In January 2015, MDS America installed an MVDDS system for our Caribbean agent, New Wave Innovations, as a Proof of Concept for Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) on Cat Island in The Bahamas. Thanks to BTC and their team support, MDS America could accomplish this project on time and the Island got the services just in 4 days.
As an Island nation, all equipment for the systems have to be brought in by small ships or by small turboprop airplanes. This means that wireless systems allow for inexpensive buildout of bandwidth.
In addition to Proof of Concept, MDS America installed an MVDDS system to demonstrate:
- advantages of dual-band frequency utilization
- scaleability (ability for simple upgrades as the system grows.)
An MVDDS system was chosen as the last mile solution to serve a minimum of 19 stationary customers for the initial trial. The system has one central transmission site for downstream data, to the customer, and two sites for upstream, from the customer, IP data: the main site and one repeater site to extend the upstream system’s coverage area. This is because of the larger coverage area of MVDSS. The MVDDS system enables delivery of high speed Internet with downstream connection data rate of over 50 Mbit/s and IPTV with over 100 TV channels. The TV package has a block of TV channels with Caribbean content to satisfy local market needs. The system averaged connection download speeds exceeding 60 Mbit/s across the entire trial period of 30 days. During the trial, no customer had a measured bandwidth lower than 50 Mbit/s and some had speeds exceeding 80 Mbit/s of connection download speed.
Dreams Come True in 4 Days
DAY 1 – January 9, 2015
The day prior to leaving our HQ, we were informed that the crates with our
equipment went through customs clearance and should be at Cat Island today. So on day 1 morning an MDSA team of 2 people jumped on an airplane and flew to Cat Island. The Bahamas are close to Florida but to reach Cat Island takes more than a half day of traveling. One must use a large commercial airline to get Nassau, New Providence, and then use regional airlines to reach the Bahamian “Family” Islands.
We arrive at The New Bight International Airport by a small SAAB 340 turboprop airplane. If a Boeing 747 could land there, then one wing of the aircraft would cover this little airport. Our Bahamian business partner, Ricardo, meets us at the airport and we go straight to the installation site.
The equipment hosting company has done a good job. A location for our rack is clear and ready, AC power distribution panel is ready to supply electricity, the grounding cable is ready…, but the equipment crates did not arrive yet. The seas were rough the night before. The delivery ship could not reach Cat Island from the main island of New Providence. Good news is that the ship comes the evening of day 1. Looking at the nice weather around, we know there should not be a delay.
So before the equipment arrives, we start planning the installation phases with the riggers, IT engineers, and the site managers. More good news – everybody is ready and knows what to do. We just need our rack and equipment to get here.
Lunch time. Local conch salad is amazingly fresh!
The crates come overnight. We wait till the morning.
DAY 2 – January 10, 2015
We are excited and wake up early in the morning. The crates with our equipment are here on the Island at the sea port, 10 miles away from the transmission site.
Breakfast, then to the installation site, a short meeting with local guys… a problem. The crates can not be delivered because there is no fork-lift and no pickup truck to bring our equipment. Ricardo works hard trying to find a solution. The Island is small and there aren’t many options to choose from. Around lunch time, we get our crates delivered and two more MDSA team members arrive and join us for the unloading and installation. Great! We can start, we can do it!
The priority now is to get everything needed to the riggers so they can climb up and install the TX (Transmission) antennas, along with the outdoor power amplifier and the access points. In parallel we can install the rack with equipment.
Everything goes well now. Everyone is busy at work. At the end of the 2nd day, the rack is installed, the TX antennas with active transmission equipment are installed and the cables laid down to the MDSA rack. The riggers do a very good job. One rigger was up on the top of the tower for almost a whole day!
At night, our team is tired and happy. We decide to do the final check tomorrow, before we power up the equipment.
DAY 3 – January 11, 2015
All cables are connected, all equipment is installed, the AC power and the ground cable are connected! The equipment works, no alarms are seen or heard. The MDSA team splits in half to start configuring IP data, and to check the radio signal coverage. IT guys from the hosting company work on configuring their equipment to give us the big Internet pipe we will deliver to the customer and IPTV data streams. MDSA works side by side with them. The same jargon’s in the air – Ethernet ports, routing tables, IP addresses, data rates… Another MDSA team member joins us from USA, remotely, as soon as the remote access is available. Eleven specialist from both sides are working now. Amazing.
The riggers go to install a repeater site about 20 miles away. The repeater site will extend the signal coverage area for the uplink part of the system to the far end of the Island. They finish their job late in the night again.
At the repeater site we check the MVDDS signal by holding a reception antenna by hand. The signal is there with a clear channel BER (Bit Error Rate) <10E-08. It’s very good, quasi-error free. The system is performing as designed and the riggers have installed the TX antennas correctly.
At the end of the 3rd day we have the Internet and IPTV streams in the MDSA rack and the repeater site is ready. Good team work everybody. Tomorrow will be the big day.
DAY 4 – January 12, 2015
In today’s world, configuring IP routing is always a tough job. IT guys work hard to configure the routers and IP modulators inside the telco site, and far away from us in Jamaican head-end where the signals originate. MDSA needed to connect the customer IPTV set top boxes all the way back to Jamaica, across the Internet using an OSI level-2 bridge whilst providing carrier grade Internet to the same customers’ router.
A couple MDSA guys go to watch the installation for the first client. The agent does the installation to show just how easy this installation is. It takes a long day to solve all problems and at the end of the 4th day we have THE SERVICES RUNNING: IPTV AND HIGH SPEED INTERNET. Our first client gets over 100 digital SD and HD TV channels as well as a high speed Internet. Dreams come true in 4 days, just in four days for the first customer- Carl. He has the digital services he dreamed of on the Island.
The thanks from the customer are endless and repeated!
Thank you for the post. It was interesting.