[WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Hello all, After a year and a half of watching, jumping in and learning about VOIP, I think I have come up with a way to implement it with a relatively low budget setup. Here is my very general outline of how to deliver VOIP on a shoestring: 1) Asterisk server with AMP (Asterisk Management Portal): This is a great soho phone system, but on the right machine it appears that it can also be used as a production VOIP server. The key is that it uses MySQL databases for the extension and trunk configurations. Another necessity - G.729 codec licensing. G.729, GSM and ilbc codecs work great on wireless - even garden variety wifi. AMP has a nice web-based interface for maintenance and a decent website for checking voice mail and account usage. 2) Freeside billing server - Freeside can be modified to submit the necessary variables for voip service to an AMP box. That means that the billing for the VOIP can be done with the same server that is doing ISP billing, and it can also handle provisioning/deprovisioning. I don't have this quite sorted out yet, but am getting close. 3) An ATA (Analog Telephone Adapter) that has a built in router and supports the codecs listed above (G729, GSM, ilbc). My preferred one at the moment is the Grandstream HandyTone 488. It is $75 to $80. This unit includes one VOIP line, a router with dhcp and nat, an FXO port (which means that it can route calls through a regular phone line) and a PSTN pass through port. If the customer has an existing phone line, 911 calls can be set up to go right to their regular phone. I have tested out the Sipura and Linksys adapters and they work as well, but the Grandstream has more features for a lower price. 4) A GOOD ITSP (Internet Telephone Service Provider). An ITSP is where you can get your numbers and long distance termination. Right now, I am very happy with Teliax for my numbers and inbound termination, and Voipjet for outbound termination. Voipjet is a little cheaper, so when everything averages out, minutes cost about 1.5cents each. If there is a lot of local traffic, you can also get a few local lines and place the calls through those lines instead of using the ITSP.Teliax has a wide selection of local numbers, better than just about anyone else, and their support and network performance is top-notch. I'm not using a large volume of minutes yet, but I think there may be some interest in putting together a plan for WISPA members to band together for volume discounts. 5) Find the right balance of pricing and features - Im looking at $24.95/month for residential with a $50 setup fee - but we maintain ownership of the ATA unit. If a 1000minute soft cap is put on the residential accounts, you can figure $15 maximum for the minutes used - with $5 (approx cost) for the inbound number that leaves a $5/month profit. If the user only uses 500 minutes, then that is a $12.50/month profit. That is where a few local lines might come in handy to provide a non-ITSP route to the PSTN that is fixed and doesn't have per minute charges. That would increase the profit margin. Businesses should be under a different plan completely. We are getting demand from some strange places for VOIP. Several small towns in my service area have monthly phone rates of $90-$100 per line for local phone service. We are finding that the phone service is more valuable to them than the Internet and they could care less about having a local number. A VOIP phone with a toll-free number is just fine for them, and even with the Internet service they can cut their phone bill in half. That is a little nuts. I welcome any comments from others who are working on the same thing. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] I'm sure there are some guys out there who are going to have some ideas on ways to improve this, so please speak up if you have some ideas. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios
The Tranzeo radios at least are 802.11, which we refuse to use for fixed wireless. -Matt Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Matt, I've talked to quite a few people who are looking at Tranzeo CPE/StarOS APs for 5.3/5.8Ghz multipoint deployments and have had good luck myself so far. The combination of StarOS AP units and Tranzeo CPE units seems to work fairly well. Within a 5 mile radius, you will probably be able to maintain 15-20meg of throughput and 40-50 subs per sector depending on the size of the pipes that you deliver to the customers. StarOS can handle batch firmware uploads, routing at the AP, bandwidth control at the AP, vlan tagging, OSFP/RIP routing, DNS at the AP, QOS and packet shaping for VOIP and other traffic and it also has great troubleshooting information along with hooks into several of the open source monitoring and traffic graphing systems. Another plus is that it will run on several hardware combinations, so you can choose the type of radio/sbc platform that best suits your needs. The Tranzeo CPE units are inexpensive ($225-$300), easy to install and work great with StarOS. If you go with an all StarOS system, my understanding is that the new version (v3) will also have the ability to use 5mhz, 10mhz and 20mhz channels and will be ready for 5.4Ghz with no need for additional hardware changes. It also works in the 4.9Ghz public safety spectrum. We provide the backhaul for several video feeds for the local law enforcement on 4.9 - works great. I think that is a combination worth considering. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] Brad Larson wrote: Matt, How much capacity do you need per 5.8 Ghz sector? Is this a business or residential rollout or both? How many subscribers per sector do you want to support? How large do you want to scale this network and is managment, batch firmware loads for radio updates, vlan tagging, voip support important to you? Brad -Original Message- From: Matt Liotta [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006 7:02 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios We are looking to start deploying 5.8Ghz multi-point radios at some of our sites. I am hoping some folks on this list can share experiences and ideas on what radios might meet our needs. We have experimented with Canopy and Trango, but would really like some better choices. From a specification standpoint, Canopy general meets our needs, but we don't like being constrained on the antenna. We would like to use sectors bigger than 60 degrees and we would like to use horizontal polarization. We don't want to use Trango for no other reason than they can't work with distributors. We really like the flexibility on many 802.11a-based radios and certainly the price, but the contention aspects of the protocol and the perception of Wi-Fi being a consumer grade technology stop us from going that route. Any thoughts from the list? -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
I don't believe you will find good margins with the setup you are specifying. Additionally, you can forget about fax working, which is an absolute requirement for businesses. If anyone on this list wants to do VoIP over wireless, figure out how to do fax before committing to the business. From experience I can tell you that it cost us an enormous amount of money to get fax working with Asterisk. -Matt Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Hello all, After a year and a half of watching, jumping in and learning about VOIP, I think I have come up with a way to implement it with a relatively low budget setup. Here is my very general outline of how to deliver VOIP on a shoestring: 1) Asterisk server with AMP (Asterisk Management Portal): This is a great soho phone system, but on the right machine it appears that it can also be used as a production VOIP server. The key is that it uses MySQL databases for the extension and trunk configurations. Another necessity - G.729 codec licensing. G.729, GSM and ilbc codecs work great on wireless - even garden variety wifi. AMP has a nice web-based interface for maintenance and a decent website for checking voice mail and account usage. 2) Freeside billing server - Freeside can be modified to submit the necessary variables for voip service to an AMP box. That means that the billing for the VOIP can be done with the same server that is doing ISP billing, and it can also handle provisioning/deprovisioning. I don't have this quite sorted out yet, but am getting close. 3) An ATA (Analog Telephone Adapter) that has a built in router and supports the codecs listed above (G729, GSM, ilbc). My preferred one at the moment is the Grandstream HandyTone 488. It is $75 to $80. This unit includes one VOIP line, a router with dhcp and nat, an FXO port (which means that it can route calls through a regular phone line) and a PSTN pass through port. If the customer has an existing phone line, 911 calls can be set up to go right to their regular phone. I have tested out the Sipura and Linksys adapters and they work as well, but the Grandstream has more features for a lower price. 4) A GOOD ITSP (Internet Telephone Service Provider). An ITSP is where you can get your numbers and long distance termination. Right now, I am very happy with Teliax for my numbers and inbound termination, and Voipjet for outbound termination. Voipjet is a little cheaper, so when everything averages out, minutes cost about 1.5cents each. If there is a lot of local traffic, you can also get a few local lines and place the calls through those lines instead of using the ITSP.Teliax has a wide selection of local numbers, better than just about anyone else, and their support and network performance is top-notch. I'm not using a large volume of minutes yet, but I think there may be some interest in putting together a plan for WISPA members to band together for volume discounts. 5) Find the right balance of pricing and features - Im looking at $24.95/month for residential with a $50 setup fee - but we maintain ownership of the ATA unit. If a 1000minute soft cap is put on the residential accounts, you can figure $15 maximum for the minutes used - with $5 (approx cost) for the inbound number that leaves a $5/month profit. If the user only uses 500 minutes, then that is a $12.50/month profit. That is where a few local lines might come in handy to provide a non-ITSP route to the PSTN that is fixed and doesn't have per minute charges. That would increase the profit margin. Businesses should be under a different plan completely. We are getting demand from some strange places for VOIP. Several small towns in my service area have monthly phone rates of $90-$100 per line for local phone service. We are finding that the phone service is more valuable to them than the Internet and they could care less about having a local number. A VOIP phone with a toll-free number is just fine for them, and even with the Internet service they can cut their phone bill in half. That is a little nuts. I welcome any comments from others who are working on the same thing. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] I'm sure there are some guys out there who are going to have some ideas on ways to improve this, so please speak up if you have some ideas. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios
If you have already committed to that idea, then I can't really persuade you. With the exception of Canopy and some of the other specialized gear, just about everything else is 802.11 based in one way or another. Karlnet/Terabeam, Trango and even the Alvarion VL is based on 802.11 chipsets with a fancy MAC in front of it. FWIW, I know of quite a few people who have had better luck with Tranzeo 5.8 and StarOS units for backhauls and ptmp compared to non-802.11 systems like Canopy. Higher speeds and more flexibility when dealing with interference. But if that doesn't meet your parameters, then that is your prerogative. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] Matt Liotta wrote: The Tranzeo radios at least are 802.11, which we refuse to use for fixed wireless. -Matt Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Matt, I've talked to quite a few people who are looking at Tranzeo CPE/StarOS APs for 5.3/5.8Ghz multipoint deployments and have had good luck myself so far. The combination of StarOS AP units and Tranzeo CPE units seems to work fairly well. Within a 5 mile radius, you will probably be able to maintain 15-20meg of throughput and 40-50 subs per sector depending on the size of the pipes that you deliver to the customers. StarOS can handle batch firmware uploads, routing at the AP, bandwidth control at the AP, vlan tagging, OSFP/RIP routing, DNS at the AP, QOS and packet shaping for VOIP and other traffic and it also has great troubleshooting information along with hooks into several of the open source monitoring and traffic graphing systems. Another plus is that it will run on several hardware combinations, so you can choose the type of radio/sbc platform that best suits your needs. The Tranzeo CPE units are inexpensive ($225-$300), easy to install and work great with StarOS. If you go with an all StarOS system, my understanding is that the new version (v3) will also have the ability to use 5mhz, 10mhz and 20mhz channels and will be ready for 5.4Ghz with no need for additional hardware changes. It also works in the 4.9Ghz public safety spectrum. We provide the backhaul for several video feeds for the local law enforcement on 4.9 - works great. I think that is a combination worth considering. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] Brad Larson wrote: Matt, How much capacity do you need per 5.8 Ghz sector? Is this a business or residential rollout or both? How many subscribers per sector do you want to support? How large do you want to scale this network and is managment, batch firmware loads for radio updates, vlan tagging, voip support important to you? Brad -Original Message- From: Matt Liotta [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006 7:02 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios We are looking to start deploying 5.8Ghz multi-point radios at some of our sites. I am hoping some folks on this list can share experiences and ideas on what radios might meet our needs. We have experimented with Canopy and Trango, but would really like some better choices. From a specification standpoint, Canopy general meets our needs, but we don't like being constrained on the antenna. We would like to use sectors bigger than 60 degrees and we would like to use horizontal polarization. We don't want to use Trango for no other reason than they can't work with distributors. We really like the flexibility on many 802.11a-based radios and certainly the price, but the contention aspects of the protocol and the perception of Wi-Fi being a consumer grade technology stop us from going that route. Any thoughts from the list? -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
[WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
Anyone in love with one of these? http://www.metrictest.com/catalog/views/rental_specials.jsp?searchTerm=Spectrum%20Analyzers Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Can I get one that does 900, 2.4, and 5 gig? Who has them and how much to rent for 2 weeks to a month? -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
Wow. For the rental price on some of those you can buy one from BVS Systems. I rented one (I can't remember the name but it was an expensive unit) for $250 per week from Wave Rider. If I remember right (it has been a while), it at least covered 900 and 2.4. You should probably have some antennas of your own ready to go for testing when you get the unit. It is a big and expensive unit, so don't plan on carrying it up a tower ! Brad Hagstrom Jenco Wireless On 1/5/06, Brian Rohrbacher [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Anyone in love with one of these? http://www.metrictest.com/catalog/views/rental_specials.jsp?searchTerm=Spectrum%20Analyzers Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Can I get one that does 900, 2.4, and 5 gig? Who has them and how much to rent for 2 weeks to a month? -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
On Thu, 5 Jan 2006, Jenco Wireless wrote: Wow. For the rental price on some of those you can buy one from BVS Systems. I rented one (I can't remember the name but it was an expensive unit) for $250 per week from Wave Rider. If I remember right (it has been a while), it at least covered 900 and 2.4. You should probably have some antennas of your own ready to go for testing when you get the unit. It is a big and expensive unit, so don't plan on carrying it up a tower ! You could, also, talk to Marlon. He has one for rent, or used to. Also, if you are looking to buy, he is able to sell you one through Electrocom. The Avcom units are pretty useful, and easy to use. The one that I have is built for 2.4GHz only, but they have adapters to add 600-1000MHz and 5-6 GHz. These are VERY lightweight units. I have carried mine up a tower with very little effort. Marlon's rental SA is NOT lightweight at all. :-) -- Butch Evans BPS Networks http://www.bpsnetworks.com/ Bernie, MO Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
If you are going to climb with it, then look for something like this one: http://www.us.anritsu.com/products/ARO/North/Eng/showProd.aspx? ID=654cat=1cat2=2cat3=3cat4=0 We just got one last month or so. Works fantastic! On Jan 5, 2006, at 11:15 AM, Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Well, I would want to climb with them. Elevator legs, not towers. That is why I am asking here. Point me to a good one. I haven't a clue. Jenco Wireless wrote: Wow. For the rental price on some of those you can buy one from BVS Systems. I rented one (I can't remember the name but it was an expensive unit) for $250 per week from Wave Rider. If I remember right (it has been a while), it at least covered 900 and 2.4. You should probably have some antennas of your own ready to go for testing when you get the unit. It is a big and expensive unit, so don't plan on carrying it up a tower ! Brad Hagstrom Jenco Wireless On 1/5/06, Brian Rohrbacher [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Anyone in love with one of these? http://www.metrictest.com/catalog/views/rental_specials.jsp? searchTerm=Spectrum%20Analyzers Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Can I get one that does 900, 2.4, and 5 gig? Who has them and how much to rent for 2 weeks to a month? -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
You may want to look at www.bvsystems.com. Their BumbleBee unit does 900, 2.4, and 5.8. It interfaces with a PDA, so that gives you an idea of the size. I don't own one yet, but I will (hopefully) someday soon. I do have their Butterfly power meter and I wouldn't give it up for anything now that I have one !! Brad Hagstrom Jenco Wireless On 1/5/06, Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Thu, 5 Jan 2006, Jenco Wireless wrote: Wow. For the rental price on some of those you can buy one from BVS Systems. I rented one (I can't remember the name but it was an expensive unit) for $250 per week from Wave Rider. If I remember right (it has been a while), it at least covered 900 and 2.4. You should probably have some antennas of your own ready to go for testing when you get the unit. It is a big and expensive unit, so don't plan on carrying it up a tower ! You could, also, talk to Marlon. He has one for rent, or used to. Also, if you are looking to buy, he is able to sell you one through Electrocom. The Avcom units are pretty useful, and easy to use. The one that I have is built for 2.4GHz only, but they have adapters to add 600-1000MHz and 5-6 GHz. These are VERY lightweight units. I have carried mine up a tower with very little effort. Marlon's rental SA is NOT lightweight at all. :-) -- Butch Evans BPS Networks http://www.bpsnetworks.com/ Bernie, MO Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
I prefer the Anritsu MS2721A Spectrum Master. Easy to operate, it is not bulky and does not weight very much for those tower climbs, color graphics, and quit a bit of storage for saved measurements. When in a pinch we rent from TRS out of Texas, phone 800-621-6354. They offer very good weekly, bimonthly, or monthly options on SpecA's, Cable Sweepers, Path Align-R's, etc. I hope 2006 will be prosperous to each of you. Best regards, SlingShot Wireless Communications Jeff -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dan Petermann Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 12:48 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers If you are going to climb with it, then look for something like this one: http://www.us.anritsu.com/products/ARO/North/Eng/showProd.aspx? ID=654cat=1cat2=2cat3=3cat4=0 We just got one last month or so. Works fantastic! On Jan 5, 2006, at 11:15 AM, Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Well, I would want to climb with them. Elevator legs, not towers. That is why I am asking here. Point me to a good one. I haven't a clue. Jenco Wireless wrote: Wow. For the rental price on some of those you can buy one from BVS Systems. I rented one (I can't remember the name but it was an expensive unit) for $250 per week from Wave Rider. If I remember right (it has been a while), it at least covered 900 and 2.4. You should probably have some antennas of your own ready to go for testing when you get the unit. It is a big and expensive unit, so don't plan on carrying it up a tower ! Brad Hagstrom Jenco Wireless On 1/5/06, Brian Rohrbacher [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Anyone in love with one of these? http://www.metrictest.com/catalog/views/rental_specials.jsp? searchTerm=Spectrum%20Analyzers Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Can I get one that does 900, 2.4, and 5 gig? Who has them and how much to rent for 2 weeks to a month? -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Matt Larson, I do not have adequate experience to pass judgement on your suggested configuration. However I will add, base on my recent Rant regarding Wholesale VOIP providers that don't look at small WISPs as valuable partners, I believe leveraging WISPA membership base to negotiate a good deal for us all is a good idea. I believe WISPA should agree to endorse a wholesale provider in exchange for them to be required to give partnership to 100% of WISPA member's that request partnership. I'd be willing to waive my personal preference of providers in favor of selecting a VOIP wholesaler that supports WISPs and recognizes our consolidated numbers as worthy partners. WISPA then could also act as a mechanism to more effectively distribute reocurring changing information to the membership so the Wholesaler only has to do it once. Many discussion have been had on what ventures should be explored by WISPA for the benefit of the membership, that would not be in conflict with the services that the members themselves already provided, and was in line with the goals of the organization adn what it is intented to be. Facilitating a group deal for VOIP is one of those things that I think would be a great thing for WISPA to do. But its got to be an all or nothing deal, meaning vendor accepts all WISPA members that are interested, as a condition of agreement. Negotiate once, replicate many. The reality is most WISPs are not the size alone to have any weight to negotiate. Maybe a few guys like Travis have enough volume, but not the majority of us. I'd be willing to donate time to that cause if needed, wether it be determining the requirements needed in an agreement or distributing the info after the fact. Whether the provider be you, Matt Liotta, or a national carrier is irrelevant to me. I just believe that WISPs will own at least 15% of the nations broadband subscribers at some point, and I believe that that is a significant enough market share that there has got to be someone with enough brains to realize the value of WISP partners, to the extent that they will offer favorable terms to the organization. My concern is that most VOIP providers (that value partnerships) home in on business managed PBX VOIP solutions. Although I do not dispute their reasoning for that, that does not help WISPs nationwide, whose businesses may include a large amount of residential focus as well. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Matt Liotta [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 9:50 AM Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring I don't believe you will find good margins with the setup you are specifying. Additionally, you can forget about fax working, which is an absolute requirement for businesses. If anyone on this list wants to do VoIP over wireless, figure out how to do fax before committing to the business. From experience I can tell you that it cost us an enormous amount of money to get fax working with Asterisk. -Matt Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Hello all, After a year and a half of watching, jumping in and learning about VOIP, I think I have come up with a way to implement it with a relatively low budget setup. Here is my very general outline of how to deliver VOIP on a shoestring: 1) Asterisk server with AMP (Asterisk Management Portal): This is a great soho phone system, but on the right machine it appears that it can also be used as a production VOIP server. The key is that it uses MySQL databases for the extension and trunk configurations. Another necessity - G.729 codec licensing. G.729, GSM and ilbc codecs work great on wireless - even garden variety wifi. AMP has a nice web-based interface for maintenance and a decent website for checking voice mail and account usage. 2) Freeside billing server - Freeside can be modified to submit the necessary variables for voip service to an AMP box. That means that the billing for the VOIP can be done with the same server that is doing ISP billing, and it can also handle provisioning/deprovisioning. I don't have this quite sorted out yet, but am getting close. 3) An ATA (Analog Telephone Adapter) that has a built in router and supports the codecs listed above (G729, GSM, ilbc). My preferred one at the moment is the Grandstream HandyTone 488. It is $75 to $80. This unit includes one VOIP line, a router with dhcp and nat, an FXO port (which means that it can route calls through a regular phone line) and a PSTN pass through port. If the customer has an existing phone line, 911 calls can be set up to go right to their regular phone. I have tested out the Sipura and Linksys adapters and they work as well, but the Grandstream has more features for a lower price. 4) A GOOD ITSP (Internet Telephone Service Provider). An ITSP is where you can get your numbers
RE: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform
Hi Matt, Can you please shed some light on your 3.65 GHz license? To my knowledge (and we work with the FCC on licensing almost on a daily basis) -- 3.65 GHz is not yet legally licensable for commercial common carrier applications -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 8:44 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform Is there any vendor besides Aperto that has product that will work with our 3.65Ghz license? -Matt Brad Larson wrote: Jeff, LOL. Be careful who you're listening to. Like I said, there is allot of total BS out there being spread by certain people/manufacturer's. There are several waves of certifications coming. Just because we didn't show up for the first wave doesn't mean we don't have a product. When the others get caught up Alvarion will be there for the real test phases. Brad http://www.techworld.com/mobility/features/index.cfm?featureID=2021 http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/2109/ http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/ -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:50 PM To: WISPA General List; 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform 3.5 / 2.5 / 5.8 Alvarion I believe from what I heard was waiting for the QOS revision to be agreed on. - Jeff On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 17:34:42 -0800 , Brad Larson [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Jeff, In what Frequency? There is allot of BS out there in the first wave of testing for those that have yet to get a product to market. We can discuss if you would like? Brad -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:29 PM To: WISPA General List; WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform The only product on the market today that will have backwards compatibility to wimax where a cpe can talk to a wimax base station is Aperto. Additionally, Alvarion will not be one of the first round products certified for wimax, Airspan and Aperto however, will be. - Jeff On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 15:22:30 -0600, John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Is there a firmware upgrade path for WiMAX through the VL product line or is it a hardware change? Feel free to have someone contact me offlist for pricing information. I have a need for a PtMP system with more capacity than I have now with my current system. I do not know of many systems that meet the specs you list here and I already know many people are quite fond of the product. Maybe this time the price won't drive me away as has been the case in the past. Please do not take that as a slam. It is not. I know the quality is there and it is a matter of economics for me only that has ever kept me away from Alvarion products. You guys build good stuff and in some markets the price is easily recovered through ROI. Thanks, Scriv Brad Larson wrote: John, Typically 4 sector base stations are built with either 5.3 or a licensed link as backhaul. With BreezeAccess VL, true data sector performance is 28 meg's in a 20 Mhz channel and half that in 10 Mhz Next firmware release is going to mid 30's in a 20 Mhz channel (again true data rates). I know of one sector that has 200 sub's attached although most sectors have less than 100. This customer looked at most manufacturer's gear and concluded Alvarion had the management feature sets, ease of batch processing for firmware uploads, obstructed NLOS for their application, and a host of other likes including Alvarion's support infrastructure. To be honest I don't think we have many Alvarion Operators that subscribe here but that doesn't mean there aren't a crap load of them out there which should be obviuos to everyone. Typically our Operators use Alvarion support Application Engineers and Alvarion web servers such as Mike Cowan's at ACC when needed. This could end up being a long dialog about the differences in operators, products, and ROI models but I won't go there. Brad -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ This mail passed through mail.alvarion.com *** * This footnote confirms that this
RE: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
Hi Brian, XL Microwave makes a spectrum analyzer that is extremely easy and simple to use It doesn't have all the add-ons that an anritsu or rhode and shwarz unit will provide, but for the normal user -- those extra buttons / knobs confuse more than anything else I believe that they have a rental program, but I've cc:ed Tom Duckworth from XL Microwave (he's an engineer there) -- and he may be able to better answer your question Their website is: http://www.xlmicrowave.com/ -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com On 1/5/06, Brian Rohrbacher [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Anyone in love with one of these? http://www.metrictest.com/catalog/views/rental_specials.jsp?searchTerm =Spectrum%20Analyzers Brian Rohrbacher wrote: Can I get one that does 900, 2.4, and 5 gig? Who has them and how much to rent for 2 weeks to a month? -- Brian Rohrbacher Reliable Internet, LLC www.reliableinter.net Cell 269-838-8338 Caught up in the Air 1 Thess. 4:17 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- bigdumbpipe providervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider(html formatted for easier reading)
Charles, Some very good points. However, lets look at it from another angle. What message is the VOIP wholesale provider sending, with their currently mentality, for them to decide who they will and will not allow to play in the VOIP space? More or less, I consider CommPartners an RBOC equivellent of VOIP. They are discriminating on which ISPs can and can't use their VOIP. They are saying, we'll give your competitors the Cable Companies and CLECs access to our VOIP network to compete against you, but we will not give you access to our VOIP network to defend yourselves, unless you PAYS US. Thats like Mafia protection money, in my mind. The CommPartners of the world are starting the war. They decide to take the end users for themselves or their preferred partners. So with Eye for an eye mentality If they restrict me from their network, why should I not restrcit them from mine? This is not an issue of legislation. This is an issue of market pressure. Do we support Wholeslae partners that are discriminary to our own industry that is our life blood? You could argue that the CommPartners aren't descriminary because they equally charge every one huge initiation fees. But then again, I could argue that that same mentality didn't fly when the Cable Companies denied ISPs access to their fiber, arguing they equally gave ISPs the option to pay million for the access. Same principle just different scale. I could argue that I wasn't being descriminary if I equally was charging all VOIP providers the same fee for optimization. What MCI did was more exceptable. They did not disallow partners. They just had different plans, based on the partners volume. So the partners could get better terms as the increased their dedication to the business and volume. But didn't need to abandon the initial model when they reached that size. At what point does a service provider (VOIP) get to the size that they have a strategic advantage above all other providers in the space, that they should be treated the same as a connectivity wholesale provider / monopoly such as a RBOC? The second a vendor of any type, starts saying I'm going to allow these guys but not these guys, things can get ugly. Its not a problem if the ISP mutually does not select that wholesale provider. But what when that provider gains enough market share, and the ISP would have wanted that partnership to be competitive? In my mind, someone is either with me, or against me. And if not with me, they are a threat, because their success could help my competitors, and this is a ruthless competitive world. If someone is not with me, than in my mind they are on their own, and anything goes, because I have no obligation to support someone that has chosen not to support me by terms I consider fair. I think everyone in this industry has to think really hard who their allies are and who is their competition is. Supporting the competition, in the long run could mean death to yourself eventually. We need to support the people that support us as an industry. I am not passing judgement on which companies should or shouldn't be supported, nor am I passing judgement on the method that should be used to support or fight back against companies that are our competitors. I'm just saying that the purpose of groups like WISPA, is that there is strength in numbers and unity. And we need to use that unity to demand competitive advantage in this industry. I've seen little negotiations/advantages won for the membership benefit by leveraging WISPA's weight as a group. I'd like to see more of that take place. I personally, can;t use WISPA's weight to move forward my negotiations independantly, because I am not authorized to do so on WISPA's behave. This is not meant to be a complaint regarding WISPA, just a suggestion on possible goals for WISPA. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 9:34 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- bigdumbpipe providervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider(html formatted for easier reading) snip The way I see it is this: (automatic insertion of my .o2 cents) If Bell South can charge people extra for added services I can too. You pay extra for call waiting, call forwarding, call blocking...etc - - - you pay extra on my internet service to have me give your VoIP packets prioritization! My packet prioritization is an extra added value service that I am not required to do - I offer it as a service to my PAYING clients. beating chest flailing arms wildly :-P /snip Well said (note, I am still undecided on which side of the fence to sit on) To summarize, the statement could be as follows: I built this network with my blood, sweat and tears, and I'll be @[EMAIL PROTECTED] if I'm
RE: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
Regarding Avcom The Avcom units require extra modules to go beyond 2.4 On a tower, trying to plug-in something else is kind of a hassle From an ease of use perspective, I would recommend that you find a 1 piece spectrum analyzer...that covers all the bands You'll appreciate it when you're hanging off the tower...trust me =) -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Butch Evans Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 12:17 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Re: [WISP] Renting Spectrum Analyzers On Thu, 5 Jan 2006, Jenco Wireless wrote: Wow. For the rental price on some of those you can buy one from BVS Systems. I rented one (I can't remember the name but it was an expensive unit) for $250 per week from Wave Rider. If I remember right (it has been a while), it at least covered 900 and 2.4. You should probably have some antennas of your own ready to go for testing when you get the unit. It is a big and expensive unit, so don't plan on carrying it up a tower ! You could, also, talk to Marlon. He has one for rent, or used to. Also, if you are looking to buy, he is able to sell you one through Electrocom. The Avcom units are pretty useful, and easy to use. The one that I have is built for 2.4GHz only, but they have adapters to add 600-1000MHz and 5-6 GHz. These are VERY lightweight units. I have carried mine up a tower with very little effort. Marlon's rental SA is NOT lightweight at all. :-) -- Butch Evans BPS Networks http://www.bpsnetworks.com/ Bernie, MO Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipeprovidervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider (html formatted for easier reading)
Blocking on the other hand IS discrimination. Well that depends how you do it and look at it. I do not believe in outright blocking completely. Allowing the call to go through in some capacity, does not hurt the consumer hard. 911 must still go through,etc. However, I pefer to suggest blocking by slowing down traffic. As a result only the QOS of the call goes down. Which incourages the Provider to pay up or play fair, for them to ahve adequate QOS, and equivellent service to the premium service I offer my clients with our own service. Do you really feel you should have to give competitors better service possibly than you give your own paying clients? I'd control it so my clients lways has a distinquishable improved quality of service. Is that wrong? Whats the difference really from prioritizing traffic versus slowing traffic? In directly it the same results. If I prioritize my traffic, by default the others traffic gets shoved behind and slowed, if I purposely slow down competitor's traffic it reserves bandwdith so that my customers do not get a degrated service level inadvertently. Slowing down may be a bit more agressive, but noe the less its the same result. The reasons is that by slowing down competitors traffic, there is a larger chance that the priority speed given to my subscriber will actually work. Its protection measures. Prioritzing on the other hand is not always doable based on limitations on the technology and nature of TCPIP. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:23 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipeprovidervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider (html formatted for easier reading) On Wed, 4 Jan 2006, Charles Wu wrote: For some reason, I am getting a feeling that thread may be going beyond topic debate to personal attacks -- so I will restate my If you are referring to my comment, you are missing the point. I am not, in any way, attacking you personally. I am simply saying that you are overstating what I see others saying. If you take it personally, you should re-read what I posted. Read the following article and tell me what you think http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2005/12/13/telecoms_want_ their_products_to_travel_on_a_faster_internet/?page=full I'm not certain what you want to know. Personally (and this is probably not a popular opinion here), I think that if the network operator has the ability to offer a premium network service, they should be allowed to do that. I believe that I, as a network operator, should be allowed the same freedom. At the same time, I think that there should be NO PUBLIC MONEY involved in the pool here. Now, Look back at the original topic of debate and ask yourself the following question...is there REALLY a distinction between the prioritization and/or discrimination (or blocking taken to the Prioritization of X is NOT discrimination of not X. THAT is the point I was making before. No matter how many times you say it, or how many ways you put it, it does not change a simple fact. Nth degree) of certain types of Internet packets? If you think Blocking on the other hand IS discrimination. For instance, I block LOTS of traffic. I block ALL traffic to and from known hacker havens. I do not accept mail from certain servers. I only allow certain volumes of P2P traffic to flow over my network. These things enhance my service for my subscribers. I have a few customers who have opted to move on to other ISPs as a result of these decisions. That is their choice, and in the end, it benefits my remaining subs all the more. The fact is, there has been customer movement in both directions. I have moved several customer ONTO my network for the same reason others have left. about it, prioritizing certain my preferred packets across my physical network is really no different than discriminating (depreferencing or blocking) my competitors -- in fact, the Network Neutrality (free love, etc) camp would argue that allowing certain providers to pay for prioritized / privilege access is Ok..now it's time for a personal attack. Those guys are KOOKS. The topic of debate that I am addressing is the argument between it's my @[EMAIL PROTECTED] network so I can do whatever I want vs. the Internet is a free and open medium or Network Neutrality). I have no problem with this debate. I think it is a silly debate, but there are others who will argue this till they are blue in the face. I don't have time to do that, so I will most likely bow out and watch from afar, as I have been doing. SBC started it, now BellSouth is getting into the act. Two articles (1, 2) highlight comments made by William L. Smith, CTO of BellSouth, about how he'd really like to be
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Faxing was very simple to deal with - keep one line from the ILEC for faxing. That also provides a good place to route 911 requests if they come from within the system. No need to spend the resources to figure out a problem that can be easily bypassed. If you keep a single POTS line for faxing, how do you manage the backend? You are going to get the line billed separately from your VoIP provider and you won't be able to share long distance or international across the two. Most customers expect to have their minutes pooled across both their fax and voice lines. Then you have the other problem of 911, which is that your solution is NOT compliant with the FCC's requirements for VoIP carriers. Let's not forget about trying to get the customer's voice and fax DIDs in the same block when they need to be spread across VoIP and POTS. If curious as to why you think the margins are not going to be good with this setup. I've done a lot of studying of this subject, and without large volume committments, there doesn't appear to be a way to get better margins. When I say VOIP on a shoestring, I'm talking about something that is costs about the same as setting up another WiPOP ($2000-$4000) and doesn't have any large or long-term financial committments. Almost anything worth doing requires a real commitment. If you aren't willing to make a real commitment and the margins aren't that exciting without a commitment then it probably isn't worth the time. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform
This has been discussed in depth on the private WISPA list. The FCC is giving 3.65Ghz licenses for experimental purposes, which you can use to provide customers with service. However, it may not be a wise business decision to rely on experimental spectrum, which can go away at any time. -Matt Charles Wu wrote: Hi Matt, Can you please shed some light on your 3.65 GHz license? To my knowledge (and we work with the FCC on licensing almost on a daily basis) -- 3.65 GHz is not yet legally licensable for commercial common carrier applications -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 8:44 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform Is there any vendor besides Aperto that has product that will work with our 3.65Ghz license? -Matt Brad Larson wrote: Jeff, LOL. Be careful who you're listening to. Like I said, there is allot of total BS out there being spread by certain people/manufacturer's. There are several waves of certifications coming. Just because we didn't show up for the first wave doesn't mean we don't have a product. When the others get caught up Alvarion will be there for the real test phases. Brad http://www.techworld.com/mobility/features/index.cfm?featureID=2021 http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/2109/ http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/ -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:50 PM To: WISPA General List; 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform 3.5 / 2.5 / 5.8 Alvarion I believe from what I heard was waiting for the QOS revision to be agreed on. - Jeff On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 17:34:42 -0800 , Brad Larson [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Jeff, In what Frequency? There is allot of BS out there in the first wave of testing for those that have yet to get a product to market. We can discuss if you would like? Brad -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:29 PM To: WISPA General List; WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform The only product on the market today that will have backwards compatibility to wimax where a cpe can talk to a wimax base station is Aperto. Additionally, Alvarion will not be one of the first round products certified for wimax, Airspan and Aperto however, will be. - Jeff On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 15:22:30 -0600, John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Is there a firmware upgrade path for WiMAX through the VL product line or is it a hardware change? Feel free to have someone contact me offlist for pricing information. I have a need for a PtMP system with more capacity than I have now with my current system. I do not know of many systems that meet the specs you list here and I already know many people are quite fond of the product. Maybe this time the price won't drive me away as has been the case in the past. Please do not take that as a slam. It is not. I know the quality is there and it is a matter of economics for me only that has ever kept me away from Alvarion products. You guys build good stuff and in some markets the price is easily recovered through ROI. Thanks, Scriv Brad Larson wrote: John, Typically 4 sector base stations are built with either 5.3 or a licensed link as backhaul. With BreezeAccess VL, true data sector performance is 28 meg's in a 20 Mhz channel and half that in 10 Mhz Next firmware release is going to mid 30's in a 20 Mhz channel (again true data rates). I know of one sector that has 200 sub's attached although most sectors have less than 100. This customer looked at most manufacturer's gear and concluded Alvarion had the management feature sets, ease of batch processing for firmware uploads, obstructed NLOS for their application, and a host of other likes including Alvarion's support infrastructure. To be honest I don't think we have many Alvarion Operators that subscribe here but that doesn't mean there aren't a crap load of them out there which should be obviuos to everyone. Typically our Operators use Alvarion support Application Engineers and Alvarion web servers such as Mike Cowan's at ACC when needed. This could end up being a long dialog about the differences in operators, products, and ROI models but I won't go there. Brad -- WISPA Wireless
RE: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform
Yes -- experimental licenses have been available for quite some time now -- we have one =) But if you read the FCC rules closely -- there are A LOT of limitations, and no, running a business off such a license is a BAD IDEA -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 2:13 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform This has been discussed in depth on the private WISPA list. The FCC is giving 3.65Ghz licenses for experimental purposes, which you can use to provide customers with service. However, it may not be a wise business decision to rely on experimental spectrum, which can go away at any time. -Matt Charles Wu wrote: Hi Matt, Can you please shed some light on your 3.65 GHz license? To my knowledge (and we work with the FCC on licensing almost on a daily basis) -- 3.65 GHz is not yet legally licensable for commercial common carrier applications -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 8:44 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform Is there any vendor besides Aperto that has product that will work with our 3.65Ghz license? -Matt Brad Larson wrote: Jeff, LOL. Be careful who you're listening to. Like I said, there is allot of total BS out there being spread by certain people/manufacturer's. There are several waves of certifications coming. Just because we didn't show up for the first wave doesn't mean we don't have a product. When the others get caught up Alvarion will be there for the real test phases. Brad http://www.techworld.com/mobility/features/index.cfm?featureID=2021 http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/2109/ http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/ -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:50 PM To: WISPA General List; 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform 3.5 / 2.5 / 5.8 Alvarion I believe from what I heard was waiting for the QOS revision to be agreed on. - Jeff On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 17:34:42 -0800 , Brad Larson [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Jeff, In what Frequency? There is allot of BS out there in the first wave of testing for those that have yet to get a product to market. We can discuss if you would like? Brad -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:29 PM To: WISPA General List; WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform The only product on the market today that will have backwards compatibility to wimax where a cpe can talk to a wimax base station is Aperto. Additionally, Alvarion will not be one of the first round products certified for wimax, Airspan and Aperto however, will be. - Jeff On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 15:22:30 -0600, John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Is there a firmware upgrade path for WiMAX through the VL product line or is it a hardware change? Feel free to have someone contact me offlist for pricing information. I have a need for a PtMP system with more capacity than I have now with my current system. I do not know of many systems that meet the specs you list here and I already know many people are quite fond of the product. Maybe this time the price won't drive me away as has been the case in the past. Please do not take that as a slam. It is not. I know the quality is there and it is a matter of economics for me only that has ever kept me away from Alvarion products. You guys build good stuff and in some markets the price is easily recovered through ROI. Thanks, Scriv Brad Larson wrote: John, Typically 4 sector base stations are built with either 5.3 or a licensed link as backhaul. With BreezeAccess VL, true data sector performance is 28 meg's in a 20 Mhz channel and half that in 10 Mhz Next firmware release is going to mid 30's in a 20 Mhz channel (again true data rates). I know of one sector that has 200 sub's attached although most sectors have less than 100. This customer looked at most manufacturer's gear and concluded Alvarion had the management feature sets, ease of batch processing for firmware uploads, obstructed NLOS for their application, and a host of other likes including Alvarion's support infrastructure. To be honest I don't think we have many Alvarion Operators that
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Additionally on the whole co-op idea, there are different non profits for co-op's, which wispa is not set up as. - Jeff On Jan 5, 2006, at 11:50 AM, Charles Wu wrote: Tom, Your idea is sound, but personally, I would think that what you propose falls into the same category as the WISP Buying Coop IMO, WISPA needs to focus on talking / lobbying in front of the FCC Now, if WISPA members want to get together and form such a CoOp -- go for it Btw...Part-15 I believe has some sort of wholesale VoIP program for its members (through Nuvio?)... -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:wireless- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tom DeReggi Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 1:12 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring Matt Larson, I do not have adequate experience to pass judgement on your suggested configuration. However I will add, base on my recent Rant regarding Wholesale VOIP providers that don't look at small WISPs as valuable partners, I believe leveraging WISPA membership base to negotiate a good deal for us all is a good idea. I believe WISPA should agree to endorse a wholesale provider in exchange for them to be required to give partnership to 100% of WISPA member's that request partnership. I'd be willing to waive my personal preference of providers in favor of selecting a VOIP wholesaler that supports WISPs and recognizes our consolidated numbers as worthy partners. WISPA then could also act as a mechanism to more effectively distribute reocurring changing information to the membership so the Wholesaler only has to do it once. Many discussion have been had on what ventures should be explored by WISPA for the benefit of the membership, that would not be in conflict with the services that the members themselves already provided, and was in line with the goals of the organization adn what it is intented to be. Facilitating a group deal for VOIP is one of those things that I think would be a great thing for WISPA to do. But its got to be an all or nothing deal, meaning vendor accepts all WISPA members that are interested, as a condition of agreement. Negotiate once, replicate many. The reality is most WISPs are not the size alone to have any weight to negotiate. Maybe a few guys like Travis have enough volume, but not the majority of us. I'd be willing to donate time to that cause if needed, wether it be determining the requirements needed in an agreement or distributing the info after the fact. Whether the provider be you, Matt Liotta, or a national carrier is irrelevant to me. I just believe that WISPs will own at least 15% of the nations broadband subscribers at some point, and I believe that that is a significant enough market share that there has got to be someone with enough brains to realize the value of WISP partners, to the extent that they will offer favorable terms to the organization. My concern is that most VOIP providers (that value partnerships) home in on business managed PBX VOIP solutions. Although I do not dispute their reasoning for that, that does not help WISPs nationwide, whose businesses may include a large amount of residential focus as well. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Matt Liotta [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 9:50 AM Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring I don't believe you will find good margins with the setup you are specifying. Additionally, you can forget about fax working, which is an absolute requirement for businesses. If anyone on this list wants to do VoIP over wireless, figure out how to do fax before committing to the business. From experience I can tell you that it cost us an enormous amount of money to get fax working with Asterisk. -Matt Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Hello all, After a year and a half of watching, jumping in and learning about VOIP, I think I have come up with a way to implement it with a relatively low budget setup. Here is my very general outline of how to deliver VOIP on a shoestring: 1) Asterisk server with AMP (Asterisk Management Portal): This is a great soho phone system, but on the right machine it appears that it can also be used as a production VOIP server. The key is that it uses MySQL databases for the extension and trunk configurations. Another necessity - G.729 codec licensing. G.729, GSM and ilbc codecs work great on wireless - even garden variety wifi. AMP has a nice web-based interface for maintenance and a decent website for checking voice mail and account usage. 2) Freeside billing server - Freeside can be modified to submit the necessary variables for voip service to an AMP box. That means that the
Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform
There are operators who applied for say, an experimental license with 500 subscribers testing the RF portion of the service. It is a risk, but since that spectrum is slated to be unlicensed, I doubt the risk is too great. - Jeff On Jan 5, 2006, at 12:17 PM, Charles Wu wrote: Yes -- experimental licenses have been available for quite some time now -- we have one =) But if you read the FCC rules closely -- there are A LOT of limitations, and no, running a business off such a license is a BAD IDEA -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:wireless- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 2:13 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform This has been discussed in depth on the private WISPA list. The FCC is giving 3.65Ghz licenses for experimental purposes, which you can use to provide customers with service. However, it may not be a wise business decision to rely on experimental spectrum, which can go away at any time. -Matt Charles Wu wrote: Hi Matt, Can you please shed some light on your 3.65 GHz license? To my knowledge (and we work with the FCC on licensing almost on a daily basis) -- 3.65 GHz is not yet legally licensable for commercial common carrier applications -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:wireless- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 8:44 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform Is there any vendor besides Aperto that has product that will work with our 3.65Ghz license? -Matt Brad Larson wrote: Jeff, LOL. Be careful who you're listening to. Like I said, there is allot of total BS out there being spread by certain people/manufacturer's. There are several waves of certifications coming. Just because we didn't show up for the first wave doesn't mean we don't have a product. When the others get caught up Alvarion will be there for the real test phases. Brad http://www.techworld.com/mobility/features/index.cfm?featureID=2021 http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/2109/ http://www.alvarion-usa.com/presscenter/pressreleases/ -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:50 PM To: WISPA General List; 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform 3.5 / 2.5 / 5.8 Alvarion I believe from what I heard was waiting for the QOS revision to be agreed on. - Jeff On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 17:34:42 -0800 , Brad Larson [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Jeff, In what Frequency? There is allot of BS out there in the first wave of testing for those that have yet to get a product to market. We can discuss if you would like? Brad -Original Message- From: jeffrey thomas [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:29 PM To: WISPA General List; WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion VL as a PtMP Platform The only product on the market today that will have backwards compatibility to wimax where a cpe can talk to a wimax base station is Aperto. Additionally, Alvarion will not be one of the first round products certified for wimax, Airspan and Aperto however, will be. - Jeff On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 15:22:30 -0600, John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Is there a firmware upgrade path for WiMAX through the VL product line or is it a hardware change? Feel free to have someone contact me offlist for pricing information. I have a need for a PtMP system with more capacity than I have now with my current system. I do not know of many systems that meet the specs you list here and I already know many people are quite fond of the product. Maybe this time the price won't drive me away as has been the case in the past. Please do not take that as a slam. It is not. I know the quality is there and it is a matter of economics for me only that has ever kept me away from Alvarion products. You guys build good stuff and in some markets the price is easily recovered through ROI. Thanks, Scriv Brad Larson wrote: John, Typically 4 sector base stations are built with either 5.3 or a licensed link as backhaul. With BreezeAccess VL, true data sector performance is 28 meg's in a 20 Mhz channel and half that in 10 Mhz Next firmware release is going to mid 30's in a 20 Mhz channel (again true data rates). I know of one sector that has 200 sub's attached although most sectors have less than 100. This customer looked at most manufacturer's gear and concluded Alvarion had the management feature sets, ease of batch processing for firmware uploads, obstructed
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Comments inline: Matt Liotta wrote: If you keep a single POTS line for faxing, how do you manage the backend? You are going to get the line billed separately from your VoIP provider and you won't be able to share long distance or international across the two. Most customers expect to have their minutes pooled across both their fax and voice lines. Then you have the other problem of 911, which is that your solution is NOT compliant with the FCC's requirements for VoIP carriers. Let's not forget about trying to get the customer's voice and fax DIDs in the same block when they need to be spread across VoIP and POTS. Perhaps we have a disconnect. I am advocating that the business continue to use ILEC or CLEC lines for their fax services. I'm not managing the backend for the fax lines for the customers that I am talking about. A large business in my area, is 10 or more employees. This is a very rural area, but with many of the same needs as a larger business. Having a separate bill for the fax line is not a big deal to them. You are right, this solution is not 911 compliant. Neither is service from Nufone, Teliax, Voipjet, Stanaphone or hundreds of other VOIP carriers out there. The question of the degree of 911 compliance is very much up in the air right now because the FCC's requirement is basically unenforceable. Skype is not compliant, and yet there are millions of people on their service. As far as I'm concerned, all of the hoopla around 911 compliance is BS that is out there to scare people out of the voip business and tie up the resources of the people who are in it. The model I put together never touches the PSTN, it is purely data - no different than Skype or MSN messenger with voice enabled or Xbox live with players talking to each other. The distinction of what consitutes 911 capable phone service over IP has not been made yet and will not be made for some time. Almost anything worth doing requires a real commitment. If you aren't willing to make a real commitment and the margins aren't that exciting without a commitment then it probably isn't worth the time. -Matt Tying up valuable financial resources into an early stage market like this and expecting to make a large committment without guaranteed revenue possibilities is insanity. Committments also reduce flexibility, and that is a key to the success of the small ISP/WISP operator. If someone comes out with .5 cents a minute or lower termination for low volumes, I will be able to switch my outbound service to that provider with a couple of configuration changes. You are going to be stuck with your committment, and if they can't deliver the same thing you will be out of luck. It's like signing a four year contract for Internet backbone at todays rates. The people who did that in 2003 are now paying twice as much for bandwidth as people who didn't sign long term contracts and maintained their flexibility. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Part-15 is now doing the same thing that I have been at since early summer - - which is Nuvio. The only difference being that Bullet is not paying out all that he has coming in - - which is his right! I ran this across the list many months ago offering to make nothing off of someone elses VoIP connections as resellers. I and 3 others are selling Nuvio services branded as our own and I must confess - - its been real good! check it out: https://mactel.nuvio.com If any of you other wisps want to resell VoIP - - drop me a line off lists and I will shoot you any info you might require Mac Dearman Maximum Access, LLC. www.inetsouth.com www.mactel.nuvio.com www.radioresponse.org (Katrina relief) Rayville, La. 318.728.8600 318.303.4227 318.303.4229 Charles Wu wrote: Tom, Your idea is sound, but personally, I would think that what you propose falls into the same category as the WISP Buying Coop IMO, WISPA needs to focus on talking / lobbying in front of the FCC Now, if WISPA members want to get together and form such a CoOp -- go for it Btw...Part-15 I believe has some sort of wholesale VoIP program for its members (through Nuvio?)... -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tom DeReggi Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 1:12 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring Matt Larson, I do not have adequate experience to pass judgement on your suggested configuration. However I will add, base on my recent Rant regarding Wholesale VOIP providers that don't look at small WISPs as valuable partners, I believe leveraging WISPA membership base to negotiate a good deal for us all is a good idea. I believe WISPA should agree to endorse a wholesale provider in exchange for them to be required to give partnership to 100% of WISPA member's that request partnership. I'd be willing to waive my personal preference of providers in favor of selecting a VOIP wholesaler that supports WISPs and recognizes our consolidated numbers as worthy partners. WISPA then could also act as a mechanism to more effectively distribute reocurring changing information to the membership so the Wholesaler only has to do it once. Many discussion have been had on what ventures should be explored by WISPA for the benefit of the membership, that would not be in conflict with the services that the members themselves already provided, and was in line with the goals of the organization adn what it is intented to be. Facilitating a group deal for VOIP is one of those things that I think would be a great thing for WISPA to do. But its got to be an all or nothing deal, meaning vendor accepts all WISPA members that are interested, as a condition of agreement. Negotiate once, replicate many. The reality is most WISPs are not the size alone to have any weight to negotiate. Maybe a few guys like Travis have enough volume, but not the majority of us. I'd be willing to donate time to that cause if needed, wether it be determining the requirements needed in an agreement or distributing the info after the fact. Whether the provider be you, Matt Liotta, or a national carrier is irrelevant to me. I just believe that WISPs will own at least 15% of the nations broadband subscribers at some point, and I believe that that is a significant enough market share that there has got to be someone with enough brains to realize the value of WISP partners, to the extent that they will offer favorable terms to the organization. My concern is that most VOIP providers (that value partnerships) home in on business managed PBX VOIP solutions. Although I do not dispute their reasoning for that, that does not help WISPs nationwide, whose businesses may include a large amount of residential focus as well. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Matt Liotta [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 9:50 AM Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring I don't believe you will find good margins with the setup you are specifying. Additionally, you can forget about fax working, which is an absolute requirement for businesses. If anyone on this list wants to do VoIP over wireless, figure out how to do fax before committing to the business. From experience I can tell you that it cost us an enormous amount of money to get fax working with Asterisk. -Matt Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Hello all, After a year and a half of watching, jumping in and learning about VOIP, I think I have come up with a way to implement it with a relatively low budget setup. Here is my very general outline of how to deliver VOIP on a shoestring: 1) Asterisk server with AMP (Asterisk Management Portal): This is a great soho
Re: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipeprovidervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider (html formatted for easier reading)
Again, they should be held accountable for what they have built with PUBLIC MONEY. I also fully agree with that above statement. However, not every network operator has built their network with public money or monopoly subsidy. I personally invested close to a million dollars of my personal money to build my network. I have every right to optimize the chances and ways to get a speedy recovery of that investment. Its an asset I own and paid for. It has nothing to do with what a consumer deserves to have, ISP's rights, or LEC's rights. Companies that are solely independant and do not get to recieve subsidies, monopoly protection, USF funds, or public money, should not have to be restricted by the same rules as companies that do. Thats a big differenciator in this discussion. My views are different based on the situation of which companies are involved and preferencial benefits they've recieved or not.. Its no different than an owner of a football team. Because they spent the big bucks to own the football franchise, not only do they have the right to sell seats, but they have the rights to sell parking, and the rights to re-broadcast it. Quite honestly, the need to watch football, I believe is just as importnat to the nations male population, as it is for them to have broadband access. They seem to have the right to optimize the ways they get their return on their investments in their business. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 8:23 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipeprovidervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider (html formatted for easier reading) On Wed, 4 Jan 2006, Charles Wu wrote: For some reason, I am getting a feeling that thread may be going beyond topic debate to personal attacks -- so I will restate my If you are referring to my comment, you are missing the point. I am not, in any way, attacking you personally. I am simply saying that you are overstating what I see others saying. If you take it personally, you should re-read what I posted. Read the following article and tell me what you think http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2005/12/13/telecoms_want_ their_products_to_travel_on_a_faster_internet/?page=full I'm not certain what you want to know. Personally (and this is probably not a popular opinion here), I think that if the network operator has the ability to offer a premium network service, they should be allowed to do that. I believe that I, as a network operator, should be allowed the same freedom. At the same time, I think that there should be NO PUBLIC MONEY involved in the pool here. Now, Look back at the original topic of debate and ask yourself the following question...is there REALLY a distinction between the prioritization and/or discrimination (or blocking taken to the Prioritization of X is NOT discrimination of not X. THAT is the point I was making before. No matter how many times you say it, or how many ways you put it, it does not change a simple fact. Nth degree) of certain types of Internet packets? If you think Blocking on the other hand IS discrimination. For instance, I block LOTS of traffic. I block ALL traffic to and from known hacker havens. I do not accept mail from certain servers. I only allow certain volumes of P2P traffic to flow over my network. These things enhance my service for my subscribers. I have a few customers who have opted to move on to other ISPs as a result of these decisions. That is their choice, and in the end, it benefits my remaining subs all the more. The fact is, there has been customer movement in both directions. I have moved several customer ONTO my network for the same reason others have left. about it, prioritizing certain my preferred packets across my physical network is really no different than discriminating (depreferencing or blocking) my competitors -- in fact, the Network Neutrality (free love, etc) camp would argue that allowing certain providers to pay for prioritized / privilege access is Ok..now it's time for a personal attack. Those guys are KOOKS. The topic of debate that I am addressing is the argument between it's my @[EMAIL PROTECTED] network so I can do whatever I want vs. the Internet is a free and open medium or Network Neutrality). I have no problem with this debate. I think it is a silly debate, but there are others who will argue this till they are blue in the face. I don't have time to do that, so I will most likely bow out and watch from afar, as I have been doing. SBC started it, now BellSouth is getting into the act. Two articles (1, 2) highlight comments made by William L. Smith, CTO of BellSouth, about how he'd really like to be able to charge internet companies for priority
Re: [WISPA] VOIP - and rants
Tom, This huge thread about CP is amazing. If you don't want to use them, or don't like their business plan. Fine. It is the same plan that Level(3) has, so I don't understand the big deal. You seem really peeved about the initial fee. How is that any different than an install fee? There are 1200 VOIP Providers. Go get one and get rolling. Not all of them get your plan. Heck, many of them, don't get my business plan and view of the world, but that's life. I work with the ones that do - clients and vendors. About the volume buying: We (II4A - www.ii4a.org) spoke with CP and others about volume buying DSL, VOIP, DBS, etc. The billing is th key. No one (I have spoken with) wants to bill individual ISPs under a Volume umbrella. Most want to bill II4A and then II4A bills its members. Two problems: Billing is overhead that increases the cost of the service (by about $2 per bill). Collections and cash flow - you have 15 days to pay. How do you collect from all the coop members? What if a few can't or won't pay? It affects EVERYONE else's business. Deposits, automatic debit, ACH, etc. are a pain - and, since I know you despise initialation fees, would be a barrier to entry for the little guy. Those are the realities of volume buying that I have dealt with for 4 years. Maybe someone else can get around those issues. BTW, a little CYA: If I was in your market, competing against you and read your comments on blocking/prioritize, etc., I would use it in my marketing against you. It would only take a little push and it could knock you down. Trust me on this. People like controversy more than anything. Regards, Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. 813-963-5884 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumbpipeprovidervs.end-to-endconnectivity/content provider (htmlformatted for easier reading)
Again, they should be held accountable for what they have built with PUBLIC MONEY. IMO, it's nearly impossible to do a 1/2 and 1/2 type of model I doubt there is any service provider out there who HAS NOT benefited in some manner from PUBLIC MONEY at some time (or who would want to close the door to access this opportunity) Remember, PUBLIC MONEY includes Erate / RUS Loans / Economic Development Grants / Tax Credits / etc (or the ability to access those types of contracts) Imagine how burdensome it'd be if, in order to do connecitivity business with a government entity, you would have to submit your network to some sort of open access audit it's either all regulated, or no regulation (now, in a non-regulated environment, free-market economics may spawn a market niche of open access regulated-like free access networks, but that's a whole other debate) -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Perhaps we have a disconnect. I am advocating that the business continue to use ILEC or CLEC lines for their fax services. I'm not managing the backend for the fax lines for the customers that I am talking about. A large business in my area, is 10 or more employees. This is a very rural area, but with many of the same needs as a larger business. Having a separate bill for the fax line is not a big deal to them. If the businesses are happy to have a mixed solution like that then go ahead and sell it. That sort of thing doesn't fly in our market. You are right, this solution is not 911 compliant. Neither is service from Nufone, Teliax, Voipjet, Stanaphone or hundreds of other VOIP carriers out there. The question of the degree of 911 compliance is very much up in the air right now because the FCC's requirement is basically unenforceable. Skype is not compliant, and yet there are millions of people on their service. As far as I'm concerned, all of the hoopla around 911 compliance is BS that is out there to scare people out of the voip business and tie up the resources of the people who are in it. The model I put together never touches the PSTN, it is purely data - no different than Skype or MSN messenger with voice enabled or Xbox live with players talking to each other. The distinction of what consitutes 911 capable phone service over IP has not been made yet and will not be made for some time. You can argue the FCC's 911 requirement all your want, but nevertheless it is there and they can fine you. If you believe the risk is justifiable based on your revenue projections then by all means go ahead with it. Tying up valuable financial resources into an early stage market like this and expecting to make a large committment without guaranteed revenue possibilities is insanity. Committments also reduce flexibility, and that is a key to the success of the small ISP/WISP operator. If someone comes out with .5 cents a minute or lower termination for low volumes, I will be able to switch my outbound service to that provider with a couple of configuration changes. You are going to be stuck with your committment, and if they can't deliver the same thing you will be out of luck. It's like signing a four year contract for Internet backbone at todays rates. The people who did that in 2003 are now paying twice as much for bandwidth as people who didn't sign long term contracts and maintained their flexibility. You don't need to sign a four year or large minute commitment to get $0.005 per minute termination. Our wholesale customers average $0.002 to $0.009 per minute depending on call patterns and markets served with no commitment. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
[WISPA] SonicWall Question
I have a SonicWall Pro 2040 that keeps flashing the Test and Alarm lights. The only document I can find says that means there is a major alarm, but there is nothing in the log. Anyone know SonicWall well enough to know what this may be? Scott Reed Owner NewWays Wireless Networking Network Design, Installation and Administration www.nwwnet.net The season is Christmas, not X-mas, not the holiday, but Christmas, because Christ was born to provide salvation to all who will believe! -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Just out of interest, has anyone set-up VoIP peering with others in different countries for cheaper international call termination? -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: 05 January 2006 21:55 To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Perhaps we have a disconnect. I am advocating that the business continue to use ILEC or CLEC lines for their fax services. I'm not managing the backend for the fax lines for the customers that I am talking about. A large business in my area, is 10 or more employees. This is a very rural area, but with many of the same needs as a larger business. Having a separate bill for the fax line is not a big deal to them. If the businesses are happy to have a mixed solution like that then go ahead and sell it. That sort of thing doesn't fly in our market. You are right, this solution is not 911 compliant. Neither is service from Nufone, Teliax, Voipjet, Stanaphone or hundreds of other VOIP carriers out there. The question of the degree of 911 compliance is very much up in the air right now because the FCC's requirement is basically unenforceable. Skype is not compliant, and yet there are millions of people on their service. As far as I'm concerned, all of the hoopla around 911 compliance is BS that is out there to scare people out of the voip business and tie up the resources of the people who are in it. The model I put together never touches the PSTN, it is purely data - no different than Skype or MSN messenger with voice enabled or Xbox live with players talking to each other. The distinction of what consitutes 911 capable phone service over IP has not been made yet and will not be made for some time. You can argue the FCC's 911 requirement all your want, but nevertheless it is there and they can fine you. If you believe the risk is justifiable based on your revenue projections then by all means go ahead with it. Tying up valuable financial resources into an early stage market like this and expecting to make a large committment without guaranteed revenue possibilities is insanity. Committments also reduce flexibility, and that is a key to the success of the small ISP/WISP operator. If someone comes out with .5 cents a minute or lower termination for low volumes, I will be able to switch my outbound service to that provider with a couple of configuration changes. You are going to be stuck with your committment, and if they can't deliver the same thing you will be out of luck. It's like signing a four year contract for Internet backbone at todays rates. The people who did that in 2003 are now paying twice as much for bandwidth as people who didn't sign long term contracts and maintained their flexibility. You don't need to sign a four year or large minute commitment to get $0.005 per minute termination. Our wholesale customers average $0.002 to $0.009 per minute depending on call patterns and markets served with no commitment. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.371 / Virus Database: 267.14.13/221 - Release Date: 04/01/2006 -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.371 / Virus Database: 267.14.13/221 - Release Date: 04/01/2006 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
I have not, but would certainly be interested in doing so. -Matt Paul Hendry wrote: Just out of interest, has anyone set-up VoIP peering with others in different countries for cheaper international call termination? -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Matt Liotta Sent: 05 January 2006 21:55 To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: Perhaps we have a disconnect. I am advocating that the business continue to use ILEC or CLEC lines for their fax services. I'm not managing the backend for the fax lines for the customers that I am talking about. A large business in my area, is 10 or more employees. This is a very rural area, but with many of the same needs as a larger business. Having a separate bill for the fax line is not a big deal to them. If the businesses are happy to have a mixed solution like that then go ahead and sell it. That sort of thing doesn't fly in our market. You are right, this solution is not 911 compliant. Neither is service from Nufone, Teliax, Voipjet, Stanaphone or hundreds of other VOIP carriers out there. The question of the degree of 911 compliance is very much up in the air right now because the FCC's requirement is basically unenforceable. Skype is not compliant, and yet there are millions of people on their service. As far as I'm concerned, all of the hoopla around 911 compliance is BS that is out there to scare people out of the voip business and tie up the resources of the people who are in it. The model I put together never touches the PSTN, it is purely data - no different than Skype or MSN messenger with voice enabled or Xbox live with players talking to each other. The distinction of what consitutes 911 capable phone service over IP has not been made yet and will not be made for some time. You can argue the FCC's 911 requirement all your want, but nevertheless it is there and they can fine you. If you believe the risk is justifiable based on your revenue projections then by all means go ahead with it. Tying up valuable financial resources into an early stage market like this and expecting to make a large committment without guaranteed revenue possibilities is insanity. Committments also reduce flexibility, and that is a key to the success of the small ISP/WISP operator. If someone comes out with .5 cents a minute or lower termination for low volumes, I will be able to switch my outbound service to that provider with a couple of configuration changes. You are going to be stuck with your committment, and if they can't deliver the same thing you will be out of luck. It's like signing a four year contract for Internet backbone at todays rates. The people who did that in 2003 are now paying twice as much for bandwidth as people who didn't sign long term contracts and maintained their flexibility. You don't need to sign a four year or large minute commitment to get $0.005 per minute termination. Our wholesale customers average $0.002 to $0.009 per minute depending on call patterns and markets served with no commitment. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipeprovidervs.end-to-end connectivity/content provider (htmlformatted for easier reading)
Title: Message "network operators provide free and non-discriminatory transport on their networks" This is the key phrase. This basically says that every corparate LAN, must allow any consumer to steal access from that corporation's LAN, and open up their LAN to the security threats by giving access to the Consumers. It means that Business owners can't control what content an employee views, while they are supposed to be working. The key is the definition of "Network Operator" and "broadband networks". By the definition of "Broadband" most every corporate or even home network is technically broadband, doing symetrical data throughput above 200K speed. Whats most important is the the major conduit and pipes that interconnect the "Internet" are not allowed to block traffic. The rules below should apply. Could you imagine what would happen if Verizon decided to block VOIP after they purchased MCI? However, we have got to draw the line and not get carried away, by over burdening the world by encompasing every person that owns and operates a private network to follow the same rules of the "Internet". At what point is a network considered the Internetversus private network. We need to be very careful how that is defined. The secret lies in the definiton of the key terms involved, not the rules them selves. Its easy to determine what rules are fair for consumers, the hard part is defining who should be ruled by those laws. 4. Consumers are entitled to competition among network providers, application and service providers, and content providers. Some other issues related to this. What are we saying bysaying consumers are entitled to competition? Are we saying that if Comcast and Verizon get to the buidling first, their is infact competition, and to bad for the wireless provider when the landlord does not allow them on the roof. What we really need to be saying is consumers should have their choice of network provider or network technology. If a consumer wants wireless, they should have the right to chose wireless. Quote from this month Business Wireless page 1 " I wanted wireless but cable got their first". And people always have the choice for a T1 if they have cooper phones. Thats still competition. Or we should be saying that all technologies should have the same non-discrimination access to consumers, so the consumers have the option for choice. How can a wireless carrier that pays a mandatory 25% revenue share out to a landlord able to compete against Verizon that is allowedeasement-fee-free access? 3. Consumers are entitled to connect their choice of legal devicesthat do not harm the network; and Also a problem. What about devices that potential could conflict. Should it be required to wait for a conflict to restrict it? How could that ever be managed on a wide scale with the thousand of vendors. "do not harm the network", how do you know if it will harm? The only safe way is to pre-test the device, and if the device tests not to harm then it is OK. We have a legal obligation to guarantee performance of our network for our subscribers, I can't wait for a disaster to define what will and won't harm a network. The only way to control this is to define upfront which devices you've approved for use on your network. I'd argue that text needs to be added that states, Consumer has choice of device to install on network, after first submitting device to network operator for their testing and approval of compatibilty ofthe device on their network. What this says is if you let one person on the net with a LinksysG router, you then need to allow another, which is OK, but if you let nobody on the network with a wireless-g router, than its OK. I'd also say just because its OK to allow a consumer to install a device of their choice on the network does not necessarilly mean they should be allowed to use the device any way that they want on your network. If they use that Linksys-G wireless router to serve their neighbor or free hotspot, that should be something that permission is needed from the provider. I sell broadabnd for a purpose not necessarilly just a specific amount of broadband. I sell an experience on the INternet not broadband. Every person that takes advanatage of that experience should have to pay, if that is my policy. If I buy arecord album, should I be allowed to copy and duplicate that record album across the country? If I have Windows XP, should I be able to give it to my neighbor when I'm done with the CD? No I bought a license to use the software for a specific purpose, I did not sell them a plastiv CD, nor anyone else the use of it. Basically these Network Neutrality suggestions basically contradict every licensing and copyright rule in the book. Maybe we should not be selling broadband, but instead selling a license to use broadband off of our service. Can we all just start sellling licenses to get around network
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Comments inline... You are right, this solution is not 911 compliant. Neither is service from Nufone, Teliax, Voipjet, Stanaphone or hundreds of other VOIP carriers out there. The question of the degree of 911 compliance is very much up in the air right now because the FCC's requirement is basically unenforceable. Skype is not compliant, and yet there are millions of people on their service. As far as I'm concerned, all of the hoopla around 911 compliance is BS that is out there to scare people out of the voip business and tie up the resources of the people who are in it. The model I put together never touches the PSTN, it is purely data - no different than Skype or MSN messenger with voice enabled or Xbox live with players talking to each other. The distinction of what consitutes 911 capable phone service over IP has not been made yet and will not be made for some time. You can argue the FCC's 911 requirement all your want, but nevertheless it is there and they can fine you. If you believe the risk is justifiable based on your revenue projections then by all means go ahead with it. The requirement is there but has yet to be proven by law, or enforced. I intend to keep my voip ventures separate from my regular ISP business. If the 911 requirement for voip is proven by law, then I can either work to make it compliant according to the established legal history, sell the customers to another voip provider or shut it down. FWIW, there is a requirement for cell companies for several years to provide location information to e911 centers. Guess what, a majority of the cellular carriers can't or don't provide that location information. They have gotten exemptions over and over. That didn't stop them from selling service and building out markets. This is the same sort of situation. The public wants VOIP, and they are going to get it. The 911 details will get worked out over time and a few court cases. Tying up valuable financial resources into an early stage market like this and expecting to make a large committment without guaranteed revenue possibilities is insanity. Committments also reduce flexibility, and that is a key to the success of the small ISP/WISP operator. If someone comes out with .5 cents a minute or lower termination for low volumes, I will be able to switch my outbound service to that provider with a couple of configuration changes. You are going to be stuck with your committment, and if they can't deliver the same thing you will be out of luck. It's like signing a four year contract for Internet backbone at todays rates. The people who did that in 2003 are now paying twice as much for bandwidth as people who didn't sign long term contracts and maintained their flexibility. You don't need to sign a four year or large minute commitment to get $0.005 per minute termination. Our wholesale customers average $0.002 to $0.009 per minute depending on call patterns and markets served with no commitment. -Matt I chose a poor way to express my point. Here is a better way. A year ago I spoke with another prospective voip solutions provider (similar to CommPartners) and it was going to require a $3000/month committment in services sold to start doing my own voip service. I am glad that I did not pursue that avenue, as it would have been money wasted. That is the kind of committment/lack of flexibility that I do not want to get into. I apologize if it seems that I am being contradictory, I just think that it makes sense to have some good healthy debate about things. We all see things from a different perspective, and I do appreciate what you have brought to the discussion. Business wise, if you can do $0.005 per minute termination in the lower 48 with minimal committments and can terminate IAX, then I am interested in more about what you have to offer. The difference between 1.5 cents and .5 cents a minute is pretty huge for the margins, and makes the breakeven projections work a lot better. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios
Matt, So what are you using to provide/inject MPLS support on your network? I heard there were some open source MPLS projects. Did any of them fly? Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Matt Liotta [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 3:39 PM Subject: Re: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios We mostly serve MTUs, so we don't have that many subscribers that aren't managed by our MPLS network. Radio management is important, but much less important than for the folks doing a more traditional fixed wireless network. -Matt Brad Larson wrote: Will this network be scaling to 10 subscribers in one town or 1,000 or more subscribers over many square miles? The more you scale may mean that features such as batch processing for easy firmware upgrades and other management features will save you money in the long run. Ongoing costs and radio features are seldom talked about when a question like yours is asked. X brand is cheaper may not be what you want or need to hear. Brad -Original Message- From: Matt Liotta [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 2:44 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios We want as much capacity as possible, but certainly 10Mbps minimum. This is for business customers only and we won't be oversubscribing the sectors, so there isn't a need to support many subscribers per sector. Not sure what you are asking in terms of scale, could you be more specific? VoIP will be used across the radio links however the traffic is encapsulated in MPLS. -Matt Brad Larson wrote: Matt, How much capacity do you need per 5.8 Ghz sector? Is this a business or residential rollout or both? How many subscribers per sector do you want to support? How large do you want to scale this network and is managment, batch firmware loads for radio updates, vlan tagging, voip support important to you? Brad -Original Message- From: Matt Liotta [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006 7:02 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios We are looking to start deploying 5.8Ghz multi-point radios at some of our sites. I am hoping some folks on this list can share experiences and ideas on what radios might meet our needs. We have experimented with Canopy and Trango, but would really like some better choices. From a specification standpoint, Canopy general meets our needs, but we don't like being constrained on the antenna. We would like to use sectors bigger than 60 degrees and we would like to use horizontal polarization. We don't want to use Trango for no other reason than they can't work with distributors. We really like the flexibility on many 802.11a-based radios and certainly the price, but the contention aspects of the protocol and the perception of Wi-Fi being a consumer grade technology stop us from going that route. Any thoughts from the list? -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipe provider vs.end-to-end connectivity/content provider
Charles, Just to be clear, we don't currently block or slow anything. We don;t technically have a VOIP service of our own yet. I'm simply debating the options. I am using Commpartners as an example, only because I had recent discussions with them this past summer, and they are fresh in my mind, but I am not targeting Commpartners directly in any way. My comments could apply to any VOIP wholesale provider, and should be interpreted as such. Port blocking is a very touchy subject right now, and in my mind a very important one that may define the outcome of VOIP and relationships between partners. A VOIP offering will become a significant part of my business, as it will be for most others as well, and I need to have a clear plan of how I'm going to go about competing in the space. Also on a side note, the reason I'm a little over POed on the Fee thing, was that I spent a month testing their service and negotiating terms and stuff. A whole marketing campaign was created around their service, lots of time spent. Then right after I got my first customer and signed the agreement and ready to fax it over, I saw the fine print that mentioned a $5000 fee, which I was never told about upfront or that was never mentioned once in our conversation over the month. So I got blind sided with the $5000 fee at the last minute. I thought they should have disclosed that to me before we started working with them, not a month later after the time was spent. SO then I developed the high and mighty attitude, that why should I pay a fee, I probably had just got pretty close to costing me $5000 in time just building my marketing plan. They should have waived it, at that point. The must have figured I'd be more likely to pay it after spedning all the time. I don't like to be squeezed that way. And the more I thought about it I started to boil thinking over the situation. I'm not really 100% sure what I believe yet on wether blocking should be done or not. But I don't like people that play that way. It reminds me of the high and might Covad, where what ever they say goes attitude. We are really only going to get one choice to get VOIP legislation done right, the way thatwill benefit us all. Wether the topic is what wholesale partners we should support, or wether its right to block traffic, the issues all apply to WISP's future of using VOIP. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 1:49 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] VOIP / CommPartners -- big dumb pipe provider vs.end-to-end connectivity/content provider snip performance to their VOIP servers over our network. Think about it, do you think I'm going to allow the same performance to our competitive VOIP provider as I do to our own VOIP services? By getting us to be a Partner for them, we'd optimize them for our own benefit, and indirectly Comm Parnters would guarantee that our network /snip Not that I'm trying to start anything...but this is pretty dangerous ground to tread on If you think about it, an argument can be made that preference of one's own traffic (or depreffing competition traffic) is not that much different than FCC fines telco for VoIP Port Blocking http://informationweek.smallbizpipeline.com/60405214 SBC Says Google should pay to use our network http://techdirt.com/articles/20051031/0354228_F.shtml In a larger context, it may come down to a strategy of providing big dumb pipes (like what the phone companies have done) or becoming end-to-end connectivity/content companies (like what the cable-cos have done) -Charles --- CWLab Technology Architects http://www.cwlab.com -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
I don't agree that its the same as a Coop opportunity. A coop is to buy gear. Leveraging a membership's enrollment to help the success of the Future of WISPs, and help protect the rights of the small WISP from the is more in line with what a Union does, and I look at WISPA like a union. A coop is to negotiate better pricing on a product. I'm not suggesting that. I'm suggesting negotiating better terms. Thats a different task all togeather. A coop replaces the distributor. I'm not suggesting that, or maybe I mistakenly did with out thinking clearly on the best ways for WISPA to facilitate negotiating better terms for WISPs. The transaction would still be between the WISP and the VOIP provider, the only difference is that the WISPs has gotten better terms going into the deal. This is the kind of thing I've seen that NASBA does, and association representing OEM PC companies. Its sorta like associations that organize health plans for their members. The association isn;t involved in the transaction to purcahse the health plan, they jsut pre-negotiate the terms to use numbers to get leverage for better terms. I agree that WISPA's first priority should be to lobby FCC. But that doesn't mean additional services should not be provided. Only thing I'd worry about is if there were members already trying to wholesale VOIP, that would consider it a conflict of interest. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 2:50 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring Tom, Your idea is sound, but personally, I would think that what you propose falls into the same category as the WISP Buying Coop IMO, WISPA needs to focus on talking / lobbying in front of the FCC Now, if WISPA members want to get together and form such a CoOp -- go for it Btw...Part-15 I believe has some sort of wholesale VoIP program for its members (through Nuvio?)... -Charles --- WiNOG Austin, TX March 13-15, 2006 http://www.winog.com -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tom DeReggi Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 1:12 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring Matt Larson, I do not have adequate experience to pass judgement on your suggested configuration. However I will add, base on my recent Rant regarding Wholesale VOIP providers that don't look at small WISPs as valuable partners, I believe leveraging WISPA membership base to negotiate a good deal for us all is a good idea. I believe WISPA should agree to endorse a wholesale provider in exchange for them to be required to give partnership to 100% of WISPA member's that request partnership. I'd be willing to waive my personal preference of providers in favor of selecting a VOIP wholesaler that supports WISPs and recognizes our consolidated numbers as worthy partners. WISPA then could also act as a mechanism to more effectively distribute reocurring changing information to the membership so the Wholesaler only has to do it once. Many discussion have been had on what ventures should be explored by WISPA for the benefit of the membership, that would not be in conflict with the services that the members themselves already provided, and was in line with the goals of the organization adn what it is intented to be. Facilitating a group deal for VOIP is one of those things that I think would be a great thing for WISPA to do. But its got to be an all or nothing deal, meaning vendor accepts all WISPA members that are interested, as a condition of agreement. Negotiate once, replicate many. The reality is most WISPs are not the size alone to have any weight to negotiate. Maybe a few guys like Travis have enough volume, but not the majority of us. I'd be willing to donate time to that cause if needed, wether it be determining the requirements needed in an agreement or distributing the info after the fact. Whether the provider be you, Matt Liotta, or a national carrier is irrelevant to me. I just believe that WISPs will own at least 15% of the nations broadband subscribers at some point, and I believe that that is a significant enough market share that there has got to be someone with enough brains to realize the value of WISP partners, to the extent that they will offer favorable terms to the organization. My concern is that most VOIP providers (that value partnerships) home in on business managed PBX VOIP solutions. Although I do not dispute their reasoning for that, that does not help WISPs nationwide, whose businesses may include a large amount of residential focus as well. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Matt Liotta [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Thursday,
Re: [WISPA] VOIP - 911
You do understand that as a voice provider, since the FCC deemed 911 a requirement, if your service is not 911 compliant and someone dies, you can be held crimiinally liable as well as civilly liable? Regards, Peter -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
I like Nuvio's model a lot. They have a good model to help WISPs finance the equipment and they also give leads. I have my beef with Nuvio as well. They were the second partner I almost signed up with, but on that one I backed out at the final hour. Part of the problem is that I am too easilly annoyed, and sometimes make decissions out of principle. I jsut can't stand dealing with stupid people. If I make a good case for something that is logical and make sense and is justifiable, I should be entitled to it and get it. If my request is denied, and the person can not give a justifyable reason why, then I got a problem with it. I believe there needs to be an open door to negotiation, and people should use common sense to rule their discusions. I had two issues with Nuvio. The first was that they also put on the big push for me to provide business managed PBX. I knew it was going to be one of those deals where if I didn't sell a certain number of business managed PBX services, I was going to have problems with the relationship. The primary reason that I wanted to sell VOIP was for the residential markets. What irratated me was the sales guy insisted, that the only way he'd let me sign up is if I committed to purchasing a 5 line system, that I could use to DEMO out to the clients that requested our service. Although that kinda did make sense, to sell to the residential market place which was what I planned to do, I really didn't need to loan 5 phones out to the end user. For that matter at residential prices I didn't need to DEMO any. I jsut needed to use one in my office that I could have someone call me on, so I could show them how well it worked. Or I could initiate a no risk return policy, where I'd send it to them, and they could back out if the quality wasn't good. He said, well then just use the 5 phones in your office. I did not want to do that bnecause my office was not a good candidate for VOIP. Its the worse link on my network today. Its in the middle of the forest going through a mile of trees, 5 hops back across my network. VoIP got to bad when it rained really hard, based on my link margin. I only needed to buy 1, for DEMOs, that I could use on non-rainy days. So I refused to buy the 5 demo phones. I just couldn't justify having 5 phones sitting there on the shelf paying $200 everymonth for something that was going to jsut sit there on the shelf. Plus if I did want to lend a business a DEMO set, I see no reason why I should foot the bill. What cost does NUVIO really have to provide a couple DEMO phones? I offered an alternative. I said I would pre-purchase 5 phone services, for my first 5 clients that I didn't ahve yet, and I said that I would buy 1 phone of each type that they offered, jsut so I could show people their options if I ever decided to go onsite to show people. He declined the offer. I jsut thought that that was a stupid decission. The sales rep had worked with me now for almost two month. I made a firm commitment, I had 10,000 end users in a 10 location project condo deal, that I was going to launch the offering at. Already had most of the marketing done because of the CommPartner deal. Why in the world, would a sales person pass up that partnership opportunity, over the requrement for me to buy 5 DEMO phone services that wqould never be used? I could ahve lied, and sold the 5 DEMOs services after the fact, you know giving them to friends and familly. But thatwould have been deceptive, and I'm an honest guy. I jsut couldn't understand it. So I labeled him a stupid person and decided not to do business with him. Maybe I'm the stupid one, as today I don't ahve a VOIP solution. But quite honestly, its not worth getting into this with a partner that you don't see eye to eye with that is not flexable. So instead, I refer most of my business clients to Primus. And they just take care of it. I only get 15%, but so what I have zero headaches. The only problem is they don't offer residential service throguh partners just direct. I'll probably stay with Primus on the business, because frankly I don't want the liabilty, and they had ZERO problems being flexable. They wanted my business, and they tried hard to get it. The ironic part is that, Primus screwed me out of about a few hundred thousand dollars worth of DSL clients about 5 years back when they were onthe verge of bankruptcy (but managed to escape it somehow). But you know what, the guy appologized, and actually still tried to win our business back even when he knew he was fighting against an obstacle that huge. He must have really wanted our business. I have to say that made me feel special. Thats the kind of guy that I want to deal with. Its the kind of guy that I wish I could find to work for me in sales. I made it hard for him, I was burnt out on evaluating VOIP providers. But he made it so easy for me. Flexability was their middle name, they just
Re: [WISPA] VOIP - and rants
Yes, but I have not ever blocked anyone. I am making hypothetical comments. However your point is well taken. level3 same plan. The differnce is Level 3 lets me know the plan upfront. Second, LEVEL3 may deserve the right to charge. Level3 is not a new startup like CommPartners. Level3 is leading the country as a national tier1 transit provider. They are the big fish, and they probably have the right to act like one, and demand any terms that they want. . There are 1200 VOIP Providers. Do you know where to find that list of 1200 providers? I've found only about enough to fill one hand full of fingers, regarding wholesale. The billing is the key. Thats exactly why I do not want to go through a third party. I either want my partner to bill my client directly, or I want to villthem and only have one bill to cross reference the one from the carrier that tracks it and provides it. Doing VOIP through a middle man will be a nightmare from the billing point of view. That need to be avoided at all cost. Try and get a credit, when the overbilling start, going through a third party. I'vebeen there done that. With one compnay the over billing got to be over $20,000 a month. I had no recourse to cure it, as I had no agreement with the provider tracking the costs, and the reseller wouldn't fix it for me or waive it until the provider did. It becomes a nightmare. Must be avoided. A perfect reason why companies like Commpartners should do direct deals not through resellers. ONce they have a billing system in palce that can accommodate the middle man and cure the man in the middle billing headaches, thats fine, build a resller middle man channel. But until then, dont do it. Blocking may not be the right approach. I'm undecided. Maybe someone else can get around those issues. They can't. Exactly why I suggest Commpartners should go direct and avoid the problems of a middle man. And why I didn;t suggest a COOP, like some people misunderstood. My goal is to simplify billing not make it more complex. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Peter R. [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 4:37 PM Subject: Re: [WISPA] VOIP - and rants Tom, This huge thread about CP is amazing. If you don't want to use them, or don't like their business plan. Fine. It is the same plan that Level(3) has, so I don't understand the big deal. You seem really peeved about the initial fee. How is that any different than an install fee? There are 1200 VOIP Providers. Go get one and get rolling. Not all of them get your plan. Heck, many of them, don't get my business plan and view of the world, but that's life. I work with the ones that do - clients and vendors. About the volume buying: We (II4A - www.ii4a.org) spoke with CP and others about volume buying DSL, VOIP, DBS, etc. The billing is th key. No one (I have spoken with) wants to bill individual ISPs under a Volume umbrella. Most want to bill II4A and then II4A bills its members. Two problems: Billing is overhead that increases the cost of the service (by about $2 per bill). Collections and cash flow - you have 15 days to pay. How do you collect from all the coop members? What if a few can't or won't pay? It affects EVERYONE else's business. Deposits, automatic debit, ACH, etc. are a pain - and, since I know you despise initialation fees, would be a barrier to entry for the little guy. Those are the realities of volume buying that I have dealt with for 4 years. Maybe someone else can get around those issues. BTW, a little CYA: If I was in your market, competing against you and read your comments on blocking/prioritize, etc., I would use it in my marketing against you. It would only take a little push and it could knock you down. Trust me on this. People like controversy more than anything. Regards, Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. 813-963-5884 -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 5.8Ghz Multi-point radios
Tom DeReggi wrote: Matt, So what are you using to provide/inject MPLS support on your network? I heard there were some open source MPLS projects. Did any of them fly? We use Cisco gear for MPLS. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: The requirement is there but has yet to be proven by law, or enforced. I intend to keep my voip ventures separate from my regular ISP business. If the 911 requirement for voip is proven by law, then I can either work to make it compliant according to the established legal history, sell the customers to another voip provider or shut it down. Make sure you have help from legal counsel as ventures that only appear to be separate can easily be treated as one legally. FWIW, there is a requirement for cell companies for several years to provide location information to e911 centers. Guess what, a majority of the cellular carriers can't or don't provide that location information. They have gotten exemptions over and over. That didn't stop them from selling service and building out markets. This is the same sort of situation. The public wants VOIP, and they are going to get it. The 911 details will get worked out over time and a few court cases. They have indeed gotten exceptions, but the real question is have you? Until you get an exception you are in an exceedingly risky situation. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] Renting Spectrum Analyzers
Handheld Bantam 425A Wireless LAN Spectrum Analyzer for 2.4 5.0 GHz bands. A review: http://snipurl.com/Bantam425A http://www.bantaminstruments.com/products.htm Can be purchased from: http://www.warddavis.com/wdc/default.asp Or: Cognio's Laptop SA will do 2.4 and 4.9 - 5.9: http://www.cognio.com http://www.wlanparts.com/product/ASM-92010-001-WIFI Thank you Frank Keeney Pasadena Networks, LLC Antennas, Cables and Equipment: http://www.wlanparts.com -Original Message- On Behalf Of Jenco Wireless You may want to look at www.bvsystems.com. Their BumbleBee unit does 900, 2.4, and 5.8. It interfaces with a PDA, so that gives you an idea of the size. I don't own one yet, but I will (hopefully) someday soon. I do have their Butterfly power meter and I wouldn't give it up for anything now that I have one !! -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] Katrina article
Didn't see my credits for photography. ;) Mike Fuzzy Face Guy -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mac Dearman Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 5:12 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: [WISPA] Katrina article As appeared in Red Herring magazine 12/26/2005 Mac Dearman Tom DeReggi wrote: Just got the new Broadband Wireless. There is a nice three page arcticle on the volunteer effort. I would have liked to see WISPA's name mentioned or at least Mac Dearman's group, but none the less good credit given to many volunteers. Jim Patient managed to get a photo in. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Katrina article
I didnt see Harnishes either - - dirty scoundrels!! :-P Mac Dearman Maximum Access, LLC. www.inetsouth.com www.mactel.nuvio.com www.radioresponse.org (Katrina relief) Rayville, La. 318.728.8600 318.303.4227 318.303.4229 Mike Delp wrote: Didn't see my credits for photography. ;) Mike Fuzzy Face Guy -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mac Dearman Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 5:12 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: [WISPA] Katrina article As appeared in Red Herring magazine 12/26/2005 Mac Dearman Tom DeReggi wrote: Just got the new Broadband Wireless. There is a nice three page arcticle on the volunteer effort. I would have liked to see WISPA's name mentioned or at least Mac Dearman's group, but none the less good credit given to many volunteers. Jim Patient managed to get a photo in. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
OK, here is the $1million dollar question...what have you done to make your VOIP service 911 compliant? Are you comfortable with your level of legal exposure? How much did it cost and what is the best way to handle it? Inquiring minds Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] Matt Liotta wrote: Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: The requirement is there but has yet to be proven by law, or enforced. I intend to keep my voip ventures separate from my regular ISP business. If the 911 requirement for voip is proven by law, then I can either work to make it compliant according to the established legal history, sell the customers to another voip provider or shut it down. Make sure you have help from legal counsel as ventures that only appear to be separate can easily be treated as one legally. FWIW, there is a requirement for cell companies for several years to provide location information to e911 centers. Guess what, a majority of the cellular carriers can't or don't provide that location information. They have gotten exemptions over and over. That didn't stop them from selling service and building out markets. This is the same sort of situation. The public wants VOIP, and they are going to get it. The 911 details will get worked out over time and a few court cases. They have indeed gotten exceptions, but the real question is have you? Until you get an exception you are in an exceedingly risky situation. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] VOIP on a shoestring
Further reading https://www.stanaphone.com/index/news_Nov2205.html There is one way around the 911 requirement. Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: OK, here is the $1million dollar question...what have you done to make your VOIP service 911 compliant? Are you comfortable with your level of legal exposure? How much did it cost and what is the best way to handle it? Inquiring minds Matt Larsen [EMAIL PROTECTED] Matt Liotta wrote: Matt Larsen - Lists wrote: The requirement is there but has yet to be proven by law, or enforced. I intend to keep my voip ventures separate from my regular ISP business. If the 911 requirement for voip is proven by law, then I can either work to make it compliant according to the established legal history, sell the customers to another voip provider or shut it down. Make sure you have help from legal counsel as ventures that only appear to be separate can easily be treated as one legally. FWIW, there is a requirement for cell companies for several years to provide location information to e911 centers. Guess what, a majority of the cellular carriers can't or don't provide that location information. They have gotten exemptions over and over. That didn't stop them from selling service and building out markets. This is the same sort of situation. The public wants VOIP, and they are going to get it. The 911 details will get worked out over time and a few court cases. They have indeed gotten exceptions, but the real question is have you? Until you get an exception you are in an exceedingly risky situation. -Matt -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
