wireless design

hi all,

this is yet another wireless design post. i have read through some of the ones in the past, but thought i would get an update if anyone has one.

i have been tasked with coming up with a design for a wireless network in a quite large space, probably 60,000+ square feet. I have only done home wireless and a small company wireless with a single cisco ap. i am unsure of how to proceed with something so large. i have seen solutions from proxim as well as cisco. i am biased towards cisco, as i know them. my first concern would be security. this will be a public wireless system that is free to users. i have seen some systems like in airports where a user is sent to a webpage and then asked to connect from the page. how is this done? can anyone provide a good starting point?

TIA,
S

My company is fairly biased when it comes to Cisco too so I've only really looked at their equipment. I've recently done a small implementation in one of our offices with Cisco's 2200 series Airespace Wireless Controller w/6 Cisco 1000 Series Lightweight Access Points.

Right now I'm just running WPA-2 with a pre-shared key. The current config is great because I know less than 5 people are currently utilizing it.

I have IBM coming in to help me with a bigger implementation, however. I have a Cisco 4400 Series Controller coming and 25 more of the 1000 Series AP's. We're planning on utilizing RADIUS for AD integrated authentication.

As far as the web auth page you're talking about. That is a built in function of the hardware I've worked with. You can establish local user databases and just roll with that.

You may want to look into learning how to do a proper site survey and figuring out how many AP's you will need. This will dictate the controller you'll need to buy.

Hopefully I can offer more assistance after our project is done in the coming month!

Thanks for the reply, and keep me updated!

Can I bother you to ask what your site survey is costing you? Also, have you ever heard of anyone purchasing the equipment and software to do their own site survey? It seems like if you were going to do a lot of sites, it could pay off in the end to have the stuff yourself. but then again, i do not know the ins and outs of doing a site survey. any thoughts?

TIA,

s

Well the IBM consultant has done up a whole labour estimate and the survey part of it says 6 hours of labour. (labour costs vary, of course) This is only an estimate but I intend to milk his knowledge of surveying because I'll have to go onto our companies sites and do several more of these, without the aid of a consultant.

I did get this book:
www.ciscopress.com/title/1587051648
but have yet to really read it.

But I agree and do intend to get the equipment needed to perform my own site surveys.

So far, it looks like administrative type hoops are preventing me from getting the consultant onsite with me as quick as I hoped!

a site survey is important part of this project,,you need to know what kind of obstructions are there,, if there is any kind of Radio Frequencies operating there,,where is the suitable place to mount your antenna's,,what is the most important area to cover,,and at last how many access points and repeaters you need. you need an access-points that support wide coverage areas some thing like this:

www.akihabaranews.com/en/en/news-13224-E...ur+Wi-Fi+to+1km.html
or:
www.5gwireless.com/

and to redirect users to specific web page to access from you need a hot-spot server,,for example:
hotspot.live.com/web/SearchView.aspx