Setting up Wireless with 2 WAP11 and 3 ORINOCO GOLD

[azev]

Well I would like to achive consistent connection and maximum speed with my setup.
I will place one WAP11 in my basement and nother on the ground floor. All WAP11 connected to my linksys 4 port router.
Now I have a few question about my setup:
- What channel should be use on both of the WAP11 ? should I use different channel or one channel? (which one ?)
- To achive max speed, what should I enable and what should I disable ? (such as WEP or SSID Broadcast)
- For best signal what setup need to be changed on the WAP11 ?

I Cant connect to my WAP11 when SSID is disabled, my orinoco utilities can see my WAP11 but cannot connect, what would I miss ?

Any input is greatly appreciated.

Thanks
I

 

[rw120555]

You could configure both WAP11s identically, e.g. same channel, same ssid, same WEP and MAC address settings. Then, you could "roam" across the house, as your laptop picks up whichever is closest. (In practice, I find my laptop tends not to switch between WAPs as I move around. So, what I do is disable the connection for a few seconds, and then re-enable it, and it then picks up whichever wap is best.)

I suppose an alternative is to give your waps different ssids and different channels. Then, it will be like you have 2 wireless networks in your house, and you can choose which one to connect to.

WEP may or may not slow down your connection; it seems to depend on the connection. The loss may be as much as 50%. But, if you don't use WEP and 20 of your neighbors start piggybacking on to your connection, that will slow you down even more.

There have been a couple versions of the wap11 -- the original, then version 2.2, and now 2.6. Which do you have?

 

[ericboo]

I agree with RW in that WEP may or may not slow down your connection speed. I have a WAP11 in my attic and a Netgear wireless router on my main floor. I gave them two separate SSID's just for the heck of it. I would be WEP will slow it down a bit, so you could enable MAC address filtering to be safe.

I know my neighbors, and even share my connection with two out of three that are witnin reach. I just peek at the DHCP table every now and then to see if any unknown has gained access to my wireless network.

 

[rw120555]

Besides sharing your internet connection, keep in mind that you are also potentially sharing files and printers, depending on whether you enable sharing or not. I would recommend at least some minimal security features, such as mac address filtering. Also keep in mind that if WEP does slow you down, you will probably still be going much faster than your internet connection. Any slowdown will mostly be noticeable when moving files between machines.

 

[azev]

Mac address filtering, this is what I am using for my setup. So there are no ways to setup to where you can roam around the house and let the laptop configure and switch WAP11 to the closest one ?? Hmmm.... How about what channel to use ??
I am currently using the default channel (6), What channel usually have less outside interference ?
I also cannot connect to my WAP11 if I disable SSID Broadcasting.... what could possibly cause this ??
BTW The WAP that I got is version 2.2

Thanks

 

[ktwebb]

WAP11 if I disable SSID Broadcasting.... what could possibly cause this ??

The SSID on your client cards not matching the AP's. If you have left the default SSID on your Orinoco then yeah, disabling your AP's SSID will not allow any client card that does not have the same SSID entered manually to associate to it.

As far as the roaming question. As long as the AP's cell's do not overlap severely then you can probably get away with leaving them on the same frequency base, ie..channel. This would give you a better chance for seamless roaming. 802.11b devices are supposed to roam because they send out beacons periodically, basically polling for AP's and their signal strength. Even the enterprise level AP's struggle with roaming however. It's suppose to work and in some cases it does, some it doesn't. rw's trick of disabling the card, usually I would do it from the taskbar, especially easy if you have a PCMCIA icon in your taskbar, does work well if you want to manually find the strongest signal. The bottom line is most client cards tend to hang on to the AP their associated to until the signal gets really bad or drops alltogether. You'll just have to play around with it to see what your test yield. There is certainly a chance that the AP's will interfere with each other if the cells overlap too much, and in that case you would want to use two of the three non-overlapping channels on the respective AP's. Those being channel 1 (2.412), 6 (2.437), and 11 (2.462).

 

[azev]

how can you tell if an AP is overlapping each other ?

 

[ktwebb]

Get two AP's. Turn one on, associate to it with a client card and do a site survey. Turn that AP off and do a diagram of your coverage area.

Turn the second AP on. Associate to it and do a site survey. Diagram that survey. There's your graphical overlap. Adjust accordingly.

Site survey's are basically common sense. Environment variables and overall size of the job can make them interesting but for the home it's just get you an AP and start walking around using your utility software. Just test until you figure it out.

 

[azev]

So What would be my best bet for the setting ?? I did what you told me and about 1/3 of my house is overlapped.
Should I go with the same SSID name but Different Channel?? (it is now) or same channel and same SSID ? But with the same channel and same SSID, how can I figure out which ap is which ? at least now I know Channel 11 is basement and Channel 6 is ground floor. Well things seems to work fine, roaming can happend automaticaly sometimes, some other time, I have to disable, and disable the card. Well I am setting this network up for my boss, his house have the same layout as mine, but twice as large, and he is very computer illeterate. That is why I need this to be as easy as possible.
Thank you much for your help.

 

[ktwebb]

You would need a software utility that tells you what AP your associated to, either by MAC address, IP address, or some naming convention. My experience is predominately with Cisco, with some Lucent stuff thrown in there and their client utilities are superb. With the SOHO stuff I wouldn't know what to tell you without looking at their software. As far as the overlap, you'd have to test to see for sure if their is any interference. Again, good software would be good for that however failing that you could generally tell if their is an interference problem with a simple Strength or Signal quality meter. It would bounce around quite a bit. More as the interference got more severe. You might drop your connection alltogether. If none of that occurs then I would set up two AP's on the same SSID and channel. If there is some interference then set them up on the same SSID but different channels, 1 and 11 for instance. Roaming is usually better with same frequency AP infrastructure and slight overlap. I can't think of any good reason to have different SSID's on a home WLAN.

If roaming just doesn't want to work, then as long as you can teach your boss how to pull out a PCMCI card and then re-insert it, or disable the card and then re-enable with a mouse clicks, then he should be fine. Once re-enabled the client card will pick up the first signal it sees, which will be the strongest signal. That is forced roaming.

 

[azev]

ktwebb, thank you much for all your help, everything seem to work just fine now.
Btw since you have a lot of enterprise wireless experience, can you suggest me what would be a good wireless equipment for 2 stories office building (2500sf /floor) ?? We are moving to this building in 4 months, so we have quite some time to plan this out. We are going to hardwire most of the terminal, but we have a lot of our sales people from other state that came and go, I would like them to be able to sit anywhere in the office and have connection (wireless). We will have no more than 35-40 people on wireless at the same time. Now without having to reduce everybody paycheck to get this equipment, what would be good ? and what kind of setup ?? I am designing their network for the new building, and I can use some input on this wireless stuff from you.

Thanks again
I

 

[ktwebb]

Well Cisco isn't cheap but it is the best 802.11b equipment you can buy and since this is a commercial project that is what I would suggest, along with a Radius server and using LEAP to authenticate to the Radius server. 1200 series AP with 350 series client cards. Use patch omni ceiling mount antennas, perfect if you have dropped ceiling hallways and ofices. The only other legitimate alternative is Orinoco. At least if your going 802.11b. Owned now by Proxim and very good equipment. Not quite as expensive as the Cisco hardware and they also have good security implementations.

As to how many, that would depend on WAY too many variables to suggest something here. Might be as few as two or three AP's or it could be many more depending on layout, construction materials and bandwidth requirements. I would highly recommend having someone come out and doing a detailed site survey at your location and sitting down with you or your IT staff, and discussing usage demands and security measures.