Wireless Access

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

But this is all philosophical considerations no end-users care about, they only care about the best experience,

and it is the experts job (us)  to provide that for them, that's why my question stand for it own…

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

Hi,

I know this is an old thread, but I just wanted to make sure that all points are considered. 

From my point of view, one important point is not mentioned. Redundancy for power. I have seen situation, where APs are connected to different switches and those switches are connected to different power circles to make sure that a power outage will not bring down the WLAN as well. This might be corner case, but in production environments where critical business applications are running through wireless as well this is very important. 

This will dramatically enhance user experience during a power outage. 

just my 2 cents. 

But this is all philosophical considerations no end-users care about, they only care about the best experience,

and it is the experts job (us)  to provide that for them, that's why my question stand for it own…

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

But this is all philosophical considerations no end-users care about, they only care about the best experience,

and it is the experts job (us)  to provide that for them, that's why my question stand for it own…

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

We have 535 series access points with two Cat6a cables to each one, going back to the same closet.  The second Cat6a cable used to go a Cisco AP's console port.  Since the 535 does not have that kind of port, I was thinking we could use it for power and connectivity redundancy.  We currently are being asked to patch every other AP into another switch in the closet in case one of the switches fail - so only half of the APs go offline.  But why not take that up a notch and dual home each AP to each of the switches in the closet so if one fails, the AP will remain online.    I was asking if anyone had a configuration example, since these APs are being patched to Cisco switches.  Its important that the Wi-Fi does not go offline in our case, since it is for healthcare.  We have RTLS for monitring where babies are at all times, VoWi-Fi, iPads used to telehealth visits where its basically a Facetime session,  Vocera badges, Aeroscout temperature tags, and of course corporate user data, Guest traffic, and BYOD as well.  That's why it is important that the Wi-Fi doesn't go down.  If we were a coffee shop or maybe a retail story, it might be just a minor inconvenience, but in our case, it is mission critical.

But this is all philosophical considerations no end-users care about, they only care about the best experience,

and it is the experts job (us)  to provide that for them, that's why my question stand for it own…

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

@tdennehy,

I don't mean to interrupt a question that was directed to @Florian_Baaske;  just adding another voice.

Details on how to configure the controller itself is here:  https://www.arubanetworks.com/techdocs/ArubaOS_8.10.0_Web_Help/Content/arubaos-solutions/access-points/lacp-supp.htm?Highlight=Link%20Aggregation%20Support  as well as some troubleshooting tips.

On the Cisco switch side, you would only have to set LACP to active to dynamically negotiate the port channel.

One reason why you would not want to do this above and beyond your current redundancy is complexity in terms of configuration, management and troubleshooting.

Since you mentioned that this is a critical deployment, I would test this rigorously in your lab so that the performance, redundancy, configuration and troubleshooting workflows match up with what you are doing and doesn't become a burden in the future.  It is definitely not just a set-and-forget-it feature; it could change what you do on a day-to-day basis.

We have 535 series access points with two Cat6a cables to each one, going back to the same closet.  The second Cat6a cable used to go a Cisco AP's console port.  Since the 535 does not have that kind of port, I was thinking we could use it for power and connectivity redundancy.  We currently are being asked to patch every other AP into another switch in the closet in case one of the switches fail - so only half of the APs go offline.  But why not take that up a notch and dual home each AP to each of the switches in the closet so if one fails, the AP will remain online.    I was asking if anyone had a configuration example, since these APs are being patched to Cisco switches.  Its important that the Wi-Fi does not go offline in our case, since it is for healthcare.  We have RTLS for monitring where babies are at all times, VoWi-Fi, iPads used to telehealth visits where its basically a Facetime session,  Vocera badges, Aeroscout temperature tags, and of course corporate user data, Guest traffic, and BYOD as well.  That's why it is important that the Wi-Fi doesn't go down.  If we were a coffee shop or maybe a retail story, it might be just a minor inconvenience, but in our case, it is mission critical.

But this is all philosophical considerations no end-users care about, they only care about the best experience,

and it is the experts job (us)  to provide that for them, that's why my question stand for it own…

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

Completely agree with you.  We would not want to make this so complicated that nobody would even attempt to configure the switches for AP uptime.  As of right now, current redundancy is lame - as all if does it keep half the APs online, when the could all be online.  This would allow switches to be upgraded one by one, and the Wi-Fi would remain up.

It is odd that I have never run into anyone that is actually doing this level of redundancy.  Makes me wonder if the configuration is so painful that its not worth the hassle.

If anyone has ever got it working, please feel free to PM me or share your experience.  I'm sure I'm not the only one in the community looking into this.

@tdennehy,

I don't mean to interrupt a question that was directed to @Florian_Baaske;  just adding another voice.

Details on how to configure the controller itself is here:  https://www.arubanetworks.com/techdocs/ArubaOS_8.10.0_Web_Help/Content/arubaos-solutions/access-points/lacp-supp.htm?Highlight=Link%20Aggregation%20Support  as well as some troubleshooting tips.

On the Cisco switch side, you would only have to set LACP to active to dynamically negotiate the port channel.

One reason why you would not want to do this above and beyond your current redundancy is complexity in terms of configuration, management and troubleshooting.

Since you mentioned that this is a critical deployment, I would test this rigorously in your lab so that the performance, redundancy, configuration and troubleshooting workflows match up with what you are doing and doesn't become a burden in the future.  It is definitely not just a set-and-forget-it feature; it could change what you do on a day-to-day basis.

We have 535 series access points with two Cat6a cables to each one, going back to the same closet.  The second Cat6a cable used to go a Cisco AP's console port.  Since the 535 does not have that kind of port, I was thinking we could use it for power and connectivity redundancy.  We currently are being asked to patch every other AP into another switch in the closet in case one of the switches fail - so only half of the APs go offline.  But why not take that up a notch and dual home each AP to each of the switches in the closet so if one fails, the AP will remain online.    I was asking if anyone had a configuration example, since these APs are being patched to Cisco switches.  Its important that the Wi-Fi does not go offline in our case, since it is for healthcare.  We have RTLS for monitring where babies are at all times, VoWi-Fi, iPads used to telehealth visits where its basically a Facetime session,  Vocera badges, Aeroscout temperature tags, and of course corporate user data, Guest traffic, and BYOD as well.  That's why it is important that the Wi-Fi doesn't go down.  If we were a coffee shop or maybe a retail story, it might be just a minor inconvenience, but in our case, it is mission critical.

But this is all philosophical considerations no end-users care about, they only care about the best experience,

and it is the experts job (us)  to provide that for them, that's why my question stand for it own…

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

Thank you for your opinion.

But it is a new world with WI-FI 6 & 6E (6Ghz), and 160mhz.

I assume the Aruba engineering core has put two interface with two operation modes there, for a reason.

Why not honor there interest and effort, for the feature and actually use it.

as seen from the user's perspective, what's the best for them ? when they are connected ?

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.

What is the real word benefits (for all, administrator and most important: users)

for either method of connecting such an AP, with LACP or not,

hence the fact an AP's is working fine in both scenarios.