Tech Forum

One of the 6 Cisco AP's in the building is blinking red. Ideas?

Kevin

Blinking red - Ethernet link not operational

Thanks, None of the 40 plus cables are labeled where they terminate at the patch. Replugged them all and power cycled the whole system, still the same. This AP sits in the cultural hall way up high out of reach. Will have to get the FM group to bring in their lift to get up and check the cables there. Everything else seems in line at the switches.

While it's possible that it's the cable from the AP, I'd look for link lights between the power source and the rest of the network. It may be that cable that is broken.

Cisco AP's are powered over the Ethernet Line, somewhere in your building the typical install is to have a cable from the switch to the POE device, then out of the POE device to the AP. that's one way to know specifically which cables are the AP's. When I installed a few I was able to put the POE devices pretty close to where the AP is, if you have attic access you could look around there.

johnshaw wrote:Cisco AP's are powered over the Ethernet Line, somewhere in your building the typical install is to have a cable from the switch to the POE device, then out of the POE device to the AP. that's one way to know specifically which cables are the AP's. When I installed a few I was able to put the POE devices pretty close to where the AP is, if you have attic access you could look around there.

Although, some switches can power APs directly. I have Cisco switches that will light a orange light if the device plugged in is a PoE device.

IIRC, the external power bricks have a link light.

I would unravel the mess to find out what cables are involved in connecting this AP and see if there is a link light on the devices involved. Also, if there is a external PoE, power cycling everything at the firewall and switches may not power cycle the AP. Without figuring out the system. there's a good chance that FM will make a wasted trip to the ceiling. All that I would expect to find up there is a single cable going back to someplace more accessible.

When I power cycle an AP I always do it by unplugging the Ethernet Cable that is delivering the Power, whether that is at the switch (there are cisco and non-cisco switches that will power the AP's over ethernet from the device, but it isn't typical in my experience in meetinghouses) or the POE Brick.

I never cycle my firewall without power cycling the AP's after the firewall is back up. I generally unplug them all at the same time and only plug the AP's back in after the firewall is back up.

What does a bluish/purple light on a CISCO AP mean?

The led codes for the 1040 can be found here: https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/w ... ml#wp37791

Great URL link. Thank you!