In 1998/1999 I-XS decided to go for wireless Internet in the Netherlands.
After peeking around the world, mainly USA, it appeared that something was going on there what everyone seem to ignore:
A lot of the smaller ISP's we're installing wireless Internet systems !
"How do they do that" and "would that be possible here also" was the first thought that come up when seeing that.
It appeared that the dutch radiofrequency agencies (RDR) were not aware of the possiblities and hence had no 'license' for it.
They knew of wireless network (RLAN, Radio LAN) but not for outdoor use.
We need a license for EVERYTHING here.. farthing in public is still possible without a license but for how long ;) ??
12 months went on without actually something happening:
Then in may 2000 the RDR decided to have a license for ORLAN (Outdoor Radio LAN) usage. We immediately requested one and got it for the area we have our office, Geldermalsen.
Then came the BIGGEST problem: What equipement to use ? There's a LOT out there if you now where to look.
We considered a bunch of systems, but none was what we where looking for. All systems where for indoor usage, not for outdoor public usage.Some adopted their systems for outdoor, but missed some important stuff we thought.
Finally we choose Lucent, only because it supported Radius from the AP and mac filtering.
After ordering some stuff the next problem appeared: Where to put the base antenna ? Their seemed to be a strict policy in Geldermalsen concerning placing antenna's ;(
Lucky for us our neighbouring building was a former hotel, height with a flat roof. Perfect place for an omni !
This is our WIPOP system in a closed watertight system 'somewhere' near the antenna. From there on goes a 220V powerline and a cat-5 network cable to our central WIPOP router.
On the right is our omni, sitting at about 50' on the roof.
The first tests:
After installing the wipop system and antenna we went out to test the coverage of the omni.
We now have some reach of less then 1 mile (we're only allowed to have 20dBm e.i.r.p) but that's enough for our first customers.
This week we made an agreement with an owner of a 150' grain tower which is no longer used. Next week we'll discussing financials for placing antenna's on that thing. We went up there a few days ago: WHAT A VIEW ! (pictures later). We also contacted the local GSM operator for hiring a place on their almost 175' tower, they probably charge about USD 4000,= per year. They first have to agree to let us on there.