Another Bundaberg Installation Completed

The completion of the Boulevard Lodge install makes three hotel sites and one marina site active in Bundaberg. It would make it the third most covered area outside of Sunshine Coast and Brisbane.

The locations are as follows:

• Boulevard Lodge (Best Western)
• Bert Hinkler Motel
• Reef Gateway Motel (Best Western)
• Bundaberg Port Marina

The Boulevard is a fairly new property (4yrs since construction) thus the facilities are in good condition and everything is modern. It now has a VDSL based in-room broadband system with wireless access throughout the common areas.

The installation was straight forward and was fairly simple to neatly install the in-room equipment. The location of the phone system made for space constraints, had to sit the cabinet on the floor. Hardly had enough space with the inclusion of the Austar rack. Heat was a concern so I lifted a ceiling tile to allow hot air to escape.

The installation was done by Willow and myself, Phones@Work did the phone system modifications.

While time was in short supply, Willow and I still managed to go on a tour of the Bundaberg Rum Distillery. Couldn't take a camera into the place because of the amount of alcohol present (fire is a bad thing) and it was also deemed a food preparation area. Otherwise the products came a with a nice tour discount - I purchased a bottle of Royal liquor for $33AUD.

Back on the road again

It has been nearly 5 weeks since I have done an installation. During this time I've basically caught up on things and started planning for the next set of installs.

It looks like I will be in Townsville Friday next week and then in Roma the from Tuesday till Thursday the week after. Then the week after that I will be in Bundaberg. One Marinanet and two AccessEzy installations within three weeks. It's going to be hard, but I should be able to get it all done.

I think I might stay up in Townsville for the weekend, come back Sunday. However that would mean that I would have to pay for the car hire over those extra days. Pity I have bills due...

More to talk about later.

Ubiquiti Networks SR5 400mW 802.11a Adapter

Title says it all - this is one fkn awesome adapter. Atheros chipset and lots and lots of power makes for an excellent AP/Point-to-Point setup.

We've spoken to Yawarra and we've got one on order from them, they're going to be another Australian supplier of Ubiquiti gear (currently there's only one other).

Essentially we're going to test a single SR5 based AP with two CM9 based clients using WRAP 1-1 devices on each end. We will be tossing our Proxim gear in exchange for these rigs if they test out okay, which I'm sure they will.

The normal RRP in Australia for the SR5 from Yawarra is $195.00 each inc GST. Add the $290 for the WRAP, $30 for the regulated power pack and $100 for the RouterOS license and you have a powerful AP/Router with the works for around $615.00. Quite a bit cheaper than a what is currently available which would probably only do half of what the ladder can do anyway - trust me we've used quite a few different systems: Wi-LAN, Redline, Proxim, Cisco...

Mikrotik RouterOS 2.9.14 P2P Wireless Link

This is going to get technical as its a reference article for the masses of RouterOS uses out there.

To establish a Point to Point wireless link using RouterOS 2.9.14 and the following hardware:
2 x PC Engines WRAP 1-1 (w/64Mb CF card)
2 x Senao NL-2511MP PLUS 200mW miniPCI wireless adaptor
2 x Hills 15dBi Grid Directional Antenna

Plus various bits of hardware for mounting and connecting the aforementioned items together. I used thin RG58 coaxial cable since I had power to spare and the distances weren't large.

Since the Prism chipset doesn't support hidden SSID nor WEP correctly while in AP mode I had to make up the security using other methods. So I included mac filtering, limited subnet and ipsec - I'll also include a tightened firewall to keep out the randoms, but that can wait.

I'm in the process of having our supplier of these bits and peices source Ubiquiti Networks SR5 wireless adapters. The specs are 400mW 802.11a (5.8GHz), with 100mW@54Mbps and very reasonable receive sensitivities. These cards would be much better solution for this point to point link, however the added costs of 5.8GHz antennas, cable, connectors and the adapters themselves would put this link in the red. However it does offer an upgrade path.

All electonic items were purchased from Yawarra Information Appliances (http://www.yawarra.com.au). I highly recommend them, excellent service and prompt delivery and more than happy to assist.

Antennas and associated mounting equipment were sourced from Hills Australia - DJC Wholesale Pty Ltd (http://www.djcoulter.com.au)

Connectors and coaxial cable were sourced from RF Industries Pty Ltd (http://www.rfindustries.com.au).

Budget came to about $1,500.ooAUD.

The RouterOS configuration particulars are as follows:

Office End:

Wireless Interface (P2P):
name="P2P" mtu=1500 mac-address=xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx arp=enabled disable-running-check=no interface-type=Prismprism-cardtype=200mW radio-name="office" mode=bridge ssid="xxxxx" area="" frequency-mode=regulatory-domain country=australia antenna-gain=0 frequency=2462 band=2.4ghz-b scan-list=default rate-set=default supported-rates-b=1Mbps,2Mbps,5.5Mbps,11Mbps basic-rates-b=1Mbps max-station-count=2007 tx-power=23 tx-power-mode=all-rates-fixed periodic-calibration=default periodic-calibration-interval=60 dfs-mode=none antenna-mode=ant-a wds-mode=disabled wds-default-bridge=none wds-default-cost=100 wds-cost-range=50-150 wds-ignore-ssid=no update-stats-interval=disabled default-authentication=no default-forwarding=yes default-ap-tx-limit=0 default-client-tx-limit=0 hide-ssid=no security-profile=default disconnect-timeout=3s on-fail-retry-time=100ms compression=no allow-sharedkey=no
Home End:

Wireless Interface (P2P):
name="P2P" mtu=1500 mac-address=xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx arp=enabled disable-running-check=no interface-type=Prism prism-cardtype=200mW radio-name="home" mode=station ssid="xxxxx" area="" frequency-mode=regulatory-domain country=australia antenna-gain=0 frequency=2462 band=2.4ghz-b scan-list=default rate-set=default supported-rates-b=1Mbps,2Mbps,5.5Mbps,11Mbps basic-rates-b=1Mbps max-station-count=2007 tx-power=23 tx-power-mode=all-rates-fixed periodic-calibration=default periodic-calibration-interval=60 dfs-mode=none antenna-mode=ant-a wds-mode=disabled wds-default-bridge=none wds-default-cost=100 wds-cost-range=50-150 wds-ignore-ssid=no update-stats-interval=disabled default-authentication=no default-forwarding=yes default-ap-tx-limit=0 default-client-tx-limit=0 hide-ssid=no security-profile=default disconnect-timeout=3s on-fail-retry-time=100ms compression=no allow-sharedkey=no

IPSec (both ends, substitute 'x' for appropriate addresses):

IPSec Peer:
address=192.168.254.xxx/32:500 /
secret="xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" /
generate-policy=no exchange-mode=main /
send-initial-contact=yes proposal-check=obey /
hash-algorithm=md5 enc-algorithm=3des /
dh-group=modp1024 lifetime=12h lifebytes=0

IPSec Policy:
src-address=192.168.x.0/24:any /
dst-address=192.168.x.0/24:any protocol=all /
action=encrypt level=require ipsec-protocols=esp /
tunnel=yes sa-src-address=192.168.254.xxx /
sa-dst-address=192.168.254.xxx proposal=default /
manual-sa=none dont-fragment=clear

IPSec Proposal:
name="default" auth-algorithms=sha1 /
enc-algorithms=3des lifetime=30m /
lifebytes=0 pfs-group=modp1024

Since the network only consists of three subnets I made do wit h static routing. Dynamic routing is possible but adds complexity in a otherwise static network.

I may include 'watch' scripts that keep an eye on the link and makes appropriate configuration changes or interface restarts as necessary.

But otherwise, thats all there is to it.

Servers and more servers

It appears we suddenly have a requirement for 4 new servers. These aren't just replacing existing servers (which need replacing...) but will take on all new tasks. Two are for internal use, meaning that they'll do things like host Microsoft 'Dynamics' CRM 3.0, Exchange, MSSQL and SharePoint. One will be for the new SAB Server (http://www.wificom.com) and the other will be for a cPanel (http://www.cpanel.com) webserver.

I hate having single task boxes. I know there are pros and cons, but having racks full of hardware that sits around idle for 90% of the time shits me. I'd rather see a server at 50% load most of the time and have space to stick my wine.

I guess I should give IBM a call and see what kickbacks.. I mean deals they can cut me for getting four servers. I think we'll need another 2 more by the end of the quarter anyway.

Townsville complete and 6 days remaining till RadTrip '06

Yes, it's only 6 days until RadTrip '06 begins. I really can't wait to take the week off and simply forget absolutely everything about work and just sit back and hang with my mates drinking and eating. I've given the BBQ its yearly going over, resetting the plates by scrubbing off the old oil and preping with good quality olive oil at 200°C.

I'm going to keep the big beer fridge for the week, but afterwards I'll be swapping over for a smaller bar fridge and building a shelf with a sink as a new prep area for the BBQ.

The installation at the Cluden Park Motor Inn went smoothly and without issue. The phone guys where there a fair bit longer than I had anticipated but the cat5 cable runs too longer due to the weird layout of the building. I have to get them back out there again to run more cables to two more computers again this week.

Because there wasn't any in-room installations to be done I had the configuration of the core equipment knocked over in short time and all the tests done by lunch on the 2nd day. So I went and did a few site inspections with the sales guys Thursday arvo just to clarify a few things.

Bounce trip to Townsville

Brisbane to Townsville and back in a day is a rather hectic affair.

The flight out of Brisbane was for 8:40am arriving at Townsville at 10:40am but it managed to arrive 10 minutes early which were absorbed by the rental car folk dealing with their crashed booking system.

Planted my arse into a Nissan Pulsar with 9,000km on the clock and took off towards Wulguru. 20 minutes later I'm walking into the reception at the Cluden Park Motor Inn and saying hi to Vicki. Now spelling Vicki with an I on the end is apparently rare. I know this because my mother has the same name. Vicki was surprised that I remembered how it was spelt.

The site inspection took about an hour. I have quickly learned to take photos of absolutely everything that is even remotely associated with a possible installation - these take time. Turns out that there isn't any method of installing the equipment into the rooms neatly. So I will have to make up kits for the guests to use to connect themselves up with. Not perfect but the best solution given the situation.

After that I called the Coast Guard and made a time to meet them at 1:30pm, this gave me an hour for lunch which consisted of HJ's Country Chicken bagettes at Tim's place. After using him for his toilet facilities and chatting about his absurd addiction to Silkroad Online I ventured off towards the Townsville Port area to have a look at the Coast Guard building.

Half an hour later I arrived at the Coast Guard. Its an odd building as it's a two story concrete box sitting in the middle of no where on the breakwater. Its destined to be relocated to another water side location so not a lot has been done with the building for quite sometime - apart from the occasional repaint. What is odd is that it was designed to have a third and possibly fourth floor added so the roof is solid concrete. This poses a slight problem for me as I can't easily stick a hole in it for the antenna cable. I'll have to run the cable outside and up for about a meter.

While at the coast guard they were keen to show me around their million dollar vessel with twin 400hp screws and spacious interior - I wouldn't mind one.

After that I had about an hour to kill before I needed to be at the airport so I went back to Tim's place and veged out a bit more. Once at the airport I dropped the keys off for the car and waited an extra 20 minutes because of some issue with some luggage some guy had on the plane :/.

The flight back was fine although the landing was a bit hairy due to a huge cross wind - the plane had to accelerate when close to the ground to defeat the wind - makes for a slightly rougher landing. I quickly made my way out of the airport and paid the $28 for parking. The trip home was pretty good, no jams and managed to keep to the full speed limit. Arrived back at home at 7:30pm.