Where is customers up and down speed set?

[BobY777]

Is it set in the router up on the WISP hill, and various speeds can be referenced to the MAC addresses of each CPE at the customers locations?

If it was set in the AP (and not the router), then all customers on that one AP will all be at the same speed.

Also...

Assuming that there is a T1 line being used...thats 1.544 Mbit.

How many customers can be put on a T1 and still guarantee a certain speed to a WISP customer? It would seem to me that the speed to all WISP customers that ultimately send their date through the T1 line, would vary up and down according to the number of customers using their CPE devices at any one time and the amount of data they are either uploading or downloading.

So then, how can a WISP guarantee or provision a customer for a certain speed. Seems they can't, but I hear that they do though.

Maybe the WISP speed varies, but the customer just doesn't know they may not be getting the speed they signed up for?

This sound right?

[ECWIFI]

Many wisps use Bandwidth Shaping or Management. It is very affective. I limit all users to say 768Kbs down 128 Kbs Up.

This ability could be built in to the Router but many times its a seperate unit. Check out PowerNoc or Wisp-router.com has a good solution

[BobY777]

Thank you so much:

I'm starting to see that this bandwidth limiting, although could be done in a router or AP, is evidentally best done in a seperate bandwidth management unit.

Seems this unit is between the router and the switch.

Of course I guess I could just sell one speed and limit everybody to that speed, then I wouldn't need a BMU at all then, would I? Just set it in my router?

Thanks

[ECWIFI]

In Theory yes but can you limit a user to less than 1 Mb down and can you limit up speed at all.

Maybe some routers can i have only used a few. If you can only limit to 1Mb up and down then what backhaul are you going to use. A T1 would be bottle necked with only a handful of concurrent users at that speed.

[BobY777]

Yes.

I see I would have to limit their speed to 768 K or less probably. But if so, then WISP users wouldn't have a very fast speed, just to keep people form bottlenecking the T1. I don't see how a BMU could help in this case. The BMU would just throttle everybody down to a slow speed anyway, wouldn't it?

WISPs must have a bunch of concurrent users. And even if they are less then 768, it won't take much to bottle neck their T1.

Hopefully all those concurrent users won't be h itting their return key at the same time.

[ECWIFI]

768Kb really is a good speed for surfing the web. With the assumption that most web hosts serve there web sites with a T1 and that there are multiple active pages per server per T1 the max a T1 can upload is 1.5 Mb anyway. How big is an HTML page. Most are well under a 1Mb. Yes Flash sites and other web plugins can be hefty but not even msn.com has a huge main page. Your download speed becomes an issue when users are downloading files. You will want to limit your PTP connections anyway. Even VOIP will work at 60Kbs. I dont believe your websurfing will be hampered at all when shaping down to 768 or even 512. Check out http://www.softperfect.com/download/bwmsetup.exe

its a nice little package to test with.

[BobY777]

Thanks for that link.

I assume that is a bandwidth management program?

I'll try to open it up tonight. I assume I would need a computer runnning at the T1 demarcation point where this BMU program limits the speed?

So for WISPs maybe 768 or 512 is ok from what you say. Many DSL lines operate at 768. I'm a little closer, so I get close to 1.5 Meg download. Do it looks like DSL could beat out a WISP that has T1?

But I hear of WISPs offering up to 3 Mbit. H ow do they do that? They must have a couple T1s hooked into a special router to give that higher speed. Cause I'm sure there will be some businesses that will want the higher speed.

In order to offer 3 Meg speeds to some of their WISP customers, I guess 2 T1s might be used. I guess a BMU would really be needed here...to dish out the 3 Meg speed to the people that will pay the higher cost and limit the speeds to the lower paying customers?

[ECWIFI]

Many Times when Banwidth is sold to a residential customer the rate that is shown is the burstable rate and not the sustained rate. Yes 2 T1's combined into a single pipe can offer the 3 meg download at a burstabke speed. Dsl can offer those speeds and even higher because of the size of their customer base they are employ the use of more like a ds3 .

Thats max of 45 Mb of bandwidth. Put a BMU on that and you have a great system. Also pricing for a Ds3 can many time be that of 3 or 4 ' T1's so you can see the cost saving a Ds3 over Multiple T1's can be. Do this you try to find a site that will let you download at 1Mb. The only one i have seen is an online Movie Rental called Movie link. If you are getting downloads of 250Kb your doing something great.