ePMP 3000 Performance in Heavy Interference

Does does ePMP 3000 perform in a high-interference urban environment?

Hi Ethoplex.  The ePMP3000 builds on the same interference busting features that the ePMP2000 debuted.  Practically all the enhancements between the ePMP1000 and ePMP2000 series we nearly all targeted at interference mitigation.  And, the ePMP3000/300 series contains those same features, as well as many more.

So yes - the ePMP3000 AP's contain a dynamic filter, so that they will filter out both RX and TX that are out of band.  If you configure your AP for 5750 Mhz @ 40Mhz width, the dynamic filtering will also be set to mitigate interference that is close by in frequencies... so a close/loud competitor at 5800 which would normally be a deafening problem, the filtering will dramatically reduce that.  Likewise, your transmissions at 5750 will also be filtered so that the edges of that (5730-5770 for example) will be sharper, and will less of your TX interfering with him too.  Dynamic filtering is awesome. We have some places where we have replaced ePMP1000 series PTP links with ePMP2000's and the MCS's jump to 100% on MSC15 TX & RX.  In some cases, dramatically better interference rejection.

Also, there are times when you have your own nearby links to contend with.  Self-generated interference is easier to deal with in a way, since you at least have some control over it.  With non-filtered and non-Synced equipment, the guidelines are to have twice the guard band (gap) between the AP's as the channel widths.  So, if you have two AP's at 40 Mhz widths, good RF planning says you should have 80Mhz of gap between them. That's often not possible, so often you are self-interfering...  and it's not even the 'environment' or the competition that are the issue.  Sometimes it's simply self-interference.  With GPS Sync and with Filtering (which both the ePMP2000 and ePMP3000 have) you can often reduce that guard band down to just 5Mhz.  That can in many cases allow you to avoid interference better, by allowing you to choose the channels you want, and thereby avoiding competitive interference by mitigating self-interference.  Again, this feature is in the ePMP3000 AP's as well.

Additionally, the BeamForming uplink antenna that debuted on the ePMP2000 AP's is also available for the ePMP3000 AP.  That can help eliminate competitive interference that is interfering with data coming from the SM's back to the AP.  Quite often, that's where the biggest interference problem is.  The SM's are generally somewhat isolated and generally can hear the AP fine.. but data returning back to the AP can be overwhelmed by noise. The ePMP product line does several things to help mitigate this, and the Cambium Scheduler is key to that... since SM's each transmit in their assigned time-slot, they aren't going to collide with your other SM's.  However, on top of that, the BeamForming antenna 'steers' a narrower, higher gain beam at specific clients as they are transmitting their data... this can dramatically decrease the competitive interference that the AP hears, and can help mitigate that interference.  That is an industry leading interference reduction feature, and is available on both the ePMP2000 and now in the ePMP3000.

As well, the ePMP3000/300 series has introduced a Spectrum Analyzer which can work 'live' without disrupting a link.  That allows WISP's to examine the available spectrum from both the AP's and the SM's point of views, in order to pick the best channel with the lowest noise floor.  This is an enhancement on the previous generation, so the ePMP3000/300's have added better tools for detecting interference.

And finally - since the ePMP3000 can be anywhere from 2x to 5x as fast as previous generations (depending on a bunch of factors) WISP's may find that you can operate in a 20 Mhz channel and achieve the same or maybe even better results than what required a 40Mhz channel previously.  Of course, every environment is different, but some of the ePMP3000 Beta Testers have shown results with over 200 Mbit of downloaded data going to multiple clients using MU-MIMO features, in only a 20 Mhz channel widths.  If your situation happens to be that you only have 20 or 30 Mhz of clean spectrum, then the ePMP3000 can utilize that spectrum more efficiently than anything in it's price/performance range.  Other products would require a 40Mhz channel with to achieve the same PtMP performance, and if that channel with starts bumping into interference... then the ePMP3000 can again be better at interference simply due to spectral efficiency.

Short Answer: "Yeah, they are awesome"

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