Subscriber Discussion

Problems With Multiple Engenius Radios

KJ
Kenny Johnson
Feb 11, 2016

Anyone ever work with wireless radios?

We have these working... but experience intermittent problems.
The problems is that a couple of the radios will loose connection and we will have to go reset them.

We have 4 access points on 1 pole.
They each point out to different corners of a small housing development.

Each access point has its own unique SSID.
*** Other than the SSID all the settings are the same on all the radios...

Anyone know if we can change channels or something on each Access Point & Station to help with this problem?

Thanks

Avatar
Scott Bradford
Feb 12, 2016
IPVMU Certified

Yes you should change the channels on the radios. Changing the SSID will just stop the networks from getting confused, but if you have 4 radios that close together on the same channel, you're getting RF interference, which seems to be exactly what you are experiencing.

KJ
Kenny Johnson
Feb 12, 2016

Thanks. People say to put them on channels 1, 6, 11 BUT when we look at the channel / frequency drop down box there are no channels 1, 6, 11.

It starts with like channel 35...

Any tips?

U
Undisclosed #1
Feb 12, 2016
IPVMU Certified

Or maybe starts with 36, if they're 5 gig radios.

(1)
KJ
Kenny Johnson
Feb 12, 2016

Thank you.

So should we just use the channels that are 5 channels apart like this?

AP1 = Channel 36

AP2 = Channel 60

etc

etc

The channel numbers go way down... to like over 100.

We just picked some random channels that were far apart. :)

KJ
Kenny Johnson
Feb 12, 2016

OH... or maybe we should just do it like this?

AP1 = Channel 36

AP2 = Channel 40

AP3 = Channel 44

AP4 = Channel 48

U
Undisclosed #1
Feb 12, 2016
IPVMU Certified

Before you do anything, do a 5 ghz site survey from the radios.

(2)
KJ
Kenny Johnson
Feb 12, 2016

We did click on "site survey"... but honestly did not get much out of it...

We have all the radios working... just wondering if they might work better with less drops if we can figure out the correct channels to put them on.

U
Undisclosed #1
Feb 12, 2016
IPVMU Certified

Ok, here's the thing, if you didn't see anything competing for bandwidth in the spectrum and all the points were set to auto channel and sharing the same ssid, I would think it should work at least ok.

Are the channels not set to auto?

if not have you tried it?

DW
Dennis Widdows
Feb 12, 2016

Honestly it could be so many things from RF Interference to Bandwidth over load to a network set up issue to not having CLOS ...Are they all set up as access points or are they used in a client bridge set up?? Model number, what are they being used for, cameras connected power supplies and back power to are they on timed power source on the light pole or poor input from the AC side...

That info would help in trying to figure out your issues and to help you diagnose the problem...I have Engenius units that will not ping thru a CLIENT Bridge set up it tunre dout to be an irrevocable problem in the unit...

DMW

U
Undisclosed #1
Feb 12, 2016
IPVMU Certified

If you decide not to use auto, AND there is no contention from any external AP's, you can trying using 4 40Mhz width channels, 38, 46, 54, 62. These would be non-overlapping.

This keeps you out of the DFS channels, which makes things simpler.

U
Undisclosed #1
Feb 13, 2016
IPVMU Certified

Does your site survey screen look like this:

Here the signal strength is listed using dBm.  The lower the number the weaker the signal.

(1)
CN
Chad NesSmith
Feb 13, 2016

The access points should all have the same SSID. That way the radios can roam without switching SSIDs. If configured properly they will automatically switch to the radio with the best signal. If they don't roam, they will manually have to connect to a different SSID. Asking for trouble...

Set the channels to auto. It should work just fine

(1)
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