Manually setting MR TX power benefits?

MattPainter
Here to help

Manually setting MR TX power benefits?

Deployed a large MR system, out of 500 clients 20 wireless phones have connectivity issues, appears to only be to the pbx. Yet the vendor is stating they have SNR issues, that i need to manually configure TX power on AP's.

 

Just looking for communitys thoughts on manually messing with Tx powers, i assume a site survey would need to be done regularly to adjust settings.

 

 

5 Replies 5
NolanHerring
Kind of a big deal

Technically there should have been a site survey done before the access points were installed, and that would have provided you (or should have if the person doing it was worth their salt), the TX the access points should be operating within.

That being said, what power levels do those phones operate at? Assuming they are lets say 14dBm, then you would want your access points to be running around the same power level to ensure no near/far issues occur.

Phones can be very particular with how you deploy wireless, so if your doing a voice over wireless solution, the wireless design is usually catered to those phones first and foremost.

You'll want to ensure you have fast-roaming (or as close to it as you can get) enabled. How are the phones authenticating? What channels do the phones support, and what channels are you using on the access points?

What power level are the access points settling onto (assuming your using the autoRF feature)?
Nolan Herring | nolanwifi.com
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MattPainter
Here to help

Its a larger 40AP environment varius TX powers throughout the day. MR33 in each room.

 

Phones do not support FT, only pay nice on 2.4 as well. Ascom I 62 is the model.

 

They started dropping connection to the PBX and messaging server.

 

All i know is that the SNR for the client is usually perfect, and ICMP from AP to phone never drops. Also the wireless health is pretty solid, no spectrum concerns. I have tried multiple authentication methods, even open nothing changes.

 

 

 

 

NolanHerring
Kind of a big deal

I'm not familiar with that product.

What do you mean they only play nice on 2.4? If they support 5GHz I would only use that if I were you.

Do they have communication issues even when you don't move, or is it only during roaming from one AP to another?
Nolan Herring | nolanwifi.com
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NolanHerring
Kind of a big deal

This seems to be the configuration manual for that phone:

http://www.voipsklep.pl/i62_cm_92675gb_547_ulotka.pdf

Check to see how you have the phone configured. Is it scanning every channel available (wasting time) or is it only scanning the channels your using? If your using 2.4GHz (which I don't recommend) then only scan 1/6/11. If your using 5GHz only SSID (it's recommended to have a dedicated SSID for the phones, make it 5GHz only, try to avoid using DFS channels).

Make sure your switch ports for the access points are all configured correctly as well, in case there is a vlan issue somewhere.
Nolan Herring | nolanwifi.com
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PhilipDAth
Kind of a big deal
Kind of a big deal

Sometimes making clients roam when an AP is overloaded can cause this.  You can check the event log to see if the APs are asking phones to roam because of load.

 

You can read about client load balancing here:

https://documentation.meraki.com/MR/Other_Topics/Client_Balancing

 

You can disable load balancing in the RF profile:

https://documentation.meraki.com/MR/Radio_Settings/RF_Profiles

 

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