Wireless Update 9-24-02

Sorry for the lack of updates recently.

CWC has found the problem with the low signal strengths at the tower. A line fault has been feeding back the signal into the amp and really messing things up. CWC has scheduled a time to be on the tower to fix it this week. Verizon still has not installed their local loop and is now about a month late. There is nothing CWC can do about that except complain, but we all know where that gets you to with Verizon. So they continue to wait.

We should have another update later this week when the tower-amp problem is corrected.

John

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Got Broadband?

 

Can someone explain to me what the local loop from Verizon will be for? Just what is it we're waiting for and what purpose does it serve? Will it help if several of us complain to Verizon?

What equipment will homeowners need to purchase, supply etc. to get the wireless high spped access? I've been told there's a security problem for wireless systems. Has that been addressed?

It seems like we get little snipits of information, but nowhere have I seen a broad explanation of what is going on in the Broadlands (the first and second developement areas from the Greenway and Waxpool to Claibourne and/or beyond), or what we can expect. Continuing to limp along on 56K technology is really frustrating, and Adelphia is not a good alternative.

Spence Neufeld

 

The local loop is the actual physical medium necessary to provide CWC (our soon to be wireless ISP) a circuit to the internet. Without the high-capacity circuit CWC will not be able to provide any service to the internet for us. You can complain to Verizon if you like, but I don't think it will help much. LECs are very slow turning up circuits. I work for Sprint and when we provide local loops to our customers we cant guarantee anything less than 90 days for circuits larger than a T1, its just the nature of the business.
As far as equipment needed, you may want to visit CWC's website at: http://www.my-cwc.com/faq.htm
Security, you may want to do some research on the net to appease those concerns. One site that may help is this one: http://www.80211-planet.com/news
You can find a lot of information here, forums and new technologies.
Hope this helps some.


DwArFlOrD

 

One of the most popular wireless devices (at least I and a couple others believe) will be the Linksys WET11. It runs about $110. A couple of us have it and have been testing it out, it works very well.

Edited by - hornerjo on 10/22/2002 21:12:48

 

Can we get an update on the GO LIVE date? We've got our wireless card and have been holding off on Adelphia cable. You've got a lot of anxious people out here starved for high-speed!

Thanks,

Joseph Maloney

 

I wish I could give a date. Believe me, no one wants it up and running faster than I do (except maybe for CWC - they are losing money paying for tower space with no clients up yet). I'm going to try my hardest tomorrow to get an update. I always post right after I get an update, be it good or bad. As soon as I get some news, it will be here.

John

---------------
Got Broadband?

 

How about some context? Does CWC stand
for Cable & Wireless? Do they plan to use
a single T1 pipe for everyone?

Where is the tower? What does the coverage
pattern for the tower look like? Will they
have Access Points distributed around?

-joe

 

I'll try and answer this in brief, if you need more explanation please feel free to ask.

-CWC stands for 'Community Wireless Corporation'.
-They will initially deploy T1 speeds, and will increase it as more subscribers sign up.
-The tower is located up near the 2 large water towers.
-We're not sure on the coverage patten yet, CWC is still correcting problems on the tower itself with the antenna equipment.
-If there are dead zones within the Broadlands, CWC will deploy remote APs to those areas so we can have full coverage.

If you want to know more, the best thing would be to show up at our next HOA Web Committee meeting Tuesday, Nov 12th at 7:30pm (7:00 for new members and for chatting) at the Visitors Center.

John

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Got Broadband?

 

John,

Good answers. Thanks. I'll try to catch up with all
this. Seems odd that a wireless solution does not
include a ~6Mbs wireless feed from a datacenter at the
other end of waxpool, but what do I know.

-joe


joem@iim.com

 

Well it's a little more complicated than one might think to do that, but we talked about that very early on. For now, CWC decided it was best to have an actual land connection to their tower instead of doing a 5.8ghz wireless backbone. It took them more planning and time but it was the best decision for the long term. If they did a wireless feed from OpenBand all sorts of new contracts would have to be written up, reviewed by lawyers, etc and would probably have actually taken longer than installing a loop from Verizon.

John

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Got Broadband?