Long range wireless link essentials
There are five parts to an outdoor wireless installation
- Controller
- Wireless Module
- Coaxial Cable
- Antenna
- Accessories
A computer board that controls one or more wireless modules. Typically a MikroTik Routerboard.
An IEEE 802.11 b/g or a miniPCI, PCI, or Cardbus card with an antenna socket. Slots into an available slot on a controller board. Typically a miniPCI module, with a u.FL antenna socket.
The right combination of pigtails and coaxial leads to successfully connect your antenna to the wireless module. Typically a u.FL to N-female bulkhead and a 1.5m N-male to N-male coax extension lead.
Depending on the type of installation, either an omnidirectional (for allowing local wireless clients to connect in) or directional (for being a client or creating a long distance point to point connection) antenna. Typically either a Superpass 8 dBi omnidirectional, or a 24 dBi parabolic grid directional which have an N-female connector ready for you to plug your coax lead in to.
Waterproof enclosure, ethernet cable, power supply, mast, bolts, u-bolts and other hardware. A typical way to supply power to the Routerboard is via the spare wires inside the Ethernet cable. This is achieved with a POE (Power Over Ethernet) injector.
There are many ways to configure wireless connections. The basic building blocks of wireless networks are Point-to-Point and Point-to-Multipoint. Multipoint-to-Multipoint is the building block of mesh networks.
Keep in mind that everyone on the same physical wireless channel, in a reasonable radius, is sharing the same bandwidth, even between devices not associated with your network. To optimise bandwidth, networks can be configured such that a dedicated "backbone" is used on a different channel to the local access point. This means that 100% of the bandwidth in the local channel is available to the clients, while at the same time the backbone has 100% of a channel to itself. Another reason for this is to expand networks over long distances, as point to point will always go further and faster than point to multipoint. This is similar to mobile phone networks, there are local points of connections (cells) connected by long distance backhauls. Once we go far enough distance, we can start to re-use channels, just like phone networks.
The drawings below show some possible configurations. Dotted lines of the same colour indicate potential traffic on the same channel. The more elaborate the network, the more channels we can use, but more expensive the set up costs are.
Use our modular Access Point, Client, Network Expansion, Backbone or Rolls kits to build any wireless network configuration. (coming soon)
- Access Point (Point-to-Multipoint)
- Backbone (Point-to-Point)
- Client (Point-to-Multipoint)
- Network Expansion (Point-to-Multipoint to Point-to-Multipoint)
- Backboned Access Point (Point-to-Point to Point-to-Multipoint)
- Access Point Pair with Dedicated Backbone (2 x Point-to-Multipoint connected via Point-to-Point)
- "Rolls Royce" - Two Backbones and Access Point (2 x Dedicated Point-to-Point and local Point-to-Multipoint)
- Ad-hoc Mesh Network (Multipoint-to-Multipoints)
