Wireless Access

Hi, 

 

First of all I'd like to say that I'm fairly green behind the ears in the word of WLAN networking so I apologize for any confusion my inexperience might cause ahead of time.

 

I have a test environment that I am using to learn how to navigate the Aruba interface. It's extremely simple, just a 3600 controller, connected to my laptop by a 1 serial cable and 1 ethernet cable, and also connected to an AP-105 (of course with a PoE injector between the controller and AP). 

 

Well, previously I had provisioned this AP-105, had several SSIDs broadcasting from it, and had actually used it for my internet access at work for several days. After I had fully set up the the network, I wanted to start over, so I did a write mem on my controller, did a factory reset/purgeenv on the AP-105, and started from the ground up again. However, this time when I went to provision the AP and there is no listing for it anywhere in the web UI. The Power button is blinking in 1 second intervals, and the radio lights aren't on at all, which I take to mean that the radios aren't broadcasting.

 

My questions are:

1.) What is going on with my AP?

2.) Why, when it is directly connected by ethernet cable to my controller, can't I see it?

3.) How do I fix it???

#3600

The power light will blink when the AP doesn't find a controller or doesn't get an IP address. Connect a console cable to the AP, power it on and watch the boot sequence. The output will tell you the IP address the AP receives and/or whether or not it finds a controller. Post that output and we can debug further.

APBoot 1.2.4.4 (build 26618)
Built: 2011-01-07 at 13:42:04

Model: AP-10x
CPU: AR7161 revision: A2
Clock: 680 MHz, DDR clock: 340 MHz, Bus clock: 170 MHz
DRAM: 128 MB
POST1: passed
Copy: done
Flash: 16 MB
PCI: scanning bus 0 ...
dev fn venID devID class rev MBAR0 MBAR1 MBAR2 MBAR3
00 00 168c 0029 00002 01 10000000 00000000 00000000 00000000
01 00 168c 0029 00002 01 10010000 00000000 00000000 00000000
Net: eth0
Radio: ar922x#0, ar922x#1

Hit <Enter> to stop autoboot: 0
Checking image @ 0xbf100000
Invalid image format version: 0xffffffff
Checking image @ 0xbf800000
Invalid image format version: 0xffffffff
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex
DHCP broadcast 1
DHCP broadcast 2
DHCP broadcast 3
DHCP broadcast 4
DHCP broadcast 5

Retry count exceeded; starting again
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex
DHCP broadcast 1
DHCP broadcast 2
DHCP broadcast 3
DHCP IP address: 172.16.0.107
DHCP subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
DHCP def gateway: 172.16.0.1
DHCP DNS server: 172.16.0.20
DHCP DNS domain: redcelltechnologies.net
ADP multicast 1
ADP broadcast 1
ADP multicast 2
ADP broadcast 2
ADP multicast 3

Retry count exceeded
DNS request 1 for aruba-master.redcelltechnologies.net to 172.16.0.20
T T T T
Retry count exceeded; starting again
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

These are the extent of my boot logs for this AP

The AP got an IP address (172.16.0.107). It was not able to resolved aruba-master, so it won't find the controller that way. Is there an IP address (n the controller) assigned to the VLAN with a 172.16.0.x address? If so, the AP should have found the controller via Aruba Discovery Protocol (ADP), but it didn't. Also, did you disable ADP? From the console, you can do "show adp config" and "show ip int brief" to verify both questions above.

The default IP was of course 172.16.0.254, but I removed the default vlan IP (as I've been told if you're not using it, it can cause interference in the IP interface). I now have a Management VLAN at [172.16.10.27], an Employee VLAN [172.16.11.27], and a Guest VLAN [172.16.13.27]. Have I created some sort of IP conflict or anything like that?

The AP has a 172.16.0.x subnet address. You may need to move the port where the AP plug in into the correct VLAN (probably Management (172.16.10.x)). It sounds like the AP is in a VLAN that doesn't have an IP address assigned (not sure how it gets DHCP). If you move it to the Management VLAN, does it get a 172.16.10.x address and then find the controller? Another data point is to do "show controller-ip" and see which IP is acting as the controllers IP that APs need to connect to. That should probably be the Management VLAN IP address.

I have all ports set to access the management VLAN for configuration purposes. I've tried plugging the AP into all ports and that hasn't seemed to help, the power light is still blinking and there are still no radio lights. I even changed the Management/Controller IP to 172.16.0.27 and it did not budge.

- Make sure the VLAN the access point is on has dhcp

- Make sure the controller has an ip interface on that VLAN

- Make sure control plane security is turned off (configuration> network> controller> control plane security> Disabled>  Apply.

 

See if the access point comes up.

 

Please publish the latest console log for that access point if it is not working.

How do I find out if a specific VLAN has DHCP enabled? I've looked around quite a bit in the VLAN tab in "Configuration" and haven't seen anything.

All my VLANs do have IP interfaces and Control Plane security is off.

 

I reset my controller and configured it without the use of any wizards and this is now the output of the bootlogs:

APBoot 1.2.4.4 (build 26618)
Built: 2011-01-07 at 13:42:04

Model: AP-10x
CPU: AR7161 revision: A2
Clock: 680 MHz, DDR clock: 340 MHz, Bus clock: 170 MHz
DRAM: 128 MB
POST1: passed
Copy: done
Flash: 16 MB
PCI: scanning bus 0 ...
dev fn venID devID class rev MBAR0 MBAR1 MBAR2 MBAR3
00 00 168c 0029 00002 01 10000000 00000000 00000000 00000000
01 00 168c 0029 00002 01 10010000 00000000 00000000 00000000
Net: eth0
Radio: ar922x#0, ar922x#1

Hit <Enter> to stop autoboot: 0
Checking image @ 0xbf100000
Invalid image format version: 0xffffffff
Checking image @ 0xbf800000
Invalid image format version: 0xffffffff
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex
DHCP broadcast 1
DHCP broadcast 2
DHCP broadcast 3
DHCP broadcast 4
DHCP broadcast 5

Retry count exceeded; starting again
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex
DHCP broadcast 1
DHCP broadcast 2
DHCP broadcast 3
DHCP broadcast 4
DHCP broadcast 5

Retry count exceeded; starting again
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex
DHCP broadcast 1
DHCP broadcast 2
DHCP broadcast 3
DHCP broadcast 4
DHCP broadcast 5

Retry count exceeded; starting again
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex
DHCP broadcast 1
DHCP broadcast 2
DHCP broadcast 3
DHCP broadcast 4
DHCP broadcast 5

Retry count exceeded; starting again
eth0 up: 1 Gb/s full duplex

DHCP ranges and the status of the DHCP server are at Configuration> Network> IP > DHCP server.

 

So in this situtation how should I configure DHCP so that this AP can receive it's address from my controller?

To Create VLAN and assigning IP Addresses

configure terminal  
vlan 1000
interface vlan 1000
ip address  20.1.1.1 255.255.255.0
no shutdown  
operstate  up
exit

To defining DHCP Pool

ip dhcp pool  VLAN_1000
network  20.1.1.1 0 255.255.255.0
default-router  20.1.1.1
exit

To Enable DHCP service on controller (Most Important)

 

service  dhcp 

See Below snapshot

 

Is your aruba-master 172.16.0.20 ? It looks its trying to talk it using that ip .

Is that the ip of your controller ?

Finally got it working again. Had no DHCP set up. Added a firewall to the mix that now hosts my DHCP servers. No problems since!