High interference situation

freddy7
Here to help

High interference situation

I have Meraki MR42's installed at a 3 storey appartment. There are 8 appartments per floor, with 4 on one side and 4 on the opposite side. I have MR 42 AP's in 18 of the appartments (wall mounted) - and 6 appartments without. The AP's are in the same room numbers on each floor. example: 101, 201 and 301. I have a 200MB/s (symetrical) internet connection which comes in to a MX86 firewall and from there to a switch where all the APs connect to. Right now there are on average approx 216 clients connected at any one time, and can be a variation of smartphones, smartTV's, watches, macs, ipads, laptops, etc. Right now we have one SSID for each 2 appatrtments, for example, a SSID called 307/306 and users in those condos are given the password for that SSID so they can only connect to that SSID. On average there is approx 10 to 16 clients per SSID. We are trying this as an option as there is so much interference - with many dropped Zoom/TEAMs calls, Yotube videos, netflix etc. We have set a client per AP of 25MB/s (SSID is left at unlimited). Overall the experience is poor for all. I know there is documentation on recommendations for high density environments but is there something available for high interference environments? I also have the auto power (with a set range) and Auto channel. I  am also using band steering.

 

If I run a speedtest from an client connected to an AP I see approx 135MB's download and 75MB/s upload.

If I look at the WAN bandwidth I have never seen it hit any higher than 100MB's - half of the 200MB's.

 

Should I be looking at setting up group polices on MX?

Should I change something such as a separate SSID for 2.4GHz and another for 5Ghz for all APs

Shoud I be using traffic shaping?

Should I be setting up speed on the MX appliance or on each SSID/AP?

Should I be upping our internet connection speed? And if so to what?

 

I have a Meraki vendor in looking at the issue, but I thought I would post here as well, in case others have run in to this situation and can share their insight. The vendor ran an assessment and this is how we determined the interferance.

 

I apologize for the length of this post, I wanted to provide as much information as possible.

I know I will get back many suggestions. that is fine. I am just trying to figure out what the solution would be to make this situation better. Thank you

14 REPLIES 14
cmr
Kind of a big deal
Kind of a big deal

@freddy7 do you advertise all SSIDs on all APs, or do you only advertise each SSID on the APs nearest that apartment?

 

Having more than 3 SSIDs advertised from a single AP's radio (either 2.4GHz or 5GHz) reduces performance by taking up time to advertise each SSID.

ww
Kind of a big deal
Kind of a big deal

Also disable meshing  if you have them wired.

Dont use 80mhz channels

And check if the mx is not near 100% load

BlakeRichardson
Kind of a big deal
Kind of a big deal

Traffic shaping yes you should be using this if end users are reporting video call issues. 

I'm sure you've already done this, but make sure that you disable lower speeds on the radios so clients don't connect at slow speeds and pull the whole network speed down. Minimum bitrate should be at least 12Mbps, and if you've good coverage this could even be pushed up to 24Mbps.

Right now we have the minimu bitrate set to 11 MB. I will try upping it and see what this does.

I'll look in to this further. Where should this be set MX or MR? Does on over ride the other?

freddy7
Here to help

Meshing is disabled. We also do not use the 80Mhz channels. Where would I check for the MX not near 100% load? Are you referring to network usge - see screen shot below..

 

freddy7_0-1616371934785.png

 

There is also this graph of the Live Data which I had not seen before: I see 200MB/s here (which I have not noticed before.

 

freddy7_0-1616373098156.png

 

Bruce
Kind of a big deal

Go to Organization -> Summary Report, and then select the appropriate appliance network to see the Device Utilisation over time, it will also give you a view of the usage too.

I looked at the summary report and this is what I saw:

 

freddy7_0-1616418376366.png

 

and device utilization shows as:

 

freddy7_1-1616418429106.png

I also had our internet service provider dig in to details on their end and it shows a much different take on this issue.

 

freddy7_2-1616418582269.png

 

From what I can see (this is my take on it), there are two possible situations:

 

1. The MX is somehow not allowing the full 200 MB

2. we have to move to a higher speed internet connection. possibly 400MB

 

Thoughts?

 

Thanks 

We only advertise the SSID to the appartments nearest.

PhilipDAth
Kind of a big deal
Kind of a big deal

I would create a single SSID, and a VLAN per apartment.  Then use group policy assigned to the resident's devices to force them into the correct VLAN.  This will make roaming around the facility much better.

 

Splash Access make a solution like this but with a portal that allows end-users to use a portal and self-provisioning their devices (so you don't have to).

https://www.splashaccess.com/portfolio/mdusolution/ 

for clarification: one SSID for the whole building and individual VLANs for each apartment?

cmr
Kind of a big deal
Kind of a big deal

For clarity, you are hitting maximum line speed (200Mb/s) where marked in red.  This will cause buffering / slowness / reduced media quality etc. for clients:

cmr_0-1616421659606.png

So your second choice is likely the best option if affordable.

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