Rolling your own wireless link really isn't very complicated, I'm working on my own right now. It involves 3 separate links covering over 6 miles, since there's hills in the way. As long as hills aren't in the way, it's a piece of cake. This project has taken me a long time to make progress on since I had a hard time finding people who would let me put equipment on their hilltop property. Finally it's all coming together, and I'm doing it for about $400 per link. I could do it for cheaper if it was just for me, but since I'm going to be reselling the service to other neighbors the onus is on me to make sure it stays working come hell or high water.
In my testing, I was able to get a 3 mile link with clear line of sight working just fine with two off-the-shelf WRT54Gs and a panel antenna on each end that cost about $50 apiece. In the end, I'm using Engenius enterprise-class access points (model 5354AP1) I bought off eBay for $30 apiece, and sticking them in 2.4ghz Rootennas (an outdoor antenna with weatherproof box for access points, about $45 apiece). Since the access points have both an 802.11g (2.4ghz) and 802.11a (5.8ghz) radio, I'm going to mount an Echo Backfire 5.8ghz antenna (~$55) on the pole next to the Rootenna. Presto, a reliable wireless repeater with great end-to-end bandwidth for $125.
The great thing about these access points is they accept Power Over Ethernet (aka PoE), so I can put them outside and don't have to run a power cord to them. I picked up some 3Com PoE injectors with integrated power supplies for $15 apiece on eBay. I just stick one of those injectors inside the person's house on an UPS (a relatively unnecessary expense, I'm just doing it for the sake of the people I'm selling connections to), and bury shielded CAT5e out to a pole in their yard that I have the antennas mounted on.
At the end of the day, counting all hardware costs such as CAT5e, UPS, surge protecters etc, I'm looking at $225 or so per repeater. Total costs for connecting 5 people besides myself to broadband that was previously unthinkably out of reach? Under $1600. That's doing everything *right*, engineered to keep ticking month after month without my oversight, and includes equipment for proper bandwidth management and network security. You can do a simple 1.5 mile link with much less, particularly if you aren't in a lightning-prone area and have line of sight from one end of the link to the other. If you don't have line of sight, even lots of trees are relatively easy to overcome with 900mhz (incurs some extra expense), but a hill or mountain is another beast entirely.
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