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WAPs again

HedbergHedberg Posts: 671
in AMX Hardware
I've recently been reading old threads about WAPs in general and the AMX WAP200G in particular. All my experience with the WAP200G has been in the last six months or so, and it seems to me that they are pretty reliable. They seem to have good signal strength, don't get all hot-and-bothered when devices disconnect and then reconnect, etc.

So, my question is about what level of reliability should be expected -- assuming that some level below "perfect" must be acceptable. We have an installation in a law office which consists of three separate rooms -- two combined on one network (two masters and two WAPS) and one small room with an NI2000 and one WAP. Since installed, two of the WAPs have locked up one time each and the other has had no problems whatsoever. Should a failure requiring a power-cycle reboot every couple months be acceptable? One of the failures manifested itself by losing connection on the wired side while still allowing wireless connection/"association". That is, the wireless panel connected to the WAP but could not connect to the master. I'm not sure whether or not the WAP was accessible from the wired side at all as I wasn't on site when it happened and we can't access the Netlinx network from outside. The other failure occurred recently and I'm not sure whether it was the wired or wireless side (or both) in that case. All I know is that power cycling the WAP solved the problem.

Harold

Comments

  • Spire_JeffSpire_Jeff Posts: 1,917
    Are the WAPs on different channels? Also, do you have the latest firmware on the WAPs? I heard that the most recent firmware was a big improvement.

    Also, you could check for interference using the Wi-Spy tool (http://www.metageek.net). It only costs $99.00 and I have found it to work quite well. Definately more informative than NetStumbler alone.

    Jeff
  • HedbergHedberg Posts: 671
    Jeff wrote:
    Are the WAPs on different channels? Also, do you have the latest firmware on the WAPs? I heard that the most recent firmware was a big improvement.

    The WAPS are far enough apart so that they don't interfere and, as best I can tell, there doesn't seem to be a 2.4ghz interference problem. When I set them up, I used channels 1 and 11 with the two furthest apart on the same channel. In my experience, almost all folks who don't give it much thought end up on channel 6, so my goal was to avoid that traffic jam. So, the big conference room is about 150' by 50' and has one WAP and this is the room that has had no problems at all. The TPs report excellent signal strength/connectivity throughout the room.

    As I said, the WAPS are far enough apart so that interference doesn't seem to be a problem. One of the WAPS is totally inaccessible from the other two and visa versa. The other two can be accessed from the opposing rooms though signal strength is low -- they are about 200' and 5 conference rooms/offices apart. Each WAP has it's own SSID and list of allowable MACs.

    In general, I'm pretty impressed with the AMX WAPs. They seem to output a good strong signal which doesn't vary much (I've seen DLINK integrated router/WAPs that did). My main problem with this particular installation is that it's probably impossible to train any of the client's staff to access the WAPs through UTP or wireless and reboot them and two of the WAPS are in inaccessible locations requiring ladders and gymnastics to power cycle. So, when one of these locks up, it requires a service call.

    I'm wondering if something like the Dataprobe iBoot might be the solution -- remote power cycling controlled via IP. The problem is the suckers are about $200/pop. Maybe an IP controlled relay to switch the 5.6v on and off.

    Harold
  • shr00m-dewshr00m-dew Posts: 394
    Can you get some PoE adapters and put those on a PC20? The WAP's don't have to be plugged in at the WAP.

    Kevin D.
  • HedbergHedberg Posts: 671
    Kevin wrote:
    Can you get some PoE adapters and put those on a PC20? The WAP's don't have to be plugged in at the WAP.

    When we installed these, we tried POE without success. My recollection is that POE adapters were available in either 5v or 12v flavors and we opted for 5v -- thats somewhat less, I think, than the voltage put out by the WAP200G wall wart. The units wouldn't stay up for more than about an hour at a time, so we abandoned the POE idea. I've toyed with the idea of implementing my own POE using the WAP power supply, it's not, as I understand it, rocket science, but I've not tried it.

    I understand that the WAP200G is supposed to work with POE, but I'm uncertain of the commercial hardware details. A friend tells me that there are Cisco switches with POE built in and that these will successfully power WAP200Gs.

    What's a PC20?

    Harold
  • shr00m-dewshr00m-dew Posts: 394
    I actually meant PC2, dual outlet power controller. Expensive relays that say AMX in a box. ;)

    Kevin D.
  • HedbergHedberg Posts: 671
    Kevin

    I just looked up the specs for the WAP200G, and it is _supposed_ to operate off 5vdc. The POE kit we were trying is the Linksys 5V POE kit which has a 48vdc power supply. This kit has two parts -- the 'Injector' and the 'splitter'. My understanding is that the 'Injector' splits out the 4 unused wires in the 8 wire UTP cable and puts 48v on those wires (in pairs). The splitter, as I understand it, passes the 4 IP wires and splits out the 48v and regulates it down to 5vdc on two wires. These two wires are connected to the power supply inputs of the WAP.

    I haven't actually checked to see if the 5v output is a consistent 5v, but we had two of these things running with the same result -- no buono por caca. My assumption at the time was that the WAP200Gs just were not happy with 5v and, as they say, time is money, so we moved on.

    I'd be interested if anyone has had success with either the Linksys 5vdc POE kit or another brand of a similar thing. As it stands right now, I'd have trouble convincing the guy who writes my checks to spend a lot of time fiddling with it.

    But, if I could do POE, I wouldn't need the Axlink controllable power box. You could just run one leg of the 48v through a relay on the master.

    Harold
  • DHawthorneDHawthorne Posts: 4,584
    I can't share the enthusiam for the AMX WAP. I've had a rash of issues with them, including one that was bad and kept needing to be reset (sound familiar?). I have switched to Netgear. They have better range, by far, and will also accept POE. But look into the possibility you have a bad WAP, and the firmware is up to date. As I recall, early revisions had an overheat problem.
  • HedbergHedberg Posts: 671
    Dave, yes it sounds familiar. What model of Netgear WAP are you using and what form of POE?

    Best I can tell, the last firmware release for the WAP200G was on 11/04. I checked the firmware when we installed these, and it was the latest at the time and that was after 11/04, but I will recheck the next time I'm there. It's possible I missed one, and sometimes I see AMX products come in with pretty far outdated firmware.

    In your experience, do the Netgear units ever "lock up" or require a reboot? I'm currently in the process of replacing a Netgear wired router/4port switch that is occasionally locking up the router function. The switch function continues to operate (it has two WAP200Gs and an NI4000 on the switch) but it stops serving DHCP and the router itself becomes invisible from both the WAN and LAN side. All the AMX gear is using fixed IPs out of the DHCP range, the DHCP is only for use by PCs that connect on the LAN side either through one of the WAPs or through the UTP port. The purpose of the router, by the way, is to keep the Netlinx gear isolated from their intranet but to still allow G4 computer control of the Modero TPs (which works fine from both sides of the router -- when the router is working, that is). This is the only Netgear device that I've used on a job. I've left quite a few DLINK routers and Linksys switches around town and have never had any failure with any of those so I'm a little dissapointed with the Netgear router.

    Thanks for your thoughts on these questions. I know from looking at the old threads that you've had difficulty with the AMX WAPs and success with the Netgear. The Netgear WAPs are probably not that expensive and if they'll work on 5v POE (like the AMX should), it would be well worth a couple bucks to check one out.
  • DHawthorneDHawthorne Posts: 4,584
    I've been using the WG102. It supports POE, but I haven't had an application where I needed it yet; the jury is still out on what I would use ... I have a job coming up that will need it, so I have to decidde soon. Another product I've just tried out, which works amazingly well, is the Netgear powerline extender. Plug one box in at ther router, and another in wherever you need network - the receivers come in a hardwired version, or WAP versions. It's a great solution for when you can't get new wires in.

    I too have run into the problem of needing to reboot switches because the DHCP server suddenly stopped talking to devices. I have only had that problem, however, with external routers. Most of the time, my customers already have their own routers, so I am only supplying switches to expand the network to my equipment. Generally, the router is built into the cable or DSL modem. I always blamed it on the DHCP server :). However, if you are having issues with the Netgear routers, then that deserves a second look. Perhaps the issue is in the switches after all. By the way, I have almost eliminated this particular problem by installing UPS's on my switches. It would seem to be related to the short brownout condition you get during a power loss. Breaking the power clean is no problem, but dips and momentary dropouts that don't result in a cold boot are.
  • HedbergHedberg Posts: 671
    WAPs and POE

    DHawthorne wrote
    I've been using the WG102. It supports POE, but I haven't had an application where I needed it yet; the jury is still out on what I would use ...

    I've done a little more investigating over the net and I've talked to AMX tech support, and it seems that I was confused about how POE works with IEEE 802.3af compliant sources and loads. It's simpler (for the user) than I thought. Maybe everybody else already knows this.

    Devices (including the AMX WAP200G and the Netgear WG102) that are designed to get POE in compliance with IEEE 802.3af, accept 48vdc through the ethernet (CAT5) port on the device. An IEEE 802.3af compliant power source (injector or switch) is necessary to put the 48vdc on the CAT5 but no power splitter is necessary on the other end -- that was my mistake. The purpose of the splitter is to satisfy the load end requirements of the spec, to strip the 48vdc off the CAT5, and to provide a DC voltage to be sent to the power connector of non-compliant devices. A discussion that I found helpful is at:<http://www.altair.org/labnotes_POE.html&gt;

    It looks like there are a number of vendors (including Linksys) who make these "injectors." For situations requiring a bunch of POE powered devices, an ethernet switch, such as the AMX ENET24 with POE would work. For just a couple devices, I think the individual injectors (like the Linksys WAPPOE kit, one of which I still have) -- that's probably the way to go.

    I'm not sure what the issue is with the Netgear Router/4port switch, but in my case it's not the switch functionality that is cratering -- it's the NAT router and DHCP server. It's already plugged into a UPS, so I don't think it's a power thing.

    My experience with the Linksys simple 5 port and 8 port switches has been real good -- I've not seen any problem with them at all. I know that Netgear and DLink make comparable "dumb" switches and I'd expect them to be pretty reliable as well. My guess is that you're probably right to blame the router/cable modem/DSL modem when these things happen.

    Thanks for your thoughts, by the way. It's very helpful to me to hear what sort of problems and solutions others have.
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