Controllerless Networks

Hi all,

Say you live in an isolated area with no other APs around, and you wanted to maximise WiFi speeds and so enable 160Mhz to allow clients with compatible radios to link at 1.7gbps.

My question is why isn't 160Mhz selectable in GUI? Is 160Mhz "discouraged" this way for reasons other than potential channel utilization/spectrum issues?

For example, does enabling 160Mhz cause the IAP/radios to overheat? Or in other words can I transfer huge data over wifi at speeds exceeding 1Gbps? And maintain such high loads for a long time? Can the IAP 335 handle such a scenario?

I got curious about this because using an similar QCA chip in a consumer-grade router would make its temps shoot up, but I would guess Aruba IAPs are built with consistent high loads in mind and so it might be able to handle it..

Thanks for the info.

There are no technical concerns (AP will not overheat), but here are a few reasons it's discouranged:

- 160MHz support is "optional" for Wi-Fi Alliance certification. Your client devices may not support it.

- Since the (I)AP-335 supports 160MHz in an "80 + 80" implementation (the two 80 MHz chunks do not have to be adjacent/contiguous, the radio will drop from 4x4 to 2x2 mode when operating in this wider channel bandwidth settting. The peak datarate therefore does not increase (but if that's limited by a 2x2 client radio anyway, it will double).

- The number of 160 MHz channels (even in 80 + 80 mode) is limited. The exact number depends on your country and applicable regulatory restrictions, but you may have just two channels available in the entire band. Obviously not good in a dense enterprise deployment, but to your point it could be ok when channel reuse is not needed/critical.

Onno,

Thorough answer, appreciate it.

Cheers