Joe, steer clear of mesh networking when dealing with large volumes of people in a small enclosed area. A far better approach is to hard-wire each access point. Utilize grossly over-powered access-point boards (Mikrotik RB600, Alix3d2, etc) and spend some money on the radios, Ubiquity XR2 is a very high-quality 2.4ghz radio. Lower the radio power to ~15db which will put it on par with about 90% of the devices connecting to it and will cause less interference. Because conferences tend to be in buildings with thick cement walls, you have the advantage of a very low noise-floor with the exception of the noise that you create yourself as well as other conference attendees. This means that if you space out your access points with adjacent access points on opposite sides of the spectrum (use channels 1,6,11) you'll minimize the effect of interference.
You'll need to install enough access points to not only take care of active users, but associated users as well (how many iphones/ blackberries do you expect to attend). An XR2 card with either of the two CPU boards suggested above should be able to handle 70-100 associated users, but likely not more than 15-20 active users at a time. If you have the budget for it, add an XR5 (802.11a) card as well broadcasting the same SSIDs which will allow users with 802.11a adapters to connect when the nearest 802.11b/g ap is overloaded. You'll want to utilize bandwidth shaping on the upstream router to prevent any single user from spoiling the party for everyone else. It's also probably a good idea to block p2p traffic as a rule for your wireless network as it can quickly consume all of your available time- slots regardless of how much bandwidth it's actually consuming. Tyler Booth // President ph. 503.548.2000 | fx. 503.548.2002 921 SW Washington St, Suite 224 Portland OR 97205 On Feb 11, 2009, at 2:22 PM, Joe Christensen wrote: > > Hello, > > I have been researching event wifi and mesh networking (Meraki & > Open-Mesh). Does anyone have experience setting up wifi for a densely > packed room full of technical conference attendees? Could a mesh > network survive in this situation? > > It seems like 802.11 is ill suited for 500 live bloggers in a > conference room. How is this accomplished? My basic understanding is > that APs have 3 desired channels (1,6,&11). How does this scale? > > I have read of two high profile conferences with 1000+ technology > focused attendees that had horrible wifi issues. (Techcrunch50 & > LeWeb) LeWeb paid 100k for the event networking contract. Techcrunch > replaced the wireless vendor after the 1st day failure. Are > conferences full of technical people starting to exceed the limits of > 802.11? > > Any links or personal experiences are appreciated. > > Thank you, > > Joe Christensen > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ The Personal Telco Project - http://www.personaltelco.net/ Donate to PTP: http://www.personaltelco.net/donate Archives: http://news.gmane.org/gmane.network.wireless.portland.general/ Etiquette: http://www.personaltelco.net/index.cgi/MailingListEtiquette List information: http://lists.personaltelco.net To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
