APRS digi bandwidth usage ?

[W5KVV]

I guess this is the right place. Didn't see a APRS dedicated topic.

Question is, how much bandwidth does the typical APRS digipeater use in a months time? I'm looking to put up a digi in a remote location, with good wireless internet service. It will be running off of an AT&T air card.

Our APRS traffic is minimal around here if it matters. But when we need it for storms, emergencies etc. we need good reporting. The mountains of S.E. Oklahoma are no too APRS friendly.

Thanks guys
KF5LCH

 

[n9mxq]

The digi won't use any. But if you gate to the web it will depend on how much traffic you see.. It's all text so it's not like pushing video or audio..

If you're in a low volume area I'd try a 2gb package to start and either up or downsize from there..

 

[W5KVV]

Wow. Did I ever screw that up.

I mean I-gate, not digi. Man I've got too much APRS stuff on my mind.

Traffic is very slow around here. Im wondering if a 5gig air card would work for 1 month without going over the 5gig limit?

 

[n9mxq]

5 gig.. I would think you'd get by for a couple months on that.. I've never tracked my usage here, but I would think even with all the traffic mine passes it wouldn't go past 2g in a month...

 

[Jay911]

I can't fathom an igate using 5gb/mo without it being super busy.

5gb = 5120 mb = 5,242,880 kb

You'd have to push 175,054 kb (nearly 171 mb) per 24 hour period to do 5gb per month.

7 mb an hour or 2 kb per second. An APRS packet is only going to be a couple hundred bytes (0.2 kb) at the absolute maximum. You could send 10 packets a second on a 5gb plan.

Remote or mobile igates are a great idea. I'm going to be in a pretty igate/digi-sparse region later this year with quite a few other hams, but with plenty of cell coverage. I was half-seriously considering a mobile igate myself.

 

[W5KVV]

Cool beans. Thanks for the help guys.

I figured 5gig would be plenty, but I wanted to double check before I hooked everything up & next thing you know, AT&T is blowing up my inbox/cellphone telling me I'm 5 gig over my 5 gig limit !!

I had never even thought of doing a mobile i gate. I might have to give that a try as well.

73's
KF5LCH

 

[LtDoc]

I agree, a mobile I-gate or mobile digi would certainly be useful in certain specific situations. But, not very useful in most conditions. If there's no coverage at all, then sure, do it. If there is coverage though, it's just an additional load on the system which may not be contributing any significant benefits. It's a judgement call.
I-gating can also be useful, naturally! But it does have draw-backs. 'Time' is one of them. If information is time sensitive then adding a delay may not be beneficial. Porting things to the internet always means some delays. That delay may not be very significant at all, but it can certainly get delayed past usefulness. That 'real time' thingy is dependent on how busy the internet is which has a hugely wide range of delays possible.
I'm certainly NOT trying to talk you out of doing it, just use some judgement on when to use it, you know?
- 'Doc

 

[KZ9G]

What were you planning on using for an iGate?

 

[EC-7]

You don't have to iGate it at the same site as the digipeater.
If you have a good tall site for RF coverage, just digipeat it. You can use a cheap scanner, small antenna and PC at home to receive the packets that are repeated. This will cut down a monthly cost of a data plan.

OR you could use some unlicensed wireless internet gear to connect to somewhere with an open WIFI signal or to your home (assuming its a clear line of sight for RF). Check out Ubiquiti gear for that at UBNT.com . I use it for my Wireless Internet company and also linking my Ham & APRS sites.

 

[kf5qgf]

make 2 800 MHz yagi, connect it your wireless router with a linear (you can run up to 1500 watts internet as an amateur radio operator) and make your internet reach to your repeater.

 

[krokus]

You don't have to iGate it at the same site as the digipeater.
If you have a good tall site for RF coverage, just digipeat it. You can use a cheap scanner, small antenna and PC at home to receive the packets that are repeated. This will cut down a monthly cost of a data plan.

This sounds like the better idea, to me. The other RF users in the area get the immediate benefit, and the internet users will, probably, have lowrr latency. You, as the Igate provider, save expenses with the mobile data plan.

Of course, the wide-area RF footprint is key.

As an extension to this, is there a way to have a voting receiver system for a digi? I figure this could minimize collisions and duplicate traffic, if feasible.

 

[KZ9G]

Look into the WX3in1+ Digi/igate/wx. http://www.rpc-electronics.com/microsat-wx3in1.php I just purchased one and put it up. It works great and is much better than running a computer all the time to igate traffic. You can also add telemetry or a weather station to it and have it inject it to the IS or via rf. It also supports IS to rf message gating so someone could send a message via the is to a rf station. Running for over 24 hours used up just over 2 megabites of data. There is a statistics page built into the web server for the unit that lets you monitor what your usage is.

 

[KB3KBR]

You don't have to iGate it at the same site as the digipeater.
If you have a good tall site for RF coverage, just digipeat it. You can use a cheap scanner, small antenna and PC at home to receive the packets that are repeated. This will cut down a monthly cost of a data plan.

You don't really want to do that on the regular APRS frequency as that breaks the 2 way ability of an i gate. APRS Messaging EXPLAINED! - APRSISCE/32 The future of Amateur Radio APRS

 

[BJ_NORTON]

You don't really want to do that on the regular APRS frequency as that breaks the 2 way ability of an i gate. APRS Messaging EXPLAINED! - APRSISCE/32 The future of Amateur Radio APRS

There are still a lot of guys out there that feel that RF to internet is a legitimate part of ham radio, but Internet to RF is not. They are probably the same guys that refuse to use something like IRLP, but they are out there...

 

[n3ijw]

Hiya,

I run an Igate in one of the busiest regions for APRS activity in the country, and with a 250km filter on the incoming APRS-IS stream that system (a Windows XP virtual machine) typically sees well under 3GB of traffic per month, which includes a bunch of other unrelated stuff that gets passed over the network (backups, screen captures, remote desktop, etc). Even the computer-to-TNC communication goes over the network port, to a Lantronix device server.

Hope this helps.