RE: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's
It is not just Apple. Many vendors, Dell, Linksys, DLink, etc... are starting to merge content and delivery devices with a whole host of wireless enabled media equipment. Here are just two links: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=uscs=19l=ensku=A1735461 http://www.dlink.com/products/category.asp?cid=127sec=0 In the end, it is probably just going to get worst making it increasingly difficult for University's to deliver quality of service for the masses. Combine this problem with the constant struggle of housing and resident life departments to be competitive with off-campus housing puts us IT people in the middle of the struggle with the end result being a no win scenario where we are perceived as the all-controlling villain. Especially, when you throw issues related to security, CALEA, RIAA, etc... If anyone out there has a solution to this dilemma, I'd love to hear it. Unfortunately, all I can see is situation that will tend to grow like a wild forest fire with our garden hose of educating the populous as an attempt to keep things under control. Ideas? Thanks, Michael Martin University of Montevallo -Original Message- From: The EDUCAUSE Wireless Issues Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jeffrey Sessler Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2008 12:22 PM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's You can thank Apple for part of it... at least at our campus. We have 100% coverage but I'm seeing a lot of those Apple Time Capsules pop up. Either individual users want to backup their computer or a suite is sharing one. Rachna Ahlawat [EMAIL PROTECTED] 9/9/2008 12:14 AM Even with 100% coverage, what do think are the reasons that students are still connecting rogues? Are these rogues using .11n? From: The EDUCAUSE Wireless Issues Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Peter P Morrissey Sent: Saturday, August 23, 2008 5:11 PM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's Has anyone had any success dealing with Rogue AP's? Is anyone else seeing a lot of them this year? We have 100% coverage in the dorms, and advertise this. We also constantly tell people not to put up rogues, but it is very challenging to control the rogues in our dorms. Pete Morrissey Syracuse University ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
RE: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's
Most of the D-Link things you linked to are just wireless client devices, which in terms of pulling down lots of media, aren't all that different from PCs doing Hulu, iTunes, Netflix, Amazon streaming, etc. As digital distribution increases in popularity, which it absolutely will, guaranteeing a sufficient level of service for our campuses is a challenge, but is mostly a matter of speeds and feeds like it has always been. I just see it as bigger internet pipes, 11n for wireless, multi-Gigabit backbones, traffic management for preventing bandwidth hogs and everything else that comes with it. I agree it is a challenge, but not one that can't be dealt with. It takes some planning and an understanding and supportive administration for sure. Matt Barber Network Analyst / PC Support Morrisville State College 315-684-6053 From: The EDUCAUSE Wireless Issues Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Jr., D. Michael Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 9:14 AM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's It is not just Apple. Many vendors, Dell, Linksys, DLink, etc... are starting to merge content and delivery devices with a whole host of wireless enabled media equipment. Here are just two links: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=uscs=19l=ensk u=A1735461 http://www.dlink.com/products/category.asp?cid=127sec=0 In the end, it is probably just going to get worst making it increasingly difficult for University's to deliver quality of service for the masses. Combine this problem with the constant struggle of housing and resident life departments to be competitive with off-campus housing puts us IT people in the middle of the struggle with the end result being a no win scenario where we are perceived as the all-controlling villain. Especially, when you throw issues related to security, CALEA, RIAA, etc... If anyone out there has a solution to this dilemma, I'd love to hear it. Unfortunately, all I can see is situation that will tend to grow like a wild forest fire with our garden hose of educating the populous as an attempt to keep things under control. Ideas? Thanks, Michael Martin University of Montevallo -Original Message- From: The EDUCAUSE Wireless Issues Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jeffrey Sessler Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2008 12:22 PM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's You can thank Apple for part of it... at least at our campus. We have 100% coverage but I'm seeing a lot of those Apple Time Capsules pop up. Either individual users want to backup their computer or a suite is sharing one. Rachna Ahlawat [EMAIL PROTECTED] 9/9/2008 12:14 AM Even with 100% coverage, what do think are the reasons that students are still connecting rogues? Are these rogues using .11n? From: The EDUCAUSE Wireless Issues Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Peter P Morrissey Sent: Saturday, August 23, 2008 5:11 PM To: WIRELESS-LAN@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU Subject: [WIRELESS-LAN] Roque AP's Has anyone had any success dealing with Rogue AP's? Is anyone else seeing a lot of them this year? We have 100% coverage in the dorms, and advertise this. We also constantly tell people not to put up rogues, but it is very challenging to control the rogues in our dorms. Pete Morrissey Syracuse University ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
FYI: Cisco controllers may put radios on UNII-2e channels
FYI. This documents something that we have stumbled over with UNII-2e channels and is a heads up for anyone running Cisco LWAPP gear and using the auto channel selection component of RRM (Dynamic Channel Assignment (DCA) in Cisco-speak). The Cisco WLC release notes for v4.1.185.0 have an important caveat (CSCsi86794) that describes the behavior of DCA and the UNII-2 Extended channels (UNII-2e).(1) For some reason this caveat is missing in 4.2.130.0 release notes, while the DCA issue still appears to be present in that code. (Based on the text in the 4.1.185.0 release notes the UNII-2e support appears to have first shown up in 4.1.171.0.) Briefly, Cisco has added support for the UNII-2e channels to the wireless lan controller and LWAPP APs, and these channels are automatically enabled for use by DCA. As a result of the new support, AP radios may be automatically assigned by DCA to one of the UNII-2e channels. We found several radios in our system where that had happened. Unfortunately, none of the 802.11a clients that we have tested know about the UNII-2e channels, and therefore most (all?) 802.11a clients cannot associate with AP radios that have been assigned to the UNII-2e channels. An AP radio on one of those channels is no longer available to dot11a clients and your wireless coverage will have holes in it even though the AP is up and system monitors are happy. If the client NIC has an 802.11an radio then it may have support for the UNII-2e channels. You would need to test against an AP radio set to one of the UNII-2e channels to find out, since the vendor docs that we have looked at don't tend to have any documentation about the presence or absence of UNII-2e support. To avoid this issue, Cisco's release notes tell you to disable the UNII-2e channels in DCA. However, the release notes incorrectly tell you to also disable channel 149, which is NOT one of the UNII-2e channels. Instead, it is one of the older channels that is supported by all 802.11a NICs that we've tested. If you want to avoid issues with AP radios being set to UNII-2e channels that are invisible to clients then you can do that by disabling all DCA channels in the UNII-2e range of 100-140. Note that when you disable these channels using either the CLI or the Web GUI the AP radios must be disabled and then re-enabled to make that change. We would be interested in hearing about the experience at other sites with UNII-2e channels, especially the results of any tests of UNII-2e support in clients. Thanks, -Charles Charles E. Spurgeon / UTnet UT Austin ITS / Networking [EMAIL PROTECTED] / 512.475.9265 (1) The UNII-2e channels appear to be relatively recent additions. This Cisco doc mentions them in the context of DFS support requirements: http://tinyurl.com/yq7y9r ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] FYI: Cisco controllers may put radios on UNII-2e channels
Charles, We discovered this a couple of months ago during our initial setup/rollout of the Cisco product. I believe there is a US2 setting in the DCA templates (at least in 5.1) that exclude the UNII-2e channels. In out testing, the latest Apple iMac's with integrated BCM43xx do support UNII-2e, but nothing else that we've tested including the popular Intel 4965AGN or Atheros chipsets (think MacBook Pro) do. I've been told by our Cisco SE that the latest Intel 5100 and 5300 also support UNII-2e. Given our diverse client base, I think UNII-2e is basically off-limits to us for the next 3-4 years. By 2011-2012, must of our client-base should have turned over, and hopefully most will be supporting UNII-2e. Jeff Charles Spurgeon [EMAIL PROTECTED] 9/10/2008 7:41 AM FYI. This documents something that we have stumbled over with UNII-2e channels and is a heads up for anyone running Cisco LWAPP gear and using the auto channel selection component of RRM (Dynamic Channel Assignment (DCA) in Cisco-speak). The Cisco WLC release notes for v4.1.185.0 have an important caveat (CSCsi86794) that describes the behavior of DCA and the UNII-2 Extended channels (UNII-2e).(1) For some reason this caveat is missing in 4.2.130.0 release notes, while the DCA issue still appears to be present in that code. (Based on the text in the 4.1.185.0 release notes the UNII-2e support appears to have first shown up in 4.1.171.0.) Briefly, Cisco has added support for the UNII-2e channels to the wireless lan controller and LWAPP APs, and these channels are automatically enabled for use by DCA. As a result of the new support, AP radios may be automatically assigned by DCA to one of the UNII-2e channels. We found several radios in our system where that had happened. Unfortunately, none of the 802.11a clients that we have tested know about the UNII-2e channels, and therefore most (all?) 802.11a clients cannot associate with AP radios that have been assigned to the UNII-2e channels. An AP radio on one of those channels is no longer available to dot11a clients and your wireless coverage will have holes in it even though the AP is up and system monitors are happy. If the client NIC has an 802.11an radio then it may have support for the UNII-2e channels. You would need to test against an AP radio set to one of the UNII-2e channels to find out, since the vendor docs that we have looked at don't tend to have any documentation about the presence or absence of UNII-2e support. To avoid this issue, Cisco's release notes tell you to disable the UNII-2e channels in DCA. However, the release notes incorrectly tell you to also disable channel 149, which is NOT one of the UNII-2e channels. Instead, it is one of the older channels that is supported by all 802.11a NICs that we've tested. If you want to avoid issues with AP radios being set to UNII-2e channels that are invisible to clients then you can do that by disabling all DCA channels in the UNII-2e range of 100-140. Note that when you disable these channels using either the CLI or the Web GUI the AP radios must be disabled and then re-enabled to make that change. We would be interested in hearing about the experience at other sites with UNII-2e channels, especially the results of any tests of UNII-2e support in clients. Thanks, -Charles Charles E. Spurgeon / UTnet UT Austin ITS / Networking [EMAIL PROTECTED] / 512.475.9265 (1) The UNII-2e channels appear to be relatively recent additions. This Cisco doc mentions them in the context of DFS support requirements: http://tinyurl.com/yq7y9r ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
Re: [WIRELESS-LAN] FYI: Cisco controllers may put radios on UNII-2e channels
Charles, I'd be interested to know which client/drivers you've already tested this with. Maybe others have some as well to add to a list of either working or not. Thanks, -- Don Wright Brown University CIS - NTG On 9/10/08 10:41 AM, Charles Spurgeon [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: FYI. This documents something that we have stumbled over with UNII-2e channels and is a heads up for anyone running Cisco LWAPP gear and using the auto channel selection component of RRM (Dynamic Channel Assignment (DCA) in Cisco-speak). The Cisco WLC release notes for v4.1.185.0 have an important caveat (CSCsi86794) that describes the behavior of DCA and the UNII-2 Extended channels (UNII-2e).(1) For some reason this caveat is missing in 4.2.130.0 release notes, while the DCA issue still appears to be present in that code. (Based on the text in the 4.1.185.0 release notes the UNII-2e support appears to have first shown up in 4.1.171.0.) Briefly, Cisco has added support for the UNII-2e channels to the wireless lan controller and LWAPP APs, and these channels are automatically enabled for use by DCA. As a result of the new support, AP radios may be automatically assigned by DCA to one of the UNII-2e channels. We found several radios in our system where that had happened. Unfortunately, none of the 802.11a clients that we have tested know about the UNII-2e channels, and therefore most (all?) 802.11a clients cannot associate with AP radios that have been assigned to the UNII-2e channels. An AP radio on one of those channels is no longer available to dot11a clients and your wireless coverage will have holes in it even though the AP is up and system monitors are happy. If the client NIC has an 802.11an radio then it may have support for the UNII-2e channels. You would need to test against an AP radio set to one of the UNII-2e channels to find out, since the vendor docs that we have looked at don't tend to have any documentation about the presence or absence of UNII-2e support. To avoid this issue, Cisco's release notes tell you to disable the UNII-2e channels in DCA. However, the release notes incorrectly tell you to also disable channel 149, which is NOT one of the UNII-2e channels. Instead, it is one of the older channels that is supported by all 802.11a NICs that we've tested. If you want to avoid issues with AP radios being set to UNII-2e channels that are invisible to clients then you can do that by disabling all DCA channels in the UNII-2e range of 100-140. Note that when you disable these channels using either the CLI or the Web GUI the AP radios must be disabled and then re-enabled to make that change. We would be interested in hearing about the experience at other sites with UNII-2e channels, especially the results of any tests of UNII-2e support in clients. Thanks, -Charles Charles E. Spurgeon / UTnet UT Austin ITS / Networking [EMAIL PROTECTED] / 512.475.9265 (1) The UNII-2e channels appear to be relatively recent additions. This Cisco doc mentions them in the context of DFS support requirements: http://tinyurl.com/yq7y9r ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/. ** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
