Every so often I go through my APs to look for SMs that have power levels turned up to high so I can balance them, normal maintenance.
Is this something everyone else does with backhauls also? Many of my backhauls have connections at -53 or even better. Should I be turned down the power levels and getting these around -70?
If you are co-located with a lot of other backhauls or units in the same frequency band it may not be a bad idea, otherwise I would say you can probably leave them be.
I usually get mine peaked and adjust the power so they’re around -60. It gives me plenty of fade to work with and a solid link.
The reasoning for RF balancing on a multipoint unit is because one unit with exceptionally high RF output can diminish the performance of other units with lower values. I can’t remember who described it, but the flashlight theory is the best way of describing this:
Imagine you are in a dark room and you have several flashlights pointed at you from various distances. The closer ones will overpower you because they are much brighter than the ones that are farther away. By adjusting the output on the closer flashlights to a lower level, you are better able to see the farther ones.
Another way to describe it is wireless as a conversation. If you have a couple guys shouting at you, a few talking normal and a couple whispering, who do you think you will hear best?
Generally it’s best to set power levels to be “good enough” plus a little extra for fade. By having links much hotter than needed you are polluting the RF space with the unnecessary overage.
Ok this may be a stupid question, but on my 5.8 sm I only see a normal and low power setting…I would like to tweak mine down a bit…so is there another spot to tweak it down in increments?
I’m guessing that is probably a P8 backhaul which only has Normal and Low as options. P9s and P10s are the ones I believe that can adjusted numerically.
Ok I miis read the posting as it says backhauls, I was refering to my sm which are all p9 and p10…
You have P9s and P10s that only have ‘Normal’ and ‘Low’ as power settings? Are you positive they are P9/P10s?
Only P10 have numerical values for power level
After looking through my backhauls, it appears that all of my 5.2 & 2.4Ghz backhauls that are P9 can be adjusted numerically. With my 5.7Ghz backhauls only the ones that are P10 can be adjusted with the numbers.