The Network and Your Home

Will my period property (thatched roof and wattle & daub internal walls) interfere with the radio signal?

You are correct in assuming that these materials are less efficient than most in allowing radio waves to pass through them. However, the radio signals are transmitted to and from an external antenna which is connected by a cable to your radio transceiver in the loft and are therefore unaffected. You may find that you cannot take up the option of an internal wireless network and may have to use a cable connection instead. Your installation engineer will test for this.

Do I need planning permission for the antenna?

Normally No. The antennas we use are small boxes that mount onto a chimney stack or a TV aerial mast and are very unobtrusive. If you are in any doubt please contact you local planning authority.

My property is listed. Do I need any other permissions?

You will need to direct your question to your local District Authority Heritage department.

Will trees surrounding my property prevent me from receiving a signal?

Trees, buildings and other large fix objects that obscure a line-of-sight to one of our CAPs (Community Access Points) are not good for this type of installation as it relies on very low powered transmitters.

However, we will take all practical steps to plan the placement of our CAPs in locations where the largest number of subscribers can access them on a line-of-sight basis. We also have other tricks for getting signals into difficult locations. There can be no guarantees but we usually find a way of getting our subscribers connected.

Does the speed of your service drop the further you are from a CAP (Community Access Point) ?

No. Our wireless network can run at higher speeds than the contracted speed.

There will be a slightly higher error rate the further the subscriber is from a CAP (Community Access Point) resulting in more packet retransmissions but this has a marginal effect on throughput - but by comparison, the fall off in service speed experienced in ADSL networks is far greater than anything you will experience with our wireless network.

Do atmospheric or weather conditions affect your network?

No. There is a slight reduction in signal strength but this is allowed for when we configure your connection.

Is your system affected by private wireless networks, microwave ovens, bluetooth, etc.?

Most wireless systems automatically select an available channel thereby avoiding channels already in use by other equipment. Anyone operating a new wireless network would want to chose a channel unaffected by others so it's a mutual thing. Microwave ovens can affect wireless networks but our systems are mainly outdoors and out of range of these devices. We have a number of subscribers using bluetooth, cordless phones as well as a microwave oven with no apparent problems.

What do the aerials look like?

See below for some examples.

County Broadband Ltd · Old Chapel · 33 Church Street · Coggeshall · CO6 1TX · info@countybroadband.co.uk · Tel: 0870 446 10 60