Broadband service and PABX extensions

[BriancuffRest In Peace]

An unusual section for me but here goes:
A friend of mine lives in sheltered accommodation and is connected, I assume, to a PABX as he can dial "9" to get an outside line. There is, however, no facility for him to receive calls directly as there is only one incoming number and the call is forwarded by an "operator".
The problem is how can he get access to an ISP? The main house has broadband but his chalet is 100yds+ from the house so access to their wifi is not on (even if they provided the service). Is there an accepted way of providing broadband on extensions such as this?

[Terrykc]

... The main house has broadband but his chalet is 100yds+ from the house so access to their wifi is not on (even if they provided the service). Is there an accepted way of providing broadband on extensions such as this?

If there is already broadband in the complex, forget about ADSL down a phone line - that's how the existing broadband service gets there, anyway, unless it's connected to VM Cable.

So, lets assume there is a spare port on their router that is available for his use.

Either run a Cat 5/Cat 6 cable to his chalet or experiment with 'boosting' a Wifi connection.

This requires a Wifi router with an external antenna as you can't get to an internal one!

The simplest way is to add a corner reflector or a parabolic reflector to an existing Wifi antenna. Either can easily be made with nothing more exotic than some cardboard, aluminium foil and glue! The corner reflector is simplest.

http://www.freeantennas.com/projects/Ez-10/index.html

http://www.freeantennas.com/projects/te ... index.html

In either case, the reflector simply sits over the existing whip antenna.

Get a redundant Wifi router - if you haven't got one, try your local Freegle of Freecycle.

Set it up in the house in a suitable location to give the clearest unobstructed view of his chalet and see if his PC can reliably communicate with it - there won't be an internet connection, obviously, but it should be possible to connect to the router and look at the internal set-up and diagnostic pages.

If this works, all you need is a connection to the broadband router. Incidentally, as you are using this router as an extender you must connect the broadband to one of the output ports - not the WAN input. Exactly why this is, I don't know, but that is how I had to connect my spare router when I wanted to expand the number of ports above the usual four ...

How easy this will be depends a lot on geography and how helpful the staff are.

One possibility might be if your friend can enlist the help of another resident in the main house, if that is an option, who already has broadband and, hopefully, a window pointing in the right direction! If the Wifi experiment is successful, it resolves the broadband connection problem as the router will connect both users.

Good luck!

[Michael Watterson]

Ethernet Switch, not a Router.

[Cathovisor]

Wouldn't a mobile broadband dongle from somebody like O2 or EE be much simpler...?

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/1849105.htm

Let's assume your friend has a laptop with WiFi already in and enabled. Using Terry's second method - of connecting a spare WiFi router (we'll call it the 'slave') to an existing (call this 'master') broadband router - you would need to connect one of the slave's LAN ports to a spare LAN port on the master WiFi router, and using a crossover Cat. 5 cable (assuming that auto MDI/MDI-X isn't supported - does no harm anyway).

The most important things that you must do on the slave router are to:

(a) disable DHCP - else the two routers will get into a fight over handing out IP addresses;

(b) Set up its own wireless SSID using WPA2/PSK or better still, a VPN;

(c) set its own IP address to be something currently non-existent on the network.

This is absolutely necessary as all the handling of traffic to the WAN must be carried out by the master router. The slave router effectively passes the traffic through to the master.

Your friend's machine should then be assigned an IP address and informed of the WAN gateway by the master router, which controls access to the internet.

However... the accommodation may well take exception to a machine outside of their control appearing on their network and will categorically refuse access. I have to say, if I was managing their network that this is the stance I would take.

It would be possible to block the slave router's access to the existing LAN on the master router (by creating a VLAN), but that would involve port management and the like, which routers will do...

[Terrykc]

Wouldn't a USB WiFi dongle from somebody like O2 or EE be much simpler...?

I'm assuming that Brian's friend is using a Wifi enabled laptop or that Brian would fit a Wifi dongle to a desktop machine as required.

The device in the house must have an aerial which can be mounted in a reflector (no dongle I've seen does) in order to get the additional gain needed to (hopefully) get good communication to the chalet ...

using a crossover Cat. 5 cable ...

Sorry? Why would a crossover cable be necessary? I haven't got one on my set-up and can't see why I would need one ...

[Michael Watterson]

I haven't had to use cross over Cat5 since 10Mbps days. All switch and router ports are auto sense. You'd only need a cross over cat5 direct between two laptop/PC/Notebook etc when there is no switch or router.

An Ethernet switch is very cheap. Note Ethernet cable really only goes 100m reliably, but you can extend to 200m by simply plonking a cheap switch (cheaper than ethernet repeater) in the middle.

I'd only use wiFi at 100m with proper aerials and "air bridge" boxes not Wifi dongles.

mobile broadband

An oxymoron. No such service exists. It's Mobile Internet (EDGE, 3G/HSPA, 4G/LTE etc) and has poor cap (even if they claim otherwise), it has no guarantee of connection or not dropping, generally unsuitable for video and speed can vary 100:1 or nothing. Data Cap in reality is 1/10th to 1/100th of real broadband. Complementary to real broadband for people that need Mobility.

[Cathovisor]

Wouldn't a USB WiFi dongle from somebody like O2 or EE be much simpler...?

I'm assuming that Brian's friend is using a Wifi enabled laptop or that Brian would fit a Wifi dongle to a desktop machine as required.

The device in the house must have an aerial which can be mounted in a reflector (no dongle I've seen does) in order to get the additional gain needed to (hopefully) get good communication to the chalet ...

My apologies Terry, I've not been clear enough. I mean a dongle to get Internet access provided via a mobile phone company such as O2 or EE. That way he'd be independent of the accommodation's systems.

A friend had to do this some years ago when he lived in a part of Lincolnshire that the phone lines didn't pass by. The cost to get a land-line to his house was over £1000 as it involved erecting poles over a farmer's land...

I haven't had to use cross over Cat5 since 10Mbps days. All switch and router ports are auto sense. You'd only need a cross over cat5 direct between two laptop/PC/Notebook etc when there is no switch or router.

You've clearly not met some of the switches and routers I've met - especially the ones with dedicated 'uplink' ports. This is on some quite modern kit too. Whilst not usually necessary, it saves head-scratching if you do encounter such a device.

mobile broadband

An oxymoron. No such service exists.

Perhaps so, but try telling that to the marketing men.

As I mentioned earlier - it's a nice idea but I feel from a network security point of view, the whole venture is doomed to failure - because I know that if I was managing the network in question and someone came to me asking to do what's being asked here, they would be met with a very firm NO.

[BriancuffRest In Peace]

I tend to agree that "the management" would not like to share their broadband with one of their punters so it would have to be the dongle path. As a matter of interest, when there are a number of incoming lines using the same number, can exchange equipment be installed on more than one of them so that different ADSL signals can be added to the lines with routers connected to each line at the subscriber end? This does mean, however, that a CAT5 line will have to be run in.
The alternative, which will be looked into, is for Chris (my friend) to try to get a direct line from the exchange!
Thanks for the suggestions, I have learnt something about network architecture, something which leaves me cold

[Niall]

It depends what your friend wants to do with his internet connection. My experience with a similar situation of a static caravan park where landlines are not available is that a 3G connection is fine. There is no requirement for e.g. streaming movies but for email and ordinary web browsing a 1GB/ month service has worked fine. This is of course providing there is a good 3g signal in the area for the chosen provider.
Three has a selection of packages which include the dongle or a 3g / wifi adaptor.

I recommend the wifi adapter as it is easier to use and doesn't involve installing special software on the PC.
I found with the 3 usb dongle that any time it was used it turned off the laptop's wifi which then had to be re enabled in windows control panel to use it where wifi was available.

[Terrykc]

I tend to agree that "the management" would not like to share their broadband with one of their punters so it would have to be the dongle path ...

Ah! I had assumed that the broadband in the main building might be to provide the residents with internet facilities in communal areas, etc.

If it strictly for staff use only, that is an entirely different matter ...

[Michael Watterson]

If it's Staff only then he can't have broadband, only mobile internet.
Obviously if there are multiple lines on PABX another can have DSL also and filter, so PABX is unaffected, but surely they are unlikely to agree?

If they did agree to another ADSL account:
Another pair of filters can be added (output of PABX to Chalet with modem port patched to incoming line modem port on filter and in Chalet) so ADSL Router can be in the Chalet.

[BriancuffRest In Peace]

Thanks for the input, guys. I'll let you know what develops.

[crackle]

This sounds like a strange sheltered housing complex and is probably owned by a private company rather than the local Council.
It seems wrong that the owners of the site monitor (potential for call logging and recording) private calls their residents make and receive.
I would suggest the residents liaison group contact the owners and ask them to agree to allow BT to cable to each Chalet for those who require their own (non monitored) private phone line and ADSL.

Local Councils are under strict instructions from the Government to ensure that their services are made available to all via the internet. This is one group of people who are discriminated against and who will not be able to access the internet and the public services available on it.
It sounds like a personal rights issue, the residents could try to involve their local Councillors and Council, they may be able to influence the site owners to provide the service.

Mike

[BriancuffRest In Peace]

Local Councils are under strict instructions from the Government to ensure that their services are made available to all via the internet. This is one group of people who are discriminated against and who will not be able to access the internet and the public services available on it.

That's a very good point, Mike. I know he hasn't had much luck talking to them so I guess a bit of "persuasion" might benefit his cause! Thanks for that.

[John Hanson]

It might be helpful to consider the use of powerline. There are wireless/powerline bridges available that could be placed in an position of good wifi reception, and then use powerline to get into his room.

[Michael Watterson]

Those Homeplug / Powerline are criminally evil and if tested sensibly massively fail everyones EMI / RFI standards. They are using loopholes in procedures to get CE and FCC approvals.

The older ones wipe out 1MHz to 30MHz. The latest ones "Wipe out" up to 200MHz.

They are transmitters. The lighting switch loops radiate signal. You can run one off extension cable plugged into car inverter and they still connect!