their trucks.

 

[sfx2000]

BTW - as a good place to start for per User/per Application flow in a public context for venue planning for a good customer experience..

Application by Use Case
Nominal Throughput

Web - Casual
500 Kbps

Audio - Casual (Spotify, Pandora, iTunes radio)
100 Kbps

On-demand or Streaming Video - Casual - YouTube, Vimeo
1 Mbps

File Sharing - Casual (peer to peer or client/server) - per link
1 Mbps

VOIP - Casual (depends on codec used, some are more efficient than others)
100 Kbps

sfx

 

[fistv]

For once a year event it is not going to be cheap, no home inexpensive hardware for this. I do it here for secure wireless for one event. This year with Two networks, one secure, other open, two cisco 891w's, 6-10 Cisco aeronet 1600 saps. All the aeronets use PoE with PoE switches. I move the Ap's around as needed for the event then they get put back in their normal areas after the event. I'd contract for this, otherwise the hardware will just be sitting around for the other 51 weeks of the year. As it is 4 of the AP's sit in a craftsman storage cabinet in my office along with a couple of 8 port Cisco PoE switches, camera tripods for mounting and the 100 meter cat 6 cables purpose bought just for this 3 day event. Cost for my setup was about $2500 IIRC, an in no way shape for form could support several thousand users. The aeronet 1600's are rated for 128 clients per radio and they have 3 radios per figure 12 in the link. Do the math, thats alot of AP's at $500 a pop.
http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/wireless/technology/apdeploy/7-5/Cisco_Aironet75.html
I'm curious to see how the open one works this year. The last two events were only using secure.

 

[stevech]

We decided against this for now. For 10,000 people this wouldn't work. So we decided that next year, we will contact AT&T or Verizon or both, and see if we can work a deal with them to sponsor the event and be there with their trucks.

Folks here eager to help needn't continue with solutions based on the above, right?

Verizon might bear some/all cost if it's a charitable endeavor with news media potential. "cell on wheels" aka COWs.
Trouble is this is one-carrier. They wouldn't be interested in a WiFi-only solution, and they have the same capacity per sq. yard issue.

 

[sfx2000]

I've seen a couple of interesting large scale deployments recently...

Accuris Networks, along with Cisco and ATT, deployed a large scale Hotspot 2.0 network at the Mobile World Conference in Barcelona last spring - ATT providing backhaul, Cisco the WiFi and Accuris providing the Cellular to Wifi connectivity.

It worked amazingly well...

Accuris also did something similar with Bell Canada last summer for events in Montreal and Toronto.

Check with the CableCo's in your area, along with the CellCo's - they're set up to do very large events, providing all sorts of connectivity...

 

[htismaqe]

I echo what stevech and sfx2000 said.

Search out a provider and "rent" the event. TCO is much lower and you're not on the hook for really anything other than the bill.