Page 143 - DCAP311_DCAP607_WIRELESS_NETWORKS

Unit 8: Wireless MAN

Building WMAN-Phase I Notes
First, a suitably high location—Rural Polytechnic for Women—was identified. The VSAT
was installed by the NIC engineers and was connected to a typical Windows NT setup
of Primary Domain Controller (PDC) and Backup Domain Controller (BDC). During
Phase I, 13 sites were networked including schools, professional colleges, Pravara Medical
Trust hospital, Pravara Co-operative Bank, Krishi Vigyan Kendra and Padmashri Dr.
Vitthalrao Vikhe Patil Sahakari Sakhar Karkhana (sugar factory). These institutions were
then connected to the Intranet using a 64 Kbps FTDMA VSAT at the Rural Polytechnic for
Women. RF towers at 11 other institutions with clear line of sight with the main hub were
constructed. At the remote sites 16 Pentium II PCs from Wipro were used. The wireless
network was connected through Avaya Access Points to a hub and the PDC and BDC were
also connected to the same hub.
With this, all the institutions have Internet access (for browsing and also sending and
receiving mail) and can communicate amongst themselves. Within each institution,
there can be any number of computers connected through a cable network and all these
computers can also access the Internet and communicate with PCs in other institutions.

The equipment used in phase I are 64 KBPS FTDMA VSAT- Gilat with Sky surfer
accessories, RF Access Point-WavePOINT-II_99UT12206350, Wireless Cards - 2 Mbps
Lucent’s Wavelan Cards, 10 Mbps NICs, and 10 Mbps Hubs.
“Communication has become faster and more efficient. Extensive computer training at all
levels in Marathi and data input services have been planned to ensure that the facilities
are utilized by the target population,” says Nale. The test run of the system was taken on
August 14th 1999. It went live on Independence Day 1999 and all centers were declared
operational.
Phase II
In January 2000, the management of Pravara Group decided to upgrade the 64 Kbps
FTDMA VSAT to a 256 Kbps high-speed SCPC VSAT in order to extend the Internet to
six other remote sites located in Shirdi, Satral, Kolhar, Rahata, Babhleshwar and Loni. The
work began on June 2001. NABARD sponsored six village IT centers to the tune of Rs 15
lakh.
Installation of the SCPC VSAT lead to faster communication, browsing and video-
conferencing with other locations. An IBM Netfinity server is used for proxy and caching
services while an xSeries200 server is used as the mail server (pravara.ren.nic.in). Other
products used in Phase II are—Cisco 2600 series router with 16 ASYNC ports, RF Access
Point - Orinoco Outdoor routers, Wireless Cards - 11 Mbps Lucent’s Wavelan Cards,
10/100 Mbps NICs and 10/100 Mbps Switches.
Benefits of the implementation
The advantages of providing a wireless MAN in a setting like Pravara for different
population segments are many.
Linking all high schools in around 50 villages within a radius of 10 km lets teachers and staff
stay in touch with the HO of their Education Society. This helps them introduce modern
methods of teaching, including computer-based learning (virtual school) at convenient
timings for children who have to work during the day. Students from professional colleges
can acquire knowledge using the Internet and it will help them find new jobs.
Farmers can communicate with the agricultural experts at the Krishi Vigyan Kendra and
learn new farming techniques as well as better ways of storing and packing their products
for marketing.
Contd...

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