Providing Wifi for Holiday Lets

panyan

panyan

panyan

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A friend of mine has asked for advice on how to provide wifi safely.

He has a home which has a holiday let next to it that he will be renting out.

The internet connection is only 1mbps out in the sticks, but it should be enough to let people check email whilst their away from home.


What he wants to do:

- have one private network for home

- have one public network for the holiday lets
----have decent security (he will give them the key upon arrival)
----stop access to naughty websites
----stop access to torrents etc
 
He will need to get a managed switch or wifi router. Only outfit I know and use is http://meraki.cisco.com/ who do great gear but probably out of his price point.

There are some specialist wifi sellers in the UK they would be able to recommend a good solution for you.
 
http://www.thecloud.net/wifi/cloud-in-a-box/

Edit: Ignore that, it used to be £99 one off and then no extra costs each month.

Meraki gear is excellent. You can get an AP and a 3 year license for free if you attend a webinar and can convince them you are linked to a company and considering deploying Wi-Fi.
 
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I'm not sure Meraki is what he needs, I have quite a few Meraki devices and they are a bit overkill for this.

Basically you need two SSID's which even default ISP routers can normally do. It depends then on how you want to be able to block websites. You could block the sites based on DNS. This wouldn't block pictures on google for example though.

http://www.opendns.com/home-solutions/parental-controls

That is free and will block a lot of websites. I have never used it though. The only problem is when someone changes their DNS settings on their local machine. You could get around this by blocking all IP addresses on Port 53 (DNS Port) and only allowing OpenDNS IP's.
 
RHS said:
He will need to get a managed switch or wifi router. Only outfit I know and use is http://meraki.cisco.com/ who do great gear but probably out of his price point.
Click to expand...

These seem far too powerful and expensive for his needs really, but thanks for the suggestion

Caged said:
http://www.thecloud.net/wifi/cloud-in-a-box/
Click to expand...

Thats interesting, but again, the cost - he wont like paying that much + a monthly fee

wildest_jjk said:
Basically you need two SSID's which even default ISP routers can normally do. It depends then on how you want to be able to block websites. You could block the sites based on DNS. This wouldn't block pictures on google for example though.
Click to expand...

To be honest, I was hoping that a fancy router (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=NW-051-AS&groupid=46&catid=1595) would be able to broadcast two different networks with different settings:
- block torrent protocols
- block certain websites

Could the router handle openDNS on one ssid only?
 
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If you fancy learning stuff then a Mikrotik box will do exactly what you need. Run a cable from the existing router to the holiday property and use one of the small routerboard units with the built in APs. Then you can set stuff like the DNS for OpenDNS, throttle speeds, block protocols etc.
 
Mikrotik for Auth and login management. Let this manage the proxy and such.

Ubiquiti for cheap / decent wireless APs.

One VLAN for private network, one VLAN for 'public' network which requires auth which you can hand out with the holiday lets or charge for.

Done.
 
A Mikrotik Routerboard is a fancy router. If you mean point and click simple hotspot with filtering from one box that also has an ADSL modem built in then I'm not aware of one, but that's what the thread is for I suppose.
 
panyan said:
These seem far too powerful and expensive for his needs really, but thanks for the suggestion



Thats interesting, but again, the cost - he wont like paying that much + a monthly fee



To be honest, I was hoping that a fancy router (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=NW-051-AS&groupid=46&catid=1595) would be able to broadcast two different networks with different settings:
- block torrent protocols
- block certain websites

Could the router handle openDNS on one ssid only?
Click to expand...

You should just be able to have seperate DHCP settings depending on the SSID as it is a different network range. This will include the DNS settings, it should be as simple as entering the primary and secondary DNS addresses that it uses.

In terms of the blocking that is where you may have a problem. Just make sure the router has IP filtering/Access lists. Deny all on Port 53 except the OpenDNS addresses.

Thanks.
 
You can buy a Ubiquiti access point as mentioned which will allow guest wifi out of the box.

Alternatively get a cheap-ish DD-WRT compatible router and have 2 SSIDs (on different subnets) and block traffic between the two. This will require a little knowledge so will depend who is setting this up, although there many youtube tutorial videos about.

For simplicity, I'd go for a Meraki or Ubiquiti access point.
 
KIA said:
ADSL, right?

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=NW-051-AS&groupid=46&catid=1595

The above will do guest WiFi & custom DNS. Unsure if you will be able to block non-OpenDNS servers.
Click to expand...

wildest_jjk said:
The tech specs on the manufacturers website says the following:

Port, IP packet, URL, MAC filter

So by the sounds of it it should be fine :)
Click to expand...

wildest_jjk said:
You should just be able to have seperate DHCP settings depending on the SSID as it is a different network range. This will include the DNS settings, it should be as simple as entering the primary and secondary DNS addresses that it uses.

In terms of the blocking that is where you may have a problem. Just make sure the router has IP filtering/Access lists. Deny all on Port 53 except the OpenDNS addresses.
Click to expand...

Brilliant, so one ADSL router should do everything required - FANTASTIC guys, thanks

hopefully the firmware will be easy enough for me to configure everything and just tell him to plug it all in and go :)
 
Yep it should be fine. Maybe do a little bit more digging first online. It's quite an investment!

I think it will be one of the cheapest solutions though and should give a reasonable result :)
 
wildest_jjk said:
Hmm it all seems fine apart from the different DNS settings per SSID. I'm not sure this is possible with their firmware.
Click to expand...

perhaps we can have this:

- wifi 1 for owner
- wifi 2 for guests

both having the same openDNS settings?


He will be connected 99% of the time through ethernet anyway to his desktop
 
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