Hi Short of new to MikroTik but must say great stuf.

Problem: I got the routerboard 433Uha with 4GB micro-sd and 2GB usb(as backup) and 3 R52n-M wifi Cards
now I would like to set it up as one hotspot (so 3 wifi cards 1 frequency, one SSID) with one of the cards doubling as an PPPoE internet AP.

Question: Is This Possible??

More information:
one of the wifi cards has 2 5Dbi antenna's (omni) and needs to work as hotspot and as sepperate PPPoE
the two other Wifi cards have 4 9Dbi (40cm) antenna's and they only have to work as hotspot.
The use of this MikroTik will be for an appartment complex with permanent ressidence and holiday guests

Or do I have to go with 3 SSID's and 3 hotspot servers using the same config with the only difference the interface card?

Tanx in advance for reply's

Jasper

is not recommended to use three cards in the same Radio frequency band within a single radio, RB433 cards were thinking in three different bands at once, 900MHz, 2.4GHz and 5GHz, but not three 2.4GHz or 5GHz cards or 900MHz , this will cause interference between them.

Thanx
Wasn't in the specs, read some where that will be interference with diffent freq on same band, but how mutch interference will there be? couse I also read somewhere that every card has a maximum number of 20 simultanious connections. the hardware is great, but a deasent manual woudn't hurt (all data togetter with chapters getting all the bits & pieces together)!

Then to get back to the interference: would extra shielding be an option? or back to the drawingboard!

greats Jasper

I would say; Back to the drawing board...

3 cards in one rb433 is asking for problems if they have to work in the same band, even if not the same channels. I presume you want to use 2,4Ghz? 2,4Ghz has only 3 relative separated channels to start with. Putting three cards this close together is asking for interference problems, unless you are able to shield them very good. Negative side effect now would by heat dissipation from the cards.
So basically a bad idea...

But, solution: Why not use 1 card only? One radio fitted rb433ah boards are capable of handling 30-50 clients depending on the usage.

For your PPoE clients, which probably are fixed installations, I would try to use 5Ghz band with dedicated CPE's. This way you have more capacity, less interferences issues and a rb433 can have two cards each working in different band with ease.

What protocol to use? mimo? (802.11n) or legacy? TDMA (NV2)?
What are your clients allowed usage speeds? And how would that rate against what you have as supply?
With a good QoS you can connect much more clients than without it.

I suggest you spend a bit more reading around on this forum before you really decide what you want.

Tanx Rudy
very inlighting !

to awser: It pppoe will have a maximum of 30 clients max speed up 200kb/s down 300kb/s with the use of a windows dialer program ( no cpe's ) this because there is no internet at the moment and telefonica wont place lines for only 30 users! (let me revrase they will but everyone will have to pay approx 1500,- euro) and all owners don't want to pay to mutch and just want simple internet for mail msn and browsing.
speed availeble: for as yet unknown (but as seeing there is only adsl availeble on lanzarote im thinking a max of 10Mb/s down)

for the Band I was thinking about using 802.11G
For hotspot users (temp. users mostly checking mail,facebook, twitter) I was thinking up 128kb and down 256kb using hotspot and usermanager.

then yesterday I got all the equipment! and ran a test with 3 cards and the 6 antenna's and IDD interference So removed the middele card (so only top & bottem slots are occupied) and interference and heat within reasonable levels (For me).
now working on channel 2 and 10

so now I only have 4 antenna's 2x5dbi omni (channel 10) at lower level (for covering the small complex) and 2x9dbi 38cm omni (channel 2) at top level for covering users that are located at a greater distance.
test default config :
at 2 meter from station (line of sight) channel 10 -23dbi & channel 2 -19dbi
at 400m from station (station being 6meter above gnd level) channel 10 -59dbi & channel 2 -55dbi

and I have to read more about the harware configuration on MikroTik ! But was reading and learning the programing basics with the free version of ROS (Thanx mikroTik) took me about 14 days but now i know the basics only thing now to learn is how to configure pppoe and hotspot to use the same card (bridge maybe?)

The Hotspot (with pppoe) needs to be online at 12 jan 2012 so there is still plenty to learn (modify, test, etc)

Greets Jasper
Ps. Will be posting my config soon in a new post (all comments will be welcome!)

Imho I would try to set up one hotspot system that covers all. Occasional clients that have to log in and pay, and regular clients that are always allowed (and don't have to log in each time again).
Hotspot is a very powerful feature that can do all.

The advantage of using only one radio system is that you only need 1 channel which avoids interference. You also only need one radio card and one set of antenna's.
The rb can handle easy 50-70 clients with your mentioned speeds provided they are not all on-line at the same time...

I would try to use stronger antenna's. Special if users have laptops inside the building. Your 9dBi omnis are limited. I would go for the best you can get. But it depends a bit on the physical situation. Is the AP opposite of the building? Or in the same building?
The first would probably give you much better signal strengths everywhere.

Just be aware that the signal and signal quality is the most important. No matter how good a system is developed, if the signals are poor or the quality of the signals are low, you get lots of complaints.

Thanx again rudy
forgot to mention appartment complex is about 105x50meters main reception is in the middele of it all and used to have an telphone and internet so the unit is comming on the roof here to get a view see attachment.
and yes most of the time bigger = better, but the budget for this project is limited (altough I would love to have 4x90degree sectors on the roof here).

I tested it on july this year with a linksys w54g with 2 5dbi omni('s) and got a good quality signal in nearly all apartments.
(there is not a lot metal used in the buildings)

and a plus karma for youre thinking with me on this

Greets Jasper

UBTIK and UBNT dual polarity omni.

http://www.maxxwave.com/solutions/servi ... stems.html

http://www.ubnt.com/omni

UBTIK is a RB411 with an 802.11n card in a form factor that connects easily to the UBNT antennas.

If you are using laptops as clients, you may have as many horizontally polarized clients as vertical, some may be both.

UBTIK and UBNT dual polarity omni.

http://www.maxxwave.com/solutions/servi ... stems.html

http://www.ubnt.com/omni

UBTIK is a RB411 with an 802.11n card in a form factor that connects easily to the UBNT antennas.

If you are using laptops as clients, you may have as many horizontally polarized clients as vertical, some may be both.

Have you been reading the maxxwave page you refer to? It's a MT router with a MT card in it! They than say finally something to hang on an UBNT carrier class antenna...

Well, I'm not so much impressed with ubnt antenna's. If you need ubnt only for the antenna you'd better find yourself other stuff on the market.

Don't even think of using the Airmax sectors of ubnt. They are the worst I've had so far. And if you really take a good look at their specs, they are not even lying about it! They use a 6dB scale for the antenna patern coverage where every other manufacturer uses 3dB!

The only good thing about ubnt is their marketing....

You want quality and a unit you can really mangle to your specific use and not pay too much....; MT is the only solution imho!

(I'm not an MT salesman! I am just disappointed too many times by ubnt that they can get away with the crap they make.....)

Well it sounds good a antanna that is as mutch vertical as horizontal polerized.
but what i have been reading the last few days is:
that the higher the gain (dbi) the more directional the antenna becomes (hope I got this correct?)
so that means les dbi is a better omni (more vertical) but the side effect would be that the signal doesn't go as far.

and conserning the ubnt i could not find the specs anywhere?

what I have now are 9dbi omnis 360 deg horizontal and 10 vertical length approx 38 cm.
upcomming weekend I hope the run a test with them on an open field (will be posting the results here)

greets jasper

Test results with 2 wireless cards
2x2 9dbi Omni antenna
Aces One (mini) with 30mw wifi card and internal antenna
AP located 4 meters above ground level
tested on open field with jus one other wifi signal present.

card 1 bottem card top antenna Wireless N (40mhx band 9/13) dual antenna power output max 20dbi
Card 2 top card bottem antennaWireles B/G/N (20mhx band 1) dual antenna max output card definned

results:
40meter Card 1=-43 Card 2 -55
75m Card 2=-49 n Card 1 -50
100m Card 2= -59 Card 1 = -64
125m Card 2= -55 Card 1= -59
175m Card 1=-57 Card 2 -59
225m Card 1 = -59 Card 2 -60
300m Card 1=-63 Card 2 -63
400m Card 1=-70 Card 2 = -69
500m Card 1= .. Card 2 -75

and with the complex only at max 105 meters there with be lots of room to pick up some more tourists and supply them with wifi.

Greets jasper