Question : Offering ADSL via Wifi!?!

I've had this idea for a few weeks now and was wondering what it would take and or if its even possible. I now seek constructive criticism...

I was wondering about renting out an office suite near residential homes and reselling ADSL via Wifi B or G rated. I figured buy a managable hotspot switch with embeded software to track users, purchase a decent 20-30 dbi 360 degree antenna. Add an amplifire to cap at 36dbi of legal FCC limit. Buy a bulk load of AP/repeaters (im still not sure which devices are available that can work in both modes.

Accepting a connection and yet reproducing the signal) for resale to your clients. Each client would recieve 192k down 50K up(not sure on upstream yet) and at the sametime serve as repeaters for the local neighborhood to ensure strong signal from both surrounding AP's and omni antenna at central office.

I figure one would need atleast a T3(45Mbps) to handle roughly 150-200 clients.

Now i understand wireless is still very unstable when it comes to weather and obstuctions an such. Maybe even random local AP might interfere. So quality of service is a scare and signal strength. Im hoping to cover atleast a 5 mile radius from the main office. Is it possible to sustain dsl speeds of 192kps for such a distance with the repeater like setup i have in mind?


I think one could get away with offering these DSL speeds for a monthly charge of 25 or so dollars.
Now compaired to Bellsouths DSL lite being atleast 37 dollars with the phone line needed.

This type of setup is for cheap ppl that need cheap DSL but cant quite deal with Dial up... What do you guys think?

Answer : Offering ADSL via Wifi!?!

A few comments on this...

1.) yes it's theoretically possible there are hundreds of WISPs (Wireless Internet Providers) around.... equipment and FCC regulations are the most cumbersome thing...

2.) I really don't think you would need a T3(45Mbps) to handle 150-200 clients.....  A real ISP would never use a 45Mbps to handle 200 client at 192Kpbs apeice...

Speaking from the experience have having worked in the NOC of a mid-sized ISP in the midwest for 5 years, Almost all ISP's use a little thing called Oversubscription.  The theory behind oversubscription is that not all of  your users are going to be online at the same time, and even if they are they aren't all going to be pulling their maximum bandwidth at any one time.

At the ISP where I worked we had around 50-75 DSL customers at rates of 384-768Kpbs running on about 2 T1's the peak usage on those 2 T1's really only ever got to just barely over 1.544 MB.  No one ever complained about it being slow, and customers pretty much always got the advertised bandwidth.

3.) If you are really serious about this sort of thing, you should check out a lot of the info available at http://isp-planet.com