Wireless Access

a brief summary of our topology:

1x MSM710 Controller

6x MSM422 Access Point

1x PoE Switch

the APs route through the PoE switch, to the controller LAN port. the controller Internet Port then routes to our TMG server.

Controller is being used for authentication and access control, using the default VSC. WPA2 Wireless protection is the only authentication currently enabled. Controller is also being used for DHCP

The problem is anything connected to this network via Wi-Fi is basically unable to access any web pages. Google will load, i guess becuase its relatively small, but anything further (including actually using google to do a search) just doesnt load. pages frequently time out or only half download.

the only thing i have noticed that might be a clue, is that on the Status > Ports page, the 'controller data tunnel' transmit is getting a few hundred errors per hour. I cant however find any clue as to what this might mean.

currently there are no more than 30-40 users on the network, and no more than 15 per AP. I have tried setting the internet port dat limits to 1gigabit, to match the connection to the TMG NIC, but this made no difference. also tried switching on and off various routing options within the Controller but nothing has made a difference. I know the problem is not with the TMG becuase we dont have any data throttling in place, and our main office LAN runs through it with no performance issues.

I just dont know where to check...I've seen similar issues on these forums but nobody seems to know what to do about it. the Manual is also no help for troubleshooting.

P.S. This thread has been moved from Communications, Wireless (Legacy ITRC forum) to MSM Series. - Hp forum Moderator

re the 'controller data tunnel' errors - the phrase doesn't appear at all in the 700 page manual, and a google search for "controller data tunnel" returns only 1 page - another HP forum entry of someone with a similar problem!

Google will load, i guess becuase its relatively small, but anything further (including actually using google to do a search) just doesnt load. pages frequently time out or only half download.

I've seen this fenomenon before, though not related to wireless, and that was MTU problem on one link. Please theck to see that your MTU is configured correctly on all the links.

I've increased the transmit/receive buffer of the Network connection at the TMG end, it seems to have made a little improvement but internet is still unusable....is there an optimum buffer size?

I think you might be on the right track though. Anywhere else you can suggest i look? is there anything I can set on the Controller?

We have solved this problem. our Controller internet port was routed incorrectly to our TMG - instead of routing it to an internet address, it was being routed to a NIC port tagged as part of our internal network. the upshot of this was that clients were having NAT applied by the wireless controller, routing to the TMG LAN, then having NAT applied a second time as they traversed the firewall through to the internet. 

So i guess if anyone is noticing exceptionally poor internet performance with their Wi-Fi clients, check:

a) you are connecting your controller internet port to another appropriately tagged internet port on your firewall/router

b) your route isnt getting NAT applied to it more than once.

Hopefully this is of some help!