I have had a Canopy unit installed at my house in the past few weeks and I have had nothing but issues and so far the provider hasn’t been able to explain why I am having this issue.
I am 1 mile away from the tower. A building across the street has the save service from the same provider with no issues. I know of a user that is a few miles away and they have no issue either.
What will happen is that the status page will say I am registered but my pings to any internet address are very speratic. I will get a solid and fast connection and be able to download a file at about 50K, but then it will just stop, all pings will time out and the connection will drop, but the status page still says registered.
usually the connection will be up and down for an hour or so, and it seems to be down more then it’s up until at some point I lose connection to my SM unit and can’t see the status page and need to do a power cycle of the unit.
My provider has been working on the issue, but so far all there attempts to fix this issue in these few weeks have failed.
I was hoping someone here might have some in site I can pass alone to my provider.
Here is what I see when I look at the status of my Unit.
Device Information
Device Type : 900MHz - Subscriber Module - 0a-00-3e-93-02-41
Software Version : CANOPY 8.2 SM-DES
Software BOOT Version : CANOPYBOOT 1.0
Board Type : P10
FPGA Version : 060707
PLD Version : 9
Uptime : 00:07:26
System Time : 04:53:29 03/17/2001
Ethernet Interface : 100Base-TX Full Duplex
Antenna : External (Connectorized)
Subscriber Module Stats
Session Status : REGISTERED VC 83 Rate 1X/1X
Registered AP : 0a-00-3e-90-4d-a9
RSSI : 1410
Power Level : -78 dBm
Jitter : 3
Air Delay : 34 approximately 0.95 miles (4998 feet)
Now from my understanding a jitter under 5 and an RSSI above 700 indicates a good signal.
I am not clear on the power level though, it seems low to me for some reason.
If anyone here has any information that can give me that i can pass along, I would be very grateful.
The Power level seems a fair bit lower that what I am used to seeing on 900 MHz at that distance but its possible thats due to different configurations… First suggestion would be get them to upgrade the Firmware to 8.2.2 there where apparently still some ethernet lockup problems on 8.2 which sounds like what you where taking about where you loose all conectivity to the SM. Other than that because of signal strength I would look at the possibility of blocked LOS or possible signal interferacne.
What antenna is connected to the unit? Maybe an integrated instead of connectorized unit will perform better in that situation. Or increase antenna to a 14 yagi.
Definitely upgrade the software to 8.2.2.
Absolutely upgrade as advised by both posters above. 8.2 explains the symptoms you are describing exactly. Until then, go ahead and cycle power on the SM once you begin to see the problem.
Power level does seem a little low for the distance, but that will depend on:
1. Noise floor in your area
2. What antenna they’ve set you up with
3. What obstructions may be encroaching on your fresnel zone (at one mile, your fresnel zone has about a 40 ft radius at the center point between you and the ISP)
Send your provider to this forum and get them to start reading.
Its connectorized so you can have water in your connectors which would cause problems. I would check the antenna connectors and also increase your transmission power. -78 is awfully low for 1 mile. It could be something in the path as well as a problem with the AP.
When the antenna unit was installed I was told that come spring I may have some issues due to leaves on the trees, but that since it is still winter that it should be a clear LOS.
When I first called about the issue I was told they would install a Yagi antenna, but when the installer came out he could not get it to fit on the arm they used to mount my unit.
I am not sure what antenna I do have installed, but it is the same antenna used by a building across the street from me. But the unit across the road is at least 10 feet higher off the ground then mine is.
my antenna is about 15 feet off the ground.
When I look at the cables outside I can see they are covered in black tape and the fact that this unit has not worked since day one makes me think water in the connectors isn’t the likely cause.
I tried to run a spectrum analyzer, but I don’t know how to read the screen to know what it’s showing me.
I will forward this info to my provider.
I am thinking that moving the antenna to a higher point on my house and getting a Yagi installed will hope that will solve this issue.
There are 2 or 3 large trees 10 to 20 feet in front of my antenna on my neighbors front yard and there are also power lines with a transformer in with those trees and they all seem to be in my line of site.
beyond that are some trees across the road and a few building, but after that its mostly farm land for the remainder of the mile between me and my provider.
I mentioned the trees and power lines to my provider, but they don’t believe they would have this big effect.
Once I get a better antenna installed in a better location with a firmware upgrade I hope all these issues will go away.
Thank you all for your information, I will keep this post updated as things develop.
first of all wow. im VERY surprised youve found out all this about the equipment at your location we keep all of our stuff p/w protected to keep customers out. but if your shooting throught trees+powerlines+ -78 power level? that is by and far a marginal install. at our company you wouldnt have been installed. We always have trouble shooting throught powerlines. im afraid if you cannot get around them your not going to have service worth anything.
What is preventing you from mounting the SM on top of the house? What about a 50’ radian telescoping mast 5ft in the ground and attached to the side of the house?
1) Make sure your current lowrider pole is plumb.
2) Log into the SM > Configuration > Radio > set transmitter power level to 28
3) Try re-aiming the SM to see if you can improve the signal
I find trees that are extremely close to the SM wreak more havoc than trees in the distance. I would think that your provider would be willing to come out and troubleshoot.
VLAN1 wrote: first of all wow. im VERY surprised youve found out all this about the equipment at your location we keep all of our stuff p/w protected to keep customers out. but if your shooting throught trees+powerlines+ -78 power level? that is by and far a marginal install. at our company you wouldnt have been installed. We always have trouble shooting throught powerlines. im afraid if you cannot get around them your not going to have service worth anything.
On 8.x you don't need a password to view the status page - if the SM is using NAT it's pretty simple to just type the IP in a web browser. (I should add that this is only the case if you're not using a management VLAN)
In any event - we had a link about a mile from our AP with a clear LOS except for some power lines. At certain points during the day (usually early morning and mid to late evening) the link would drop for about 15-20 minutes. Never did figure out what was causing the problem (the link was for internal purposes so it wasn't a customer that was upset anyway).
-78 is usually about as low as we're willing to go with an installation in the summer time with leaves on the trees. Would be interesting to know what the AP sees for power levels. At this stage I think you either need to go higher or use a higher gain antenna.
I also agree that trees up close seem to be a problem as opposed to those off in the horizon.
On 8.x you don't need a password to view the status page - if the SM is using NAT it's pretty simple to just type the IP in a web browser. (I should add that this is only the case if you're not using a management VLAN)
I think VLAN1 was refering to Vesman doing the spectrum analyzer. That's way past the status page.
I'd do a speed test too, www.speakeasy.net/speedtest .
I've found that if you're having link quality issues, then your upload speed takes a big hit.
I suppose you’re right on that one. Either they don’t use passwords or they aren’t using good ones!
VLAN1: when the unit was first installed i just entered the IP of the router and it logged me in saying no default account set and it said I had administrator rights and I could change any settings without any passwords.
When they came out the first time to service the antenna I connected to the router and was shown a status page with guest rights. However I very quickly learned that I could just go to login and login as root with no password and get admin rights again.
I fix computers for a living and I specialize in networking. I am not familiar with this canopy system but I know my way around linksys and dlink units as well as wireless internal networks, so I assume they count on the ignorance of there customers to keep there units secure.
as for the power lines, I have never been home when they are here to do work so i have no idea if they even did any troubleshooting at all, and the fact that when I got home from work on day 1 it wasn’t working showed me they didn’t test it very well.
wifiguy: my provider owns the antenna and the unit and by contract I can’t move it myself, so I will keep on my provider about installing a yagi and perhaps moving the antenna to a new location.
jwelch: what do you mean by plumb? do you mean as in 90 degree right angles? because to me my antenna seems to be on an angle of about 80 degrees
I changed the output to 28, but with no real results.
The thing I find most odd is that when I run a link test the numbers look good, usually 100/100
Stats for LUID: 67 Test Duration: 2 Pkt Length: 1522
Downlink RATE: 1736960 bps
Uplink RATE: 494848 bps
Aggregate RATE: 2231808 bps
Pkt Xmt (Act/Exp): 88/0
Pkt Rcv (Act/Exp): 281/0
Downlink Efficiency: 100 Percent
Downlink Index (Act/Max): 100/100
Frag Count (Act/Exp): 6785/6785
Uplink Efficiency: 100 Percent
Uplink Index (Act/Max): 100/100
Frag Count (Act/Exp): 1933/1933
now as stated above i am not familiar with this system, but a 100% efficiency sounds good to me.
Thank you all again for the good information, I have been forwarding it to my provider. That was how i got a firmware upgrade so quickly was on the advice from users here.
fstaff: I tried to run a speedtest several times, but my connection never stays up long enough for the test to run properly. In fact, to even post to this board properly I need to keep a dos window open with a constant ping going and watch for it to stop timing out before I hit post or there is a good chance it will double post or not post at all.
the part that drives me nuts is that it will go from ping times of 30ms to 50ms and then just stop for minutes on end so to start again at 30ms. how does it go from near perfect to nothing so fast? not even a slow down in speed before it cuts out.
I would say that with all the information avaliable that it would be something physical like blocked line of site that would be causing the connection to drop.
jwelch: what do you mean by plumb? do you mean as in 90 degree right angles? because to me my antenna seems to be on an angle of about 80 degrees
Yes it should be on right angles rather than just close to to more it is off the more likely it is to have problems including large amounts of dropouts
the part that drives me nuts is that it will go from ping times of 30ms to 50ms and then just stop for minutes on end so to start again at 30ms. how does it go from near perfect to nothing so fast? not even a slow down in speed before it cuts out.
This is an indication that the problem with be something physical, normally the canopy gear is good at keeping a stable latency and normally only changes when there is high load or frequency interferance so the fact that the latencies are stable would indicate something is causing the connection to be broken.
Unplug any cordless phones, just in case you’re generating your own interference. Even some of the 5GHz models use 900 for communication with the base station.
Since your provider doesn’t seem to know much more than you do about the radios, try running a spectrum analysis. I know you mentioned above that you don’t know how to read it, but here’s the basics:
Go to the page and click enable repeatedly, giving a few seconds in between. You will begin to see a pattern emerge. The green bars represent the sensed power level at each frequency. The yellow indicates the highest sensed power during this session. Depending on how many APs are in the area, you should ideally see a bell-type curve. You’re not going to see much of one, since your power is so low, but hopefully you’ll see a bit of a difference. You need a margin of at least 3 dB to maintain a solid connection. If you can’t see the curve, or if there is a lot of spiking, that could explain what you’re seeing. Without your provider shutting off your AP to establish a baseline, though, you can’t really get the most out of it.
wifiguy wrote: I suppose you're right on that one. Either they don't use passwords or they aren't using good ones!
I don't think some folks realize that you need to password the 'root' account on all P10 equipment.
Jitter of 5 in 1x mode? Meh.
I suspect interference from phones, baby monitors, power lines, or something along those lines.
Moving the antenna a foot or two in one direction or another can resolve connectivty problems. I did a repair yesterday for a business customer and just for grins I moved the antenna 2 feet down the mast. When I did that the jitter shot to 8 and the dB level fell to -78 from -72.
Just fwiw.
part 15… . keep in mind, if you dont know how to calculate your signal strength, you could very well be violate’n fcc regulation.
so unless you know what your doing, playing with output power levels and other settings should be left up to the people with your ISP who should know whats going to work, and still be legal.
Its working!!!
My ISP came out and installed a yagi and put it at the highest spot of my roof.
now I am getting a power level of -60dBm and the connection has been stable for atlest 24 hours now.
Thank you all for your help on this subject, if it was not for the info I kept sending them from this forum I doubt they would have done this.
thank you all again, I am one happy customer now.
Glad to hear it.