Wireless Access

Hello Community.

I work for a small to medium University as the network admin. I'm sort of new to Aruba wireless networking. We had several complaints from the students about wireless on campus so we implemented a student technology fee that would give us some extra resources to address these issues. We had an Aruba 3600/3400 master/local set up with about 135 APs of different varieties. (105,124,125, 93H and 225) At the time we only had a 100mb connection for the wireless with approximately 750 to 800 devices accessing it simultaneously.

We have since upgraded the backbone of our network to 10gb links and replaced most of our access switches with Gigabit switches. We also bought a new controller running 6.5.3.2 code (7205) to replace the 3600/3400 master/local and replaced older APs (124s and 125s) with better APs that support AC WAVE 2. (225s,315s, 365s, and 367s) I am still hearing that students are complaining about speeds and connectivity.(Second hand of course because they won't put in helpdesk tickets but complain to the President and all the VPs)

We use two SSIDs, one faculty/Staff/student and an open guest. The faculty/Staff/student uses LDAP and AD to place the user on the proper VLAN after authentication. (student VLAN or corporate VLAN)

I've been to the Aruba Solution Exchange and found an RF Optimization and Deployment Model. https://ase.arubanetworks.com/solutions/id/75

It helps you to create profiles from cloning existing profiles but it's not much help to me because I don't fully understand the settings. If someone could help or guide me in the right direction, I would be greatly appreciative. I can also provide more data if necessary. Thanks. -Tony

Attachment(s)

RadioProfiles.docx   90 KB 1 version

FUGATE GRD FLOOR.docx   130 KB 1 version

ARMProfiles.docx   98 KB 1 version

Tony, 

The answer to your question is "it depends". RF settings are specific to certain environments and other variables that dictate what is appropriate for your use case. 

The Aruba partner you purchased your equipment through should be able to assist with guidng you in the right direction especially if they were tasked with setting up the system initially. 

I work with several of your peer schools here in NC and am very familiar with the higher ed environment. If you don't find the assistance you need from your Aruba partner let me know and I will see what help we can get you. 

Regards,

Thanks for the reply Michael. I will definitely reach out to you if I need further assistance.

Have a look at the VRDs here,:

http://community.arubanetworks.com/t5/Validated-Reference-Design/tkb-p/Aruba-VRDs

I strongly recommend the site survey and planning and the RF and Roaming Optimisation VRDs.

On a basic level, you need to do a wireless survey first to determine the best locations for the APs and also the correct models. A like for like swap isn't always appropraite. I recommend Ekahau Site Survey for survey work. After that is done then work on optimising the system.

Feel free to sendme a message and we can have a conversation about the best approach given work in higher education as well.

We've changed wireless pretty fundamentally here at Cambridge.

Best wishes

Alexander.