Meraki introduces two additional models to its inexpensive mesh routing line-up: Meraki is interested in simplicity, fungibility, and quantity. Added to their existing $49 interior mesh node, which can plug into a connection and share it through automatic discovery of other nodes, they've announced a $99 repeater designed to be hung outdoors and reach up to 700 feet without an optional high-gain antenna. The Meraki Outdoor needs no wired feed, although it comes with double Ethernet ports.
The Meraki Solar (price to come) will power the Meraki Outdoor, making external, electricity-free mesh routing a reasonable option in both U.S. neighborhoods and developing rural economies. In the U.S., the issues over first, getting the rights to site equipment on a utility pole, and, second, getting electricity to equipment on a pole seem to be stalling networks of all kinds across the country. (This is one reason why Qualcomm and cell companies were laughing at muni Wi-Fi and mobile WiMax in their early days: they were thinking how naive the nascent industries were about real estate.)
With a solar-powered outdoor node with a high-gain antenna and a decent line of sight--read up on the Fresnel zone for those issues--this could allow a neighborhood area network (NAN) that wanted to use, say, a Speakeasy go-ahead-and-share-it T-1 or DSL line to set up a network pretty easily. I have been asked many times over the years by NANs what equipment to buy--if it all checks out, Meraki's going to have a lock on that market, too.
Glenn
Do we know if the Solar Panel will work with any Ethernet ported device or is it proprietary to Meraki?
Jim
[Editor's note: The solar panel and battery are designed to work specifically with the power requirements of the Meraki Outdoor. It's a smart system, so it probably wont' be ideal for any other AP.-gf]
I obtained the following results with the Outdoor Meraki fitted with a 10dBi antenna (a supersised version of the one on most wireless routers indoor). The Outdoor Meraki was fitted on the roof 6m above ground in bungalow suburbia in a relatively flat area topographically. The device was powered via the ethernet power option.
Here are the technical results:
Channel : 6
Encryption : WEP
Signal : -25
MaxRate : 54
Altitude of transmitter: 830.38000m (but 6m above ground level).
MaxRange : 1000.9 meters
AvgRange : 246.1 meters
So theoretically the Meraki Outdoor with the 10dBi antenna could make 1000m.
The signal was any good at passing through trees or navigating its way around buildings which is typical for 2400MHZ.