[olug] starting broadband ISP, any suggestions?

[Sam Tetherow]

On 08/19/2012 11:56 PM, Justin Reiners wrote:
> Hey eveyone, weird question, I have done my googling, to no avail. I was
> wondering if anyone here works for an ISP, or has the understanding of
> first time setup. My boss have come to me with a task, He is looking for
> starting an ISP in his home town, as there are no, 100MB+ isps in the area,
> connection type is fixed wireless, or microwave. He owns a tower in IA, I
> cannot say where exactly it is located because he hosts things for the CIA,
> FBI and such. He also has fiber to the building, unused at the moment, and
> he also has all the capital he needs to get it going. I have some
> questions, He wants to start with 1Gb of bandwidth, and knows plenty of
> businesses in the area that are looking to go faster.
>
> 1. When the fiber is installed, will we be left with a 1Gigabit Ethernet
> port I route off of?
> 2. I assume we will need to buy public IPs. any idea on the costs?
You will need to get external IPs from you upstream provider.  Until you 
need a /20, or if multihomed, a /22 ARIN is not going to get you your 
own IP addresses.
> 3. What types of switches and routers do you recommend, (hoping it is just
> ethernet) (number of users will be around 20 at first, then the sky is the
> limit.)
Depends on what you are use to.  Cisco probably has the best used 
market, Imagestream makes linux based routers with a UI over the top of 
them.  Although you can log in at the shell level and do what ever.  
Mikrotik is another option it is linux based but closed.  For gig-E you 
will either want to run it on your own x86 hardware, or purchase 
something like a powerrouter or a routermaxx.

For switches you can get good used cisco or hp off of ebay
> 4. can the routing be done using a linux box?
It could, but I would recommend something designed for routing like a 
mikrotik if you want to stay affordable, cisco if you want something 
standard and affordable but used.
> 5. Can multiple users use the same directional antenna?
It all depends on the equipment and the setup and there are way too many 
to discuss without narrowing it down a little, but if you are really 
wanting to deploy +50mbps you will need to be doing point to point and 
not point to multipoint.
> 6. How can we keep networks seperate?
Don't.  You are selling the internet so why would you restrict anything 
other than their bandwidth they are paying for.
>
>
> Any help will be appreciated. I am hoping someone in the group works with
> this type of thing. google has not been much help, I find a lot of OLD ISP
> pages, talking of dialup modems of such. lol.

If you are seriously wanting to start a WISP I would HIGHLY recommend 
joining wispa.org.  You will get access to people who have been doing 
fixed wireless for over 10 years in places as rural as the desert and as 
populated at Washington DC and metro Atlanta.

>