I would recommend the approach of separate free and paid systems as well. From a business standpoint I think it's just too expensive to cover a huge park well with free wifi, unless you have what would be considered a "high end" park. But providing reliable wifi (and electric sockets) in limited areas for free is very important.
As for B vs. G/N, I don't think it matters, but today I would think any "modern" equipment you buy will be G capable.
Thank you for considering WiFi for your park. I find it a great perk when making reservations. For one think, it reflects that the park is trying to maintain itself, and keep up its standards. That said, there is very little more distressing than expecting WiFi, and finding it doesn't work. IT'S YOUR FAULT. Doesn't matter if a bird hit the antenna, or a satellite fell from the sky, it's going to be your fault. Therefore, it really pays to have it monitored by a professional, competent supplier, who you can call for service and blame for delay. Considering the size of your park, you might think about creating WiFi Hotspots in social locations...pool area, main hall, courtyard, etc. Good Luck and Happy Trails.
There are entire towns that have wifi coverage that have not invested that much money! Please consider doing it yourself. The investment is less and the support would then be SUPERB. It really isn't that hard and the knowledge can be obtained on the Internet.
It is something you could start with a smaller coverage and grow over time. I oversee a WIFI setup in a 100,000 plus sq ft facility and even with the best install there is still maintenance issues down the road. I look at Cisco Aironet equipment as being some of the best out there. You should look into using wireless repeaters to keep your cable runs to a minimum. Another name to bring up is Motorola Canopy but they maybe to much.
My tent has a antenna.
Cliford wrote: At our park we are looking into putting in WiFi. The prices run for 6k to 30k. Support is a must.
The park is in Aj in AZ, about 80 acres.
I have found some that put it in for free and charge $30 month some self run.
Please the good and bad of all
Any help thanks
Clifford
Very true story......
Prices run for 6k to 30k!!!!!!!?? This absolutely kills me. I host at Morro Bay State Park in ca. I'm not quite sure of the acreage the campground itself covers, but it has to be close as it's a big place. AT&T came in with all their fancy equipment (DSL line already in place) and hung their fancy wall mount which housed their several hundred dollar Cisco router and they mounted their fancy onmi directional antenna on the peak of the roof. This system covers maybe 70 to 80% of the park.
I built my own hotrod router up from a Linksys wrt54G and pumped it up with third party firmware AND use 2 after market 9dBi antennas (indoor in my RV) and I cover the entire campground. Very true story. In fact I was told I couldn't let anyone use it except for those who could not get the AT&T signal and that even had to be verified by me first. I couldn't charge because a vendors permit is required, you know fees, bonding and all that and I wasn't about to go that route. State Parks gets nothing from AT&T for the wi-fi system other than 3 free accounts! It's "provided" as a nicety for the campers and of course at $7.95 per day AT&T doesn't do too bad lol.
OK now not counting my monthly broadband internet service and my own computer my wi-fi system cost me a whopping $70! Now even some of the mods on here can contest to my wi-fi system as some of them have in fact used it. Please save yourself some money and do NOT spend those kind of bucks for a wi-fi setup! it can be done for less. My brother is an IT guy and Networking Engineer and gets a huge kick out of my system stomping all over the parks wi-fi system.
One day the AT&T system was down and everyone was running tome for wi-fi. AT&T sends a guy out to check it. I was assigned the liaison and was appointed unofficially the campground wi-fi guru as nobody else knew anything about it. The hilarious part was this wifi expert told me it was getting out fine until I took him and his laptop and showed him. he said man who's this firedude wi-fi? He's smoking! I laughed and said that's me and your system should at least meet mine! He said oh it will as soon as I fix it. I said you mean its been broke the last year?? He said no why? I said I've smoked this thing hands down the last year. He says (I'm laughing so hard I have tears in my eyes right now) give me a few here. he proceeds to take out this $600 Cisco router out of the rack and immediately drops it in the toilet. Zap! he takes it apart trys to dry it and puts it back up and can't figure out why the lights are going crazy lmao!! Long story short (he's a contractor for AT&T) tells them to ship out a new Cisco router, this one is no good! The whole time firedude's $70 wi-fi hummed along just fine as it has for the past 5 years with no downtime. there's even members here who've been by and used mine. i even supplied the rear camp host his wi-fi.
Bottom line find someone who knows what they are doing and local who can give you support. You do NOT need to spend that kind of money! You'll definitely need a computer, provider for the internet and with NO bandwidth restrictions and a router. Maybe a relay point. Just don't get suckered into any of those huge priced deals. As well make sure you get everything including the support in writing AND test the system before making final payment.
Sounds kind of like the usual deal with "commercial." If you, the business owner, let it be known that you want commercial service, they'll sell you the same thing that everybody else has, but for four times the price. (For our little business, we never let on that these kinds of purchases are for the business. Heaven forbid, we'd never be able to afford it!)
The metro Phoenix area has a ton of Wi-Fi available for folks with laptops already. Yes they might have to travel to be within range from your park
Our kids live near AJ (I am 200 miles away).
This equipment tends to be troublesome in lightning storms with our monsoons
A local man tried running this type of equipment and found that it was constantly being taken out during our monsoons. It got expensive to keep replacing the transceivers.
The static discharge from even a nearby strike can wipe you out and take your system down.
We lived both in Gig Harbor and then Whidbey (Oak Harbor) for 5 years prior to relocating to AZ. My wife was born in Tombstone.
Cliford wrote: At our park we are looking into putting in WiFi. The prices run for 6k to 30k. Support is a must.
The park is in Aj in AZ, about 80 acres.
I have found some that put it in for free and charge $30 month some self run.
Please the good and bad of all
Any help thanks
Clifford
We are currently in Palm Creek - a 2,000+ site park in Casa Grande, AZ. The Wi-Fi works incredibly well here - it is our workkamping job to make house calls when people are having problems and we have not been very busy! The company is Matrix Networks out of Portland Oregon. I know they are looking to install more parks. It won't be cheap, but they know what they're doing and they have very good 24/7 phone support (operated out of Portland - not India!)
If you're familiar with Palm Creek - you may know that it was Coach Connect that installed the system 3-4 years ago. There have been plenty of problems over those years. I think the important thing is not the fact that there have been problems, but that the problems have been worked through. Coach Connect learned a lot over those years, and now Matrix knows even more. This park started with 3 towers and 11 Access points to service the entire park. Now there are 43 Access points! A key factor is that the park owns their own phone system, and therefore, the copper wire to every site. This allows them to use DSL as the source of the Internet connection to the Access points. And, to offer DSL as an alternative to Wi-Fi for the park models where Wi-Fi is a problem (all those metal walls!)
Anyway - I'd be happy to give you contact information if you PM me.
Chris Guld
"Blessed are the Flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape!"
Full time in our 30' Safari Class C with Datastorm
See our weblog/travelog, at GeeksOnTour.Blogspot.com RV.net Blogger
I don't entirely agree with some of the points in the other posts.
While I'm kind of pushing the limits for "home" internet service myself, since I do access the net for business purposes from home (but don't generally run a server, for example), sharing a connection with more than household members is clearly a violation of every ISP contract I've seen.
As for DIY vs. a provider, it's a tough call for most small businesses. It's one thing for people who are basically computer enthusiasts to do this stuff, but frankly doing something like installing aftermarket firmware in a WRT54G (GL, I assume) is not completely trivial. A number of people I know who are definitely not novices have "bricked" routers in the process. So you kind of have to decide whether you want to be partly in the campground business and partly in the networking business - and staff accordingly - or just outsource the networking.
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) give me a few here. he proceeds to take out this $600 Cisco router out of the rack and immediately drops it in the toilet. Zap! he takes it apart trys to dry it and puts it back up and can't figure out why the lights are going crazy lmao!!
