I would like to get some feedback on choosing the right hardware for a specific deployment. The customer is a small rural public safety agency, and these are the requirements:
100% data coverage in rural areas
Integrate with their current ipad and Tablet Command system
Low 5 year cost of operation
Minimal installation cost
We are a cradlepoint system integrator, but peplink is very interesting because of the seemingly equal/greater capabilities combined with lower yearly licensing costs. That is the specific reason we are interested in a system like this:
Hardware Description
Part #
MAX BR1 Mini CAT-7 300/100Mb
MAX-BR1-MINI-LTEA-US-T-PRM
Antenna MAX S Dome
ANT-MAX-S
Power Conversion 90W PoE Injector
?
We see that the SFC has a yearly included data limit of 500GB, which comes to about 1.4GB per day. One question we have is:
Can we control which apps use SFC ? The idea would be to put only the critical apps on that, and everything else on cell, which would fail to Starlink .
Hello @Marnag,
Welcome to the Peplink Community Forum.
Here are some thoughts on how to get the best outcome for working in Emergency Services:
Who is your local Certified Peplink Partner that you can get your Peplink solution from (https://www.peplink.com/buy/peplink-certified-partners/)? They are the best equipped people to help you get the most out of your Peplink solution.
Would you consider the Peplink BR1 Pro 5G (GK Variant) as an alternative to the Mini? It has more powerful chipsets and other features not found in the Mini.
The coverage in rural areas varies depending on the carrier’s cellular network. For emergency services, we recommend combining with a StarLink in something like the Peplink Antenna MAX S.
If you get stuck, post what country you’re based in, and a local active Peplink Partner may respond. FYI, I’m based in Australia and support the AU/NZ and South Pacific region, you’re welcome to PM me if that’s of benefit.
Thought I would add some real world use case here. I am using (borrowed from @mldowling) Antenna Max S on my vehicle. Has onboard PoE splitter to drive the Peplink and SL Mini.
In the vehicle I’m running a Tycon 802.3 BT switch so power& data to antenna Max S assembly is via a single ethernet cable…
Tablets and other wifi based stuff easily integrates into this and the switch in the vehicle allows Ethernet connectivity.
The switch allows me to plug in various other tech… Eg. I integrate a DJI Enterprise drone (with a VideoSoft Gateway) into this network and relay drone footage eg SAR ops… back to a hub router instance/NOC.
I don’t specifically use SFC itself as I host a hub device over Starlink +Telco…
The switch also powers industrial mesh nodes so I can extend the network connectivity and scale it very quickly to allow connectivity far beyond the typical wifi ranges.
The system design is totally portable and self sustaining… There’s a 100AH LifePo4 battery bank powering the entire assembly to ensure I don’t flatten a vehicle battery which charges off vehicle power whilst I’m running. Everything is quickly dismounted so I don’t wipe off the roof mounted stuff as I enter a Perth Carpark or a MacDonalds drive through.
That being said I’d like to see a more rugged antenna max S… I don’t see that clip on cover surviving the corrugations on the Gibb River Road that eats caravan shock absorbers and wheel nuts for breakfast.
Images below show mag mounted Antenna Max S but I run coated steel cable tethers to the roll bar. Newton’s Third Law of Motion doesn’t give 2 hoots about ABS…
