Hospitality Wireless: SF WiFi delivers complete wireless coverage

Whether providing the traveler a comfortable room, television entertainment, or continental breakfast, our clients consider great hospitality is paramount. A recent client, The Majestic Hotel of San Francisco, offers the gracious traditions of yesteryear and today. They realized one of the essentials of the modern traveler is having seamless, reliable, and secure access to the Internet but with the present down economy the hotelier required a wireless solution which didn’t exceed their budget.

 The Majestic Hotel contacted us about installing a more powerful and efficient wireless network than their existing system. They had been using a legacy wireless solution that had many issues including proper signal coverage. As a result, guests’ computers were constantly dropping off the Internet. This was causing the hotel to lose guests and lose revenue so they contacted SF WiFi to propose a guest wireless network solution for the 33,000 square foot property and we were awarded the project.

Hotel Overview

The Hotel Majestic was constructed in 1902 and is San Francisco’s oldest continuously operating hotel. With distinctive French bay windows, Edwardian styling with vintage architectural details and adorned with French and English antiques. The Majestic not only offers guest the gracious traditions of yesteryear but also provides the guest with all the modern essentials of today.

 Hotel Specs: The property consists of 5 floors, 58 rooms, café bar and restaurant and 2 meeting rooms. Guests were complaining that the wireless coverage was limited, connections and performance was erratic. Adding additional Wi-Fi access points (APs) was not an option because there was no way to extend ethernet cabling throughout the property. The Majestic needed an innovative solution that would satisfy customers without disrupting business or breaking their capital budget.

 SF WiFi gets the call – Project Requirements:

  • Wireless coverage throughout the entire hotel
  • Minimize the number of access points
  • Minimize, mitigate RF interference
  • Install AP’s where Ethernet can’t reach
  • Centralized and simplified management
  • Reduce install times
  • Self-configuring, self-tuning adaptive wireless
  • Reliable and stable with no support calls
  • Consistent performance

Project credits:
Denise Leong – Marketing

SF WiFi solution:

To work around and to minimize the need for additional ethernet cabling we designed a wireless mesh network. Under normal circumstances ethernet cabling is required for all conventional wireless equipment. The SF WiFi design solution implements a WLAN managed mesh network to extend wireless coverage into difficult areas. This design limited the amount of cable required, reduced costs and simplified the installation.   

 

Benefits:

  • Reduced capital costs by eliminating the need to run ethernet
  • Dependable Wi-Fi signal quality
  • Single Wi-Fi solution for entire hotel
  • Mesh design simplified AP placement (product feature)
  • Automatic interference avoidance (product feature)
  • Automatic failover and resiliency (product feature)
  • Wi-Fi coverage with fewer APs (product feature)
  • Utilized Power over Ethernet
  • One third the cost of “other” wireless product solutions

CCTV Security Camera Installations

Ceiling Mounted Camera
Ceiling Mounted Camera

A CCTV security system is an essential component in managing your business and assets.

Recent SF WiFi installation: Dentist office. 4 security cameras.

CCTV Security Cameras / Wireless Surveillance Solutions:

Business:
Network cameras allow you to keep an eye on the business and manage your resources even when you can’t be there.
Captured video can be stored to a hard drive and viewed remotely from virtually anywhere you can access the
Internet and mobile phone.

Home:
Security Solutions are the perfect answer for family. Protect your assets against theft.
Capture footage in state of the art digital video quality to see what you’ve been missing.
Monitor your home or remote location from any Internet connection.

Features:
Indoor and outdoor solutions
View, record and manage advanced features from any Internet connection
Motion detection recording
Email alerts
Transmit high quality video over a secure encrypted wireless signal
View streaming video, hear sounds and record from any Internet connection
Manage cameras
Manage playback
Secure a greater area with pan and tilt controls side-to-side up-and-down

Wireless Site Survey

 

SF WiFi can perform a detailed wireless site survey and diagnose issues at your site. Weather this is pre-deployment or post-deployment SF WiFi can troubleshoot the cause of performance and security problems such as:

•RF spectrum analysis
•Channel and device overload
•Performance issues
•VoWiFi
•Throughput testing
•Security issues
•Wireless network design
•Interference analysis
•Rouge access point detection
•Optimize your existing network
•Hidden nodes
•Cisco spectrum expert
•Roaming tools
Also:
•GPS Site Surveys
•4.9 Ghz site survey
•Site Survey public safety network

Contact SF WiFi for more information about wireless site surveys

 

 

Contact SF WiFi for more information about wireless site surveys

Apple offers free bumper to resolve iPhone 4 issues

Anyone who buys an iPhone 4 through Sept. 30 will get a free “bumper,” a rubber-and-plastic band that wraps around the phone. Customers who have already purchased a bumper will get a refund. AT&T Inc. (T) subscribers who want to return the device can get a full refund and get out of their contracts without penalties.

An AT&T spokesman said the company supports Apple’s move to provide a free bumper and said it would waive the restocking fees for returned iPhone 4s.

Capacity and Growth

Went to a party on Saturday night. The conversations ranged from the World Cup, LeBron James, and when’s dinner. As dinner became delayed the Apple devices came out. iPhones 3G, 4G, and iTouch. (I left my iPad at home). I became impressed with a friends tech savvy son “RC” and his knowledge using his iTouch.

RC – A student in junior high – budgeted his hard earned savings and purchased an iTouch. (with some help from the bank of DAD). It goes without saying that RC is a very bright boy who schooled me on the latest game apps. Now I am hooked on Flight Control and Angry Birds. High five buddy!!… or should I say fist bump?  

The evening reminded me that when we design, install a WiFi network, (or any network infrastructure) we must take into account future capacity and room for expansion. With capacity for future mobile devices, with more apps and more users. Network design must choose applications and hardware that will allow the network to grow.

Quick example: Wireless systems that utilize the 5 GHz band (802.11a) for the wireless mesh backhaul. A significant advantage, since the 2.4 GHz band is heavily used to the point of being crowded.

“If you have knowledge, let others light their candles at it”.  Margaret Fuller