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SteveROntario
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Wanting to recreate WIFI Ranger Elite AC

Thu Feb 18, 2021 1:17 am

There used to be a product called the WIFI Ranger Elite AC that was a combination of a Mikrotik Metal 52 AC, an HAP AC, a PoE power supply, and a special GUI to make it easy to use. I want to make one of these using the newest MikroTik components available for maximum bandwidth. The intent is to have a WIFI network in my camper that uses an external access point to pick-up open networks while running on 24 Volts DC. What do you recommend? MikroTik has too many options to know what to pick. :D
This video shows how it works.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0QKmEUSU00
Thank you, Steve
 
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anav
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Re: Wanting to recreate WIFI Ranger Elite AC

Thu Feb 18, 2021 7:59 pm

Will you be dealing mostly with RV Access Points that are attached to omni directional or Sector Antennas.?
In other words to optimize connectivity you may want a sector antenna which you can rotate for optimal signal.
https://mikrotik.com/product/mantbox_52_15s
 
WeWiNet
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Re: Wanting to recreate WIFI Ranger Elite AC

Fri Feb 19, 2021 12:01 pm

Steve,

I feel free to pitch in and give you some advice:
1.) Do you really need 2 devices? I am not familiar with RV camp ground Wifi network. Do they have "good" coverage normally
or do you need to catch the signal with some special outdoor/sector antennas you turn around?
2.) Could you also use cellular for reception from time to time ? Like when not being at a camp ground or no Wifi available?

If so you have the Wap R ac which has dual band Wifi 11ac, plus LTE modem (if you buy the kit) all in one device and
it is an outdoor box.
As you can add "virtual" Wifi interfaces you can have this box listen to Wifi on 5G or 2.4G and "repeat" this as Wifi inside your RV.
and when no Wifi you just run LTE or 3G or cellular (you can even combine all).

Have a look if such device could fit.
 
SteveROntario
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Re: Wanting to recreate WIFI Ranger Elite AC

Fri Feb 19, 2021 11:50 pm

I guess I should explain the functionality I am trying to obtain.
I want a 2.4/5GHz wireless network in our RV at all times so devices can stay "connected" and talk to each other even without Internet. I also want that wireless network to have Internet access through guest networks when we park. Having an OMNI antenna for the guest network would be preferred as the Internet could be coming from any direction. Sometimes we are outside a restaurant, at a campground, or just in some random parking lot.
Being able to do all of this with one box would be great but I will need at least 1 copper port for a power meter installed in the RV.
Are there any tutorials for this "virtual" wifi so that I can see it work with my own eyes? This seems ideal and we could even use our RV as a repeater when it is parked at home.
Cellular doesn't work for us. We are normally in Canada but travel in the US so we would need multiple SIM cards and only use them for 1 month per year.
 
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w32pamela
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Re: Wanting to recreate WIFI Ranger Elite AC

Sun Feb 21, 2021 6:46 pm

The Metal 52ac and hAPac will work for what you want as would any of the Groove 52 variants and any of the other hAPac variants.

Your problem will be in trying to recreate the custom UI shown in the linked video in post #1. Mikrotik's routerOS will do every function shown in the video but not always with the nice UI shown. If you insist on a GUI like the one shown you will probably need to talk to a Mikrotik consultant about a custom GUI. If you want to do it yourself you will find it relatively easy to get the basic functions of scanning for an access point and connecting as you move from place to place.

The router you choose will probably come from the factory ready to use after you change the default Network Names and add a wifi password.

The Groove or Metal may come set by default as a CPE ready to connect to outside access points on 5ghz. Sometimes the factory default sets them as an AP Bridge or CAP in which case it will take a little more work to configure it as a CPE. You will want a computer with an ethernet port or a USB to ethernet adapter so you can connect directly to the hardware using Winbox.exe while doing configuration work.

Initially the 2 devices probably won't communicate because they will both be set as DHCP Servers using the same IP subnet, 192.168.88.0/24. There are multiple ways to deal with this. I like to simple change one of the devices to use a 2nd subnet such as 192.168.89.0/24.

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