Cost of full DS3 (approximate) and # of users for wireless network!

[BS911]

I have a buddy that is looking into setting up a large scale wireless ISP. He was asking about the price of a full DS3 and also how many customers he would be able to service if they were capped at 256k down.

Anybody have some good insight into these questions?

Thanks!

BS911

 

[FracturedSoul]

Full DS3? Is he going to be using a full 44.7M? Its going to be expensive, easily could end up 20K/month by the time you add in provider, local loop charges and taxes/fees. Best bet is to call around to major providers and find out for the exact location, depending on where you deliver it the setup fee might be rather expensive too.

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

As far as bandwith per user, a local isp I know of has 4000 customers, some dialup, some dsl, and has 18 T1's, IIRC.

 

[jonmullen]

Well with those figues you could figure out how many you could posible have on at one, bit keep in mind to make money ISP's need to over sell their bandwidth (everyone will never be at full capacity at the same time?) The question is how much does he want to over sell?

 

[randal]

44.7mbps / .256mbps = 174.6 users, without overselling. Since it's broadband, you can't oversubscribe the crap out of it, so you get maybe 7:1 without a lot of negative effects ... 174.6*7 = 1222 customers on one full DS3. Mind you, that would be totally saturating the DS3, which is a *big* no-no. I'm doing this right now - not at the DS3 level, but at the multi-T1 level, and sure, 1200 customers may sound awesome at $50 a whack, but once you figure in OSS, CPE, the NOC stuff, Bills ... that $60k becomes not much money *very very* quickly.

Please remind him that 90% of small businesses fail in the first year due to A) Funding, B) Funding and C) Lack of planning. If you get C fixed, A&B fall into place ... a strong business plan, with months of research behind it, is crucial - any business started on a whim without 200+ hours of legwork is going to fail. Getting to learn all about that as I start up my own cybercafe - running a business is not for the faint of heart.

cheers,
randal

 

[Soybomb]

If you have to ask you can't afford it

Seriously though maybe its just the pricing here, but it certainly wouldn't be cost effective for an ISP just starting out to buy a DS3. I think around here its usually cheaper to have multiple T1s added in as you need them until you reach about 15-20 T1s. Don't over estimate how fast you'll grow either, wisps seem like a goldmine, but many fail and you don't want to loose your shirt if they do.

Something else to consider is that traditional broadband providers usually would want all of their bandwidth coming in at a central location, like the headend. A wisp though is probably going to have to setup multiple pops around the region. You can backhaul from your office to the remote locations, but if there isn't line of sight and you need to light up the area, you might just order a T1 at the site.

What wireless gear is being considered out of curiosity?

 

[SLEEPER5555]

What wireless gear is being considered out of curiosity?

In this situation only use Orinoco Silver or Gold 802.11b Ap's and clients

 

[ktwebb]

Actually, if your going 802.11, and you want the best equipment, then he would go Cisco 1200 series if running AP's with 350 Workgorup bridges, or 350 series if using dedicated bridges. Proxim (Orinoco/Lucent) would be a nice alternative if he was trying to save money but not the best equipment available in the 802.11 community.