i bought 3 e500s for an event we are having over the weekend in a couple weeks. We are expecting around 400 people to be connected at a time, ive never did anything like this before and i was wondering if anyone has some tips on configuring these aps. Im able to run ethernet to all aps or can use 5ghz as backhaul and 2.4 for client access. My issue is how to provide dhcp to allow that many customers to connect. This event is in a circle so people will be walking around in a circle and would need to automatically connect to the ap thats closest to them as they walk if thats possible.
Go with UTP cable to each Access Point, don't do any mesh. You want capacity for this event. Using mesh will impact overall network capacity for clients in a negative way
Use both 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz for client access
Channels on 2.4 GHz to be used 1, 6 and 11. Make channels fixed. Don't use any auto-option
Channel size on 2.4 GHz 20 MHz
Allow only g/n clients on 2.4 GHz
Channels on 5 GHz to be used any 3 that don't overlap. Make channels fixed. Don't use any auto-option
Channel size on 5 GHz go with 40 MHz
Allow n/ac clients on 5 GHz
Transmit power on 2.4 GHz should be lower than 5 GHz. Distance of AP from clients in unknown but go full Tx power on 5 GHz and on 2.4 GHz go with 10-12 dB lower. You want to stimulate clients to choose 5 GHz that will lakely provide higher bandwidth
Unicast rate on 5 GHz radio configure to 24 Mbps. Monitor SNR rate on cnMaestro controller. If the clients have poor SNR, decrease this value to 6, 12 or 18 Mbps. Anyhow you want to stimulate clients to talk faster
Don't use any Auto-option
Turn on support for roaming protocols
Leave band-steering feature to 'Normal'
Allow 150 clients per AP
If you have a big Internet pipe, don't do any limitation on AP for clients. This is suggestion from personal experience. If you see they are killing your pipe, limit to 5/2 or 10/4 Mbps or whatever you think is appropriate. Social media apps will not kill bandwidth. Youtube and livestreaming could but start with open network without limits, monitor and react if you see it's needed
Use some any router (Mikrotik?) for DHCP server. Allow pool of of 600 IP addresses and lease time of 12 hours. If the pool is getting full fast, lets say in first 3 hours 500 IP addresses is reserved, decrease lease time to 6 hours or 3-4 hours.
If you have a floor plan share it. Or if it's outdoor send some google maps screenshot and mark location of AP's.
We are running large event now and experiencing frequent reboots of AP's (E501,502), its not power as our epmp subscribers feeding AP's stay up.
Not had the issue since all clients left site so it indicates a load issue or somthing else, cnmaestro states watchdog reboot as reason for reboot. We only have about 100 users accross the 7 AP network at any given time
We have seen poor client experince as a result, we will take on board some of the tips above but i think we have something else going on, any ideas?
Can you please check if you have the latest firmware (3.7.1) on those APs? Also please take a tech-support (under operations In the device-UI or troubleshooting in cnMaestro) from one of them and open a support ticket at support.cambiumnetworks.com? We can then check the logs and reset reason. Thanks
We have the very latest firmware installed on the E500’s, we have experienced the same issues today. As soon as the network is under any sort of load the outdoor AP’s reset or just drop clients. We will get the tech dumps to you but our 2 day event has been ruined through this issue already. We have a few indoor e410’s dotted about using firmware one version back and these are not experiencing the same issue.
It could be firmware related if you are running some old version. Download techsupport file while Access Point is not rebooted yet, otherwise logs will go away. Send it asap please.
how many reboots did you have per day?
did reboot happen only when you had 100 clients on AP, or also with less load?
I have experience the same situation while installing E400 in a large event (attended by almost all top industrialists, Chief Ministers, Prime Ministers of several countries and foreign delegates ). Luckily, soon I could come to know that there were three official vendors who has done Wi-Fi hotspot in the venue and as usaual all three three SIs(System Integrator) using the same frequency band. As a result of this, all users experienced the effect and get disconnected frequently due to packet drop. Later on we decided to maintain separate frequency band on Wi-Fi access points used by all three vendors(Freq-X For SI-A,Freq-Y For SI-B/Freq-Z For SI-C). And finally we have successfully completed that mega event. In general, most AP are configured with frequency as default which unfortunately pick up the same frequency band . We have monitored this feature as one of the vendor used E500 which severely created interference. It also depend on the density of different APs, as all may not have same intelligence of mitigation. But reload problem might be due to firmware issue.
Thank you. Ive attached a photo of the event. There will be people camping all within the trees and north of the creek. There will be hundreds of people walking around the outside of the circle with food vendors 50 feet out of circle and making an even larger circle. Im not much of a networking guy but could use some advice on basic dhcp for a router to provide 400 addresses. The router i have on hand is a crappy asus ac1200g. It was more for just dchp purposes as i would have hoped these aps were able to do dhcp on their own. I was going to run ethernet to all sides of arbor back to the announcer stand with the router and poe injectors in the stand. the backhaul is a force 180 with line of site to my tower. full 40mhz channel ptp link.
It will focus high gain beam in 90-120 degrees while collecting less interference from other angles. With 4 AP's you have overlap as well and perhaps balancing of clients across Access Points.
All 4 to be connected on switch and your Asus as well for which I'm not sure If it will survive as a DHCP server. If you don't have anything else, go with it.
Hi everyone, I’m reading this thread because I’m in a similar situation. May I ask you: - Best practice for 2.4GHz channels (how to choose, when to “reuse”) - Best practice for elevation on AP: how to set elevation on e501 for best coverage? - How to deal with interferences from other APs in the air (not mine) in 2.4GHz spectrum? - Do you suggest a tunnel like L2TP or GRE if you have each E501 with an ePMP backhaul with different public IP on each, so you can have the same DHCP pool and same GW on WiFi side?
- Best practice for 2.4GHz channels (how to choose, when to “reuse”)
Best is to use non-overlapping channel, 1-6-11. Depending how far AP's are from each other, actually how bad they hear each other maybe you can utilize 1-5-9-13 scenario. Best would be to stick with 1-6-11 no matter what others are doing around you on that event. Most of people go wild and use 40 MHz channels so you will not be able to escape. Use fixed channels, don't put anything on Automagic.
- Best practice for elevation on AP: how to set elevation on e501 for best coverage?
Mounting bracket can be tilted. So once you mount the AP test coverage starting from 20 meters to 70 meters roughly and angle of 90-120 degrees. Then go tilt AP a bit up or down if you are not happy and test again. It should not take much time.
- How to deal with interferences from other APs in the air (not mine) in 2.4GHz spectrum?
You can't do much if environment is really noisy.
Reduce your cell size by decreasing Transmit power. If you don't need to go far with 2.4 GHz signal, don't make AP too loud. Try to focus on 5 GHz coverage and network setup as you have more channels there to use and not overlap with yourself or others. So 2.4 GHz will be etremely best effort if it's overcrowded, 5 GHz should bring more solid reliability and capacity.
Decrease number of SSID's on 2.4 GHz.
Shut down 2.4 GHz radios on Access Points where they are not needed.
Get rid of 11b client devices as they use low non-OFDM data rates, which forces the use of protection mechanisms. Use 24 Mbps as your minimum basic rate. That will disconnect all 11b devices and will prevent protection ripple, both of which will add capacity to your network.
