Set up for large conference hall - thinking Ubiquiti?

MrGuvernment

MrGuvernment

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Aug 3, 2004
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I need to do a set up for a large conference hall, specifically:

JY9ey.jpg


We will have to cover about 18 employee's who need Inet, and 6-9 static systems, all laptops.

With that the hall will be filled with about...200-300 people.

We will not be providing internet for them but the distance between stations will be decent

dead middle 3 laptops, possibly 4
far right side 4-6 laptops
far left side 2-4 laptops
and just out front of the hall possibly 2 more.

Since getting a dedicated line is ridiculously expensive we are taking from the locations internet.

I want to set up 1 router as the incoming point and create our own private LAN and then go from there with AP's.

I was considering the Ubiquiti systems but wasn't completely sure what to use specifically, i wanted to do the router + 1 or 2 AP's in the room just incase.

http://www.ubnt.com/unifi

Do i just get 2 x UniFi AP (UAP) and repeat them off the main router?

Due to size we cant have cable running all over the place so the AP would have to be set as repeaters i presume.

Are the Ubiquiti routers any good or would i be better off with say a Linksys E series?

With Ubiquiti it would give 1 nice interface for configuration correct?
 
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I'd say a bare minimum of 2 APs on size alone. Whats the nature of the traffic? From a density standpoint you may want more APs depending on the traffic type.
 
What do those 18 employees need for bandwidth? Downloading a lot of stuff? Streaming video all at once?
 
2 sounds nice, was thinking send 3 incase one breaks...

RDC into work
Webmail
Skype
General web browsing
VPN for one of our developers

The connection we will have access to i am told is only 3-5Mb total for external access.

i was hoping to maybe get a router that has some firewall ability to restrict access to only ports needed

the systems on the floor, the system that will be in the middle of the area, will be communicating to a system on the far right side, but it is less than 1Mb of traffic at any one point so it should not strain the network at all.

We had considered doing some video streaming if we had enough bandwidth, but that is yet to be decided simply because Internet in general in the area is not that steady.
 
One to two APs ought to do it fine. the UniFi APs come in a single or 3-pack. Stick it in the middle of the room (do you have access to the ceiling?) and call it good.
 
One AP would cover that room easily, but I like the idea of two for redundancy. If you have two, one just repeating off the other, that removes the redundancy though. Remember it is an open air space, so the AP range will be very good unless there is a lot of other interference.

I am a big fan of engenius APs for the bang for the buck in long range situations.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833168097

Unifi is great too, but not really the best for this application unless you were doing a hardwire install IMO.
 
i don't know if the unifi's can be set up in repeater mode...

that is to say... i've never done that before...
 
You can bridge a couple capable wireless APs to a laptop running pfSense, which will handle the packet filtering and QoS much better than the wireless APs. (An I5 laptop running pfSense with 2 gigE nics could probably do dhcp/dns/routing/packet filtering for a host in every chair in that room if they have a way to connect.)

I say APs because you might want them for failover, or subnetting. You can play with the TTL's on most 3rd Party firmwares to adjust a router's range to fill that room, or even just the rostrum area, and be useless outside a given radius.

A relatively cheap wireless router gets fast if it doesn't have to route, translate, or filter packets...
 
How high is the ceiling? You do need to account for that if you want good signal, you may need to get some higher gain antennas
 
i would consider two sector antennas i think they cover 120 degree radius (assuming that you install one on the wall on each side of the room) look on l-com.com and give them a call. they are very helpful. I would probably use the Ubiquiti bullet hp
 
k1pp3r said:
How high is the ceiling? You do need to account for that if you want good signal, you may need to get some higher gain antennas
Click to expand...

Higher gain antennas are almost always also more directional, so that must be accounted for if used. Or, really, the antenna itself must be accounted for either way to get the best performance. If doing a ceiling install, I don't think just one would have great coverage (though it may not be that bad).
 
wow, some awesome info coming in, glad i asked! Seems to have some options and more research to be doing.

i am thinking easiest set up as possible as i wont be on location, i have to set this up prior to other leaving so it should just be plug and go once they arrive on location.
 
Cisco all the way. Do it right and go full on enterprise. Get a few WAPs and a wireless controller and you will have amazing coverage.

I would never use pfsense or any of that free opensource stuff for anything enterprise or SMB. Sorry wont. I will not recommend it either.

If your budget/expertise doesnt allow the usage of Cisco then Ubiquiti Unifi is another great option using their new PRO models with 2.4 and 5ghz and dot1q support.

Make sure the router you put these on can support 18 or whatever you said users at the same time and manage DHCP as well as firewalling and trunking / intervlan routing where necessary.
 
tangoseal said:
Cisco all the way. Do it right and go full on enterprise. Get a few WAPs and a wireless controller and you will have amazing coverage.

I would never use pfsense or any of that free opensource stuff for anything enterprise or SMB. Sorry wont. I will not recommend it either.

If your budget/expertise doesnt allow the usage of Cisco then Ubiquiti Unifi is another great option using their new PRO models with 2.4 and 5ghz and dot1q support.

Make sure the router you put these on can support 18 or whatever you said users at the same time and manage DHCP as well as firewalling and trunking / intervlan routing where necessary.
Click to expand...

Likely wont have the budget for full on Cisco gear and i personally have never used Cisco,. never had a need to

Also, telling people not to use pfsense is like telling people don't use FreeBSD with iptables, which i personally would trust over most anything else that is out there these days.

I am leaning towards Ubiquiti as the management side of it seems something i could easily talk someone through if something goes wrong

This is going to be a 10 day event, so just temporary, but the gear we get now could be used in future similar events.
 
tangoseal said:
Cisco all the way. Do it right and go full on enterprise. Get a few WAPs and a wireless controller and you will have amazing coverage.

I would never use pfsense or any of that free opensource stuff for anything enterprise or SMB. Sorry wont. I will not recommend it either.

If your budget/expertise doesnt allow the usage of Cisco then Ubiquiti Unifi is another great option using their new PRO models with 2.4 and 5ghz and dot1q support.

Make sure the router you put these on can support 18 or whatever you said users at the same time and manage DHCP as well as firewalling and trunking / intervlan routing where necessary.
Click to expand...

lol ok

I used a pfSense box in an office with a lot more than 18 people and a gigabit metro ethernet (internet) connection, worked fine

also what router can't support more than 18 users? I have had more users than that behind a linksys router without issue :confused:

anyway, cisco wireless stuff is ok, the ubiquiti's are better in my experience, also the commend about higher gain antennas being more directional is kind of true depending on design, but you can get high gain omni directional antennas (their radiation pattern vertically may be affected, but horizontally will still be omni)

anyway, I would put a couple AP's towards the front of the room with panel antennas facing towards the back, link the 3 APs if possible via CAT5 and if not get some APs with dual radios and bridge them over 5Ghz on separate antenna ports from the 2.4ghz panels for the users

not sure if the ubiquities can bridge but I am sure you can look it up in the documentation
 
Check out Meraki as well http://www.meraki.com/ been using them over Cisco now for a few months and have been quite impressed. Also will give you a free AP for attending a webinar.
 
I second the Meraki stuff. All their equipment (routers, access points, switches) are all controlled from the cloud. I work for a MSP. When we have a new client come on we just ship the equipment there. I call the customer and get the router, switch, or AP to get access to the Internet and I configure the rest. The GUI is extremely easy.

We have a college with the full setup. When one AP drops for whatever reason (loss of power or just died) the other AP will try to pick up whoever was on the one AP that dropped. I haven't test it but that's what I was told.
 
My facility has 2 rooms larger than this. Trust me when I say that all the "advise" in this thread is wrong. If you want my help let me know.
 
well you've peaked my interest Schnell.... how is everyone's advice wrong and what do you have to recommend?
 
I've built pfSense units that are BGP routers for 2 10Gig Ethernet backbone links.

pfSense can do enterprise, not to even mention it's probably the best thing for a SMB unless you want to burn money on "enterprise" gear for a small company...
 
Build a router for cheap, pfsense,untangle,astaro wht ever your flavor is.

Add 2 waps and call it done.

engenius waps are awesome too.. Good prices too...
 
Everyone here is looking at this scenario wrong. They are looking at it from an amount of people connected standpoint and completely forgetting about the room and what is inside it.

You say there will be about 200-300 people in the room, that is 200-300 big balls of water. You might as well be trying to broadcast through a Faraday cage with only 2 AP's. One of the ballrooms at work is about that size and we about 50 AP's in the room. The amount of AP's is not to handle the load of clients but to counter act the natural ability of humans to block wireless signals.

If it were me I would completely forget about using Wi-Fi. There are too many ways it can fail in a room like this and for what sounds like a pretty big production it seems like too big of a risk for something to go wrong during the show.

Talk to the building's IT staff and find out what the wiring infrastructure is like. If it is anything like my building there will be floor plates about every 15 feet with wired network drops and wall plates around the room with wired drops. It is fairly standard for us to bridge drops together in the network closets for people coming into the building so they can use our wiring to get all the way across the room quickly and safely.

Do the computers actually need to talk to each other or do they all just need internet? If it is just internet you should be able to just ask to wired internet at each location. In my facility all you would have to do is tell your event manager where you want the network drops at.

If you absolute must have Wi-Fi (I HIGHLY recommend avoiding it at all costs) you will want one AP per area where there are computers. No computer should be more than 5 feet from the AP. You will have to set up security on your wireless to keep everyone in the crowd off and I highly recommend hiding the SSID so that people's phones don’t try to auto connect. 300 people all try to authenticate at once will bring even the best AP's to their knees (ask me how I know). All the AP's will need a wired backhaul to your router. No Linksys router please, use something like PfSense on a mini computer so you know it can handle the DHCP traffic if tons of people try to connect.

Any other questions I would be happy to help, I have experience in this exact area. Please remember this is not like setting up Wi-Fi in your office. There are way more factors at play here.

Cliffs:
No Wi-Fi
Ask for wired backhaul
No Wi-Fi
Find out about data infrastructure
No Wi-Fi
Don't even dream about setting up repeaters

Refs:
Network admin for convention hall & pro sports arena
 
schnell said:
Everyone here is looking at this scenario wrong. They are looking at it from an amount of people connected standpoint and completely forgetting about the room and what is inside it.

You say there will be about 200-300 people in the room, that is 200-300 big balls of water. You might as well be trying to broadcast through a Faraday cage with only 2 AP's. One of the ballrooms at work is about that size and we about 50 AP's in the room. The amount of AP's is not to handle the load of clients but to counter act the natural ability of humans to block wireless signals.

If it were me I would completely forget about using Wi-Fi. There are too many ways it can fail in a room like this and for what sounds like a pretty big production it seems like too big of a risk for something to go wrong during the show.

Talk to the building's IT staff and find out what the wiring infrastructure is like. If it is anything like my building there will be floor plates about every 15 feet with wired network drops and wall plates around the room with wired drops. It is fairly standard for us to bridge drops together in the network closets for people coming into the building so they can use our wiring to get all the way across the room quickly and safely.

Do the computers actually need to talk to each other or do they all just need internet? If it is just internet you should be able to just ask to wired internet at each location. In my facility all you would have to do is tell your event manager where you want the network drops at.

If you absolute must have Wi-Fi (I HIGHLY recommend avoiding it at all costs) you will want one AP per area where there are computers. No computer should be more than 5 feet from the AP. You will have to set up security on your wireless to keep everyone in the crowd off and I highly recommend hiding the SSID so that people's phones don’t try to auto connect. 300 people all try to authenticate at once will bring even the best AP's to their knees (ask me how I know). All the AP's will need a wired backhaul to your router. No Linksys router please, use something like PfSense on a mini computer so you know it can handle the DHCP traffic if tons of people try to connect.

Any other questions I would be happy to help, I have experience in this exact area. Please remember this is not like setting up Wi-Fi in your office. There are way more factors at play here.

Cliffs:
No Wi-Fi
Ask for wired backhaul
No Wi-Fi
Find out about data infrastructure
No Wi-Fi
Don't even dream about setting up repeaters

Refs:
Network admin for convention hall & pro sports arena
Click to expand...

Um, what ? No wonder people don't take advice often from this forum, he said 18 people, not a room full of people. He doesn't need to spend tons of mown for "18" people...............
 
you did not read any of what i said.

The problem is not the amount of people connecting. It is the amount of people in the room.

Re-read my post.
 
schnell said:
you did not read any of what i said.

The problem is not the amount of people connecting. It is the amount of people in the room.

Re-read my post.
Click to expand...

Um, wtf. So because there are many people in the room he has to spend lots of money to supply 18 people Internet ?
 
Have you ever set up Wi-Fi in a Convention hall?

I did not tell him to spend any money, just avoid Wi-Fi like the plague in this situation. Most likely everything he needs is already built into the venue.
 
schnell said:
Have you ever set up Wi-Fi in a Convention hall?

I did not tell him to spend any money, just avoid Wi-Fi like the plague in this situation. Most likely everything he needs is already built into the venue.
Click to expand...

If you are suggesting this, then you should not post more.. He needs wifi, period..
 
Post in this thread when you have convention hall experience.
IT IS NOT LIKE SETTING UP WIFI IN AN OFFICE.
 
Schnell just let them fail, no point in trying to guide them in the right direction when their basics are so very wrong.

-klank
CWNA Certified
Building networks for 11+ years
5 years experience building Convention Center, Theater, Stadium Wi-Fi and last but not least college campuses.
 
Never though about people all trying to connect with their Mobile devices! good catch!

I do appreciate the advice from everyone, as it all brings allot in to consider.

I am finding out if they have an I.T dept. at the location, or one with some knowledge of the area, we have held events there before, but didn't require this new set up as we have grown in it, last year i know they did it with out even consulting me, they took 2 linksys routers, but everyone sat at the same table.

the I.T at the location for what little we had to deal with them were clueless tools, maybe they have upgraded!

if i were to do a pfsense box would something like this work

http://www.amazon.com/Barebone-Embe...&qid=1347383377&sr=1-4&keywords=Jetway+NC9KDL

allowing me to do direct connections wired out to the systems that need access, or in the case they dont have runs connecting 2-3 AP's..
 
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schell is dead on about this from a simple RF propagation perspective.

The 2.4GHz ISM band was specifically allocated since the water molecule is highly effective at absorbing RF energy at that particular frequency. It's an interesting exercise to be forced to question the typical assumptions that one uses for design basis.

The typical WiFi rollout wouldn't be faced with the density of human bodies that's seen in a convention space. Instead, the major limiting factors would be attenuation due to other causes (which would be lesser) and interference between multiple AP's.

I'd be very interested in the RF parameters of a network designed for use in a human-dense environment (I'd expect that using many AP's with the FCC's bandwidth constraints wouldn't be an issue, simply because their individual coverage range would be diminished as well). I'd also expect the AP's on the ceiling, and relatively narrow cone patterns pointing down, as well as heavy use of controllers.
 
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