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Free wireless Internet rolls out in Iqaluit

Available anywhere downtown

SARA MINOGUE

Iqaluit is set to become Canada’s first capital with free wireless Internet access.

ComGuard CTS, a two-man computer shop that offers computer networking services to local businesses, has launched the service by setting up an antenna on top of the eight-storey apartment building.

Anyone who can see the top of that building should be able to connect to the service, as long as they have a laptop or computer that is already wireless-enabled.

ComGuard’s David Fulgham said the signal is available in his offices in the Igluvut building at the Four Corners, and reaches to parts of Tundra Valley, Happy Valley and the West Forty.

People further away from these points can install their own external antenna to receive the signal, at a cost of $50 to $100. These people may also install a repeater, to rebroadcast the free signal in their neighborhoods, though this will cost another $100 to $150.

The connection speed of the free service is a fraction of the speed available to home Internet subscribers, which means the threat to other Internet service providers is minimal.

Users are capped at 96 kilobytes per second of bandwidth each, with the total aggregate amount of bandwidth available is 2 MB/s. The speeds for uploading content are even slower, though speeds both ways may increase as the service evolves.

Fulgham says that users will be able to use the service to chat with friends, share files and play video games. He’s already tried it on his Playstation Portable, Sony’s handheld video game device.

Users of the service will see a web page inviting them to log in, for free, to a web site hosted by ComGuard. From there, people can browse the world wide web.

While not an immediate moneymaker, the move establishes ComGuard as one business to call in town if you want to set up a wi-fi hotspot in your business or workplace.

ComGuard can install a satellite receiver for businesses who want to offer the service to their customers, at a cost of about $250.

It is also ComGuard’s first foray into residential services.

Right now, the service is not costing ComGuard too much money. The only expense is the parts required, and the labour used to install them. So far, they are not providing any customer support, which would be the chief expense.

Instead, users who want the service can visit an online forum to pose questions about the service, which Fulgham will answer online.

Eventually, ComGuard hopes to pay for the cost of running the service by selling advertising on the splash page to local businesses, or by running announcements from the Government of Nunavut in exchange for sponsorship.

So far, one bug in the system has already been worked out.

Fulgham replaced a part of the first wireless access point with clear plastic after a raven ate a plastic cover on one of the electronic parts.

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