Advice on how to straighten out a crappy ISP
Paul Robinson
paul at iconoplex.co.uk
Wed Jun 18 09:07:54 PDT 2003
On Wed, Jun 18, 2003 at 05:37:24PM +0200, Brad Knowles wrote:
> The best solution may be to set up your own neighborhood co-op
> ISP. Get together with the other people in the area, and offer to
> help provide Internet access to them. Even if you can't get SDSL,
> you should be able to get a T-1 or fractional T-1, which you could
> then share with your neighbors via 802.11b or 802.11g.
I was actually about to write back to Bill then and suggest the same thing
to him. Setting up an ISP is not only quite good fun, sharpens the skills,
but in an area with little competition like Bill's is likely to be
profitable. Also, quite straight forward for somebody with the skills. The
only thing I would do, is spend more time learning RADIUS before starting
out than I did the last time I was in a similar position... the tools are
better now though, anyway...
> You could then look at additional options for high-bandwidth (but
> high latency) downstream access such as satellite (with asymmetric
> routing via your T-1/Frac. T-1), or other alternative additional
> feeds.
Satellite should be available everywhere below Alaska, and is quite cheap. I
know a lot of smaller ISPs use it purely for Usenet feeds, so as to not clog
up their 256Kb leased line back to the city...
Of course, contrary to popular belief, here in the UK where the
neighbourhoods are all *VERY* old, we seem to have finally got a clue and
DSL is available in all cities, most towns, and even in the smallest village
you can get a 2Mb/sec frame relay (for $$$$$) if you want it... in fact, one
place I worked was in a hamlet and we had several 155Mb/sec links over SDH,
34Mb/sec microwave, 34Mb/sec backup frame relay... and that was some 8 miles
from the nearest town of any size.
--
Paul Robinson
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