Wireless Access

Hello,

I have a strange Mesh issue that maybe someone could shed some light on. We have upgraded our wireless network infrastructure from an A200 controller with AP 70's to a 650 controller with several additional AP124's. The upgrade was successful and the network is functioning as required. We are now attempting to deploy Mesh Points for bridging purposed but we are running into a few strange issues.

Hardware in use:

Aruba 650 Controller (FIPS)

Aruba AP-70's (FIPS) with AP-ANT 17 or 19

Aruba AP-124 (FIPS) with AP-ANT-19

Features in use

XSEC

Firewall

IDS

Scenario:

When configuring two AP-124's at my desk (lab), one as a Mesh Portal and one as Mesh Point, bridging works as expected. The Mesh point finds its portal and makes it connection. Connectivity verified. When the two AP's are physically located in the same immediate vicinity (less the 2ft) bridging works fine. However, once I separate the AP's bridging fails. I have verified signal from my mesh portal up to thirty yards away through two floors. My signal is present but I can't seem to get bridging between to two after a few feet of separation.

Anyone have any suggestions

Thanks

Several things could be going on there.

First, you need to have all 3 antenna connectors on the AP124 hooked up to antennas.   Is this the case?

Second, the ANT-19 is a stick omni type antenna with a pigtail.  Even if you had three of these hooked up, your performance is likely going to be poor because they all have the same pattern and the same polarity.

With MIMO, it's critical to have differences in pattern and polarity to help the RX side decorrelate individual spatial streams.   On our outdoor APs, we sell kits like ANT-2x2-2005 and ANT-2x2-5005 that include two antennas.   One is an an H-polarization and one is a V-polarization.  They have been designed to have similar patterns with just the polarization difference.  This makes a significant difference in measured throughput.

We have seen other customers have issues combining multiple V-pol omnis for mesh.  switching antennas usually resolves the issue assuming that there are no other impairments in the environment.

You can test this out with the ANT-17 which has 3 elements with +/-45 degree polarizations.  You should be able to maintain a mesh connection successfully out to say 100 meters with two of those pointed at each other.  This is a lower gain antenna than we would normally use for a mesh link, but it will help narrow down what you're dealing with.

Clukas,

Thanks for the reply. All three of the AP's connectors are attached. I have attempted the mesh with the Ant-17 on my mesh portal and the 19 on the mesh point. I'll give it a try with 17's on both.

Thanks again.

neutron

If you absolutely need an omni in the middle, then I would recommend buying one AP-92 and one ANT-2x2-5010 kit.

It's not really feasible to do client access and mesh on an AP124 because we diplex the connectors and we don't sell a dual-band, dual-polarization kit.   Also the AP-124 has three chains and so you'd have to buy two antenna kits and end up with extra parts.

But if you need client access at the portal then probably you want it on both bands so you're better off breaking out the mesh portal function onto its own AP anyway.

The AP-92 is a dual chain unit, so it only needs two antennas.  Perfect for the dual-pol omni kit.  You'll need also qty (2) part AFC2DL60-00 soft jumpers 60cm with RPSMA/male on the AP side and N-female on the antenna side.