Cisco 881W with WAP 1041N

[russellhltn]

Of course the available bandwidth at the meetinghouse from the ISP will be the upper limit.

I'm not sure if it's true now, but back in the B/G days, any client running "B" would knock all clients to "B", so the "G" could never get full bandwidth. I'd suspect there's something similar for B/G/N on the same WAP.

If you've got a smartphone, you might want to look for a app to check for interference. For android, WiFi Analyzer is great, giving you a picture of the noise on each channel. (And it's free/ad supported)

[jdlessley]

My statement was intended to be a statement of the obvious. If an ISP is providing 3 Mbps then don't count on anything more than that. But your carification is correct and may need to be considered also.

[russellhltn]

Boy, that was a botched reply. I should have done a +1 after that quote back before going into the other aspects of "bandwidth".

I agree that in most cases the ISP will be the limiting factor.

[harddrive]

First of all, to put 7 to 9 WAPs into a single building is WAY overkill in my book, unless the building stretches the length of a football field or more. Like others in this thread have said, you should not need anymore than 3 in any building.

I have a building that was built in the mid 1970's and I put a D-LInk WAP in it and in the FM office which is on the other side of the building, I was still able to view streaming media. Now this isn't saying that there aren't "dead" spots and the computer shouldn't be moved much. BTW, the building is concrete block. I have another building that I'm using the "old" Aironet and it covers the building nicely.

Now, I will agree with the original post about how easy it was to get the 881W up and running, once I got the screen to come up. The reason I say this is because the first laptop that I was using, it wasn't working for me. The laptop was running Windows 7 64-bit with IE9 and Firefox 6. The browser would make contact and was attempting to download the splash page and it just wasn't working.

I switched it to a Windows XP with IE7 and once I did that, everything came up fine and I was able to complete the activation process.

Now to get ready to do my next building.

[j.magis3]

I really appreciate all of the comments and input…

I would like to take this time to answer some of the questions and clarify some of the information that I mentioned in my last posting.

We current had Frontier (ISP) install FiOS to the Stake Center which they provide a 25m download and 25m upload last month.

The programs I use to do my evaluation are on my iPad which are WiFi Analyzer and Speedtest X HD. For the PC speedtest I go to the Speakeasy Test website.

The reason why I am more focused on building the wireless network over the wired network is because the trend I am seeing…we are moving fast and furious to a wireless environment. Saying that and talking with the FM manager, it was decided that we would be wasting the Lord’s money by building a wired network which will not be used and on top of that a wireless network as well. We do plan on placing LAN drops for the Stake Clerk, Media Room (to look into using Webcaster to feed Satellite Broadcast to the other buildings to save on cost of bird time), Wards Clerks’ (3), FM Group’s office area, and one in the Chapel.

The reason for my last posting was because after my initial evaluation with the placement of 7 to 9 APs, I thought it is a bit much and wanted to hear other opinions and thoughts. I have been teaching myself how to build wireless networks in a building. I learned how to build them in open areas when I was in the Army…we would place our RAU (cellsites) on the highest points if all possible and as many as possible because we wanted to dominate the airwaves and try our best not to have any dead space. I am thinking that this might not be the right approach in building the Stake’s wireless network…

After reading the posting on this subject…I decided to do another evaluation by laying out the APs again temporary and provide everyone the reading that I took to see if I am off base or not. Currently I am thinking of placing only 6 APs now through out the building….

I am every interested to in hearing everyone’s feedback and opinion…

Joe

Here are the results of my evaluation…

PC to ISP
• Chicago
o 25.59/25.05
o 25.56/25.05
o 25.56/25.05
• DC
o 25.51/22.69
o 25.62/22.91
o 25.59/22.91
PC to SLC
• Chicago
o 33.21/25.05
o 26.82/24.37
o 26.59/25.30
• DC
o 17.97/22.84
o 24.13/23.09
o 13.20/21.94

IP- 881 to SLC (2' dist) @ 90% Signal Strength -45 dBm Ch 11
• Chicago
o 9.97/5.19
o 11.29/5.69
o 11.33/4.23
• DC
o 14.42/6.95
o 12.27/6.35
o 14.14/4.25

IP- 1041 to SLC (2' dist) @ 98% Signal Strength -38 dBm Ch 1
• Chicago
o 9.57/3.41
o 11.10/5.36
o 12.21/4.08
• DC
o 15.2/5.35
o 15.26/5.95
o 15.45/2.04

IP- 1041 to SLC @ 41% Signal Strength -75 dBm Ch 1
• Chicago
o 4.33/1.53
o 9.03/2.06
o 11.68/2.90
• DC
o 8.48/2.09
o 12.42/2.60
o 13.50/2.46

[russellhltn]

Is the PC connected though the Firewall, or is it connected directly? I find the difference between PC and iPad interesting.

[j.magis3]

Is the PC connected though the Firewall, or is it connected directly? I find the difference between PC and iPad interesting.

PC to ISP is connected directly to the ISP by passing the Firewall

PC to SLC is connected though the firewall

Joe

[jdlessley]

I gather from the number WAPs estimted that you want 100% coverage in the building and that the building is quite large.

I made an assessment back in 2008 of a stake building that was home to three wards and came up with needing five Cisco 1200 series WAPs to get 100% coverage. The building was cinderblock and reinforced concrete construction with no overhead or crawl space. All interior walls were cinderblock. We called it the pancaked turtle floorplan. If the building had been built using stick frame and wallboard construction for the interior the number of WAPs could have been reduced to three. But the Church builds meetinghouses to last a long time, to withstand the abuse of people and nature, and to reduce sound transmission between rooms. And that type of construction is a real problem for WiFi.

If your stake center building, j.magis3, is similar in construction materials and size or even larger with the additional rooming added on for FM offices then six WAPs sound like a reasonable number.

[russellhltn]

Our building was made in the 40's out of continuous pour concrete. Solid, thick, concrete. I'm waiting to see how that works out. I hope it's not one WAP per room. I do know that when I step into the chapel, all the WAPs in the nearby apartment buildings disappear.

[harddrive]

Our building was made in the 40's out of continuous pour concrete. Solid, thick, concrete. I'm waiting to see how that works out. I hope it's not one WAP per room. I do know that when I step into the chapel, all the WAPs in the nearby apartment buildings disappear.

That will be interesting Russell to hear what you do. Now, I know that the old Aironet 1200's wireless range is terrible. I have one D-Link wireless access point that covers the entire building built in the mid to late 70's. I have another building almost identical and it is a combination of brick and stick built, and it currently take 3 Aironet 1200's to cover the entire building. In that building I will be replacing those with Aironet 1041n's. Hopefully I will get better coverage.

Russell if you have to put a wireless access point in every room or a "lot" of them, them my HUGE suggestion is to forget the power injectors that come with the WAPS and purchase a large port switch that has POE on every port built into it. You will save a lot of headaches and patch panel and area will be much cleaner. I am going to do that at my one building. I don't like all the power injectors, because of the extra heat/power and wires that are needed.

Also, do you really need to have a 100% coverage in the building. The way that I look at is this, hardwire the Bishop's, Clerk's, Stake Clerks, Stake President offices and the high council room. Also where you plan to do webcasting. Then the other rooms that need wireless, would be the chapel, cultural hall, RS room, Primary, Arronic Priesthood and Young Women. After that the smaller classrooms don't really need it, but it may be nice to have it there. Basically I'm saying hit the big areas where most of the main meeting will take place and then add others when time and perhaps money allow.