topic RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better? in ExtremeWireless (Identifi)

Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Sai_Prasad_Rao_ — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 23:36:00 GMT

Clients are getting stuck to the access point which they connect for the first time, they are not moving to other ap while roaming. I have enabled bandsteering for all those ap's. Is that causing the issue.... Just removed bandsteering and configured client load balancing will that help ?

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Ronald_Dvorak — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 23:44:00 GMT

No, that feature has nothing to do with roaming.

If the client is sticky then there is nothing you'd do about it beside buying a new/better client.

That is not a problem of the WLAN infrastructure - the producer of the client WLAN adapter didn't put much effort in the driver of the adapter to allow seamless roaming between the APs.

-Ron

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Doug — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 23:46:00 GMT

Hello,

Band Steering tries to move users from the more congested 2.4GHz frequency to the less congested 5GHz frequency.

Load Balance will move clients around between access points in the load group to try and get a better distribution of clients per ap. All access points in the group should be located in the same general area like a large conference room, not network wide.

Load Balancing may help but if you have "sticky" clients you may want to look at using the probe suppression feature that was added to the 9.21 track of code. https://gtacknowledge.extremenetworks.com/articles/Solution/Issues-with-clients-staying-with-an-Acce...

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Sai_Prasad_Rao_ — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 23:46:00 GMT

HI

Ap's are connected in floors, like 3 ap's in each floor (total 21 - in 7 floors), i have rolled back all these 21 which were in load group (client balancing) to Bansteering. IS THIS FINE ! and also enabled probe suppression.

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Doug — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 23:46:00 GMT

What are your probe suppression settings? Do you see any differences?

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Simon_Vosper — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 17:34:00 GMT

The decision to roam is one taken by the client device alone and different device vendors have different roaming algorithms. The only thing we can really do to make clients be less "sticky" is to disable the lower data rates. Set the minimum data rate quite high, 24Mbps for example. Once the client gets to a point where it needs to drop below 24Mbps it will being the roaming sequence.

Please beware. Increasing the minimum data will cause your wireless cells to effectively shrink, so please make sure you verify your coverage after changing the minimum data rate setting. Also a minimum data rate of 24Mbps will mean that DSSS (802.11b only) clients will not be able to connect.

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Sai_Prasad_Rao_ — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 17:34:00 GMT

HI i already have minimum rate set as shown below with probe suppression enabled. I was told that the signal is good outside the room, and very less inside the room when door is closed .does that mean i need to reduce the minimum rates, if yes what would the stable rates be....

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Raffi — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 19:42:00 GMT

I'd probably want to check the signal myself in the room and see how it is with the door closed. If it is much lower then the clients inside the room with the door closed may want to gear down to a lower rate. Easiest would be to test with a few clients in the room with the door open / closed. If they have certain devices they are looking to work everywhere, like a certain model of vowlan handset then it is easier, just test with those devices. All devices work slightly differently with respect to roaming, since they each have their own roaming algorithm. Some devices ( like most pcs for example ) have a roaming aggressiveness type setting if you go into the driver properties for the wireless nic. My 6205 for example has 5 settings from low to high for roaming. I currently have it set to medium-high so the client roams more to the best ap. Lowest would have it be sticky. I know you can set these types of roaming thresholds in some wireless phones as well, like Ascoms.

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Sai_Prasad_Rao_ — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 19:42:00 GMT

ok, but here's the final thing which i want to clear from my side, all mobiles are working perfectly both outside and inside the room , its the laptops which are not getting connected, sometime laptop doesnt even show SSID.....any idea

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Ronald_Dvorak — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 20:00:00 GMT

You'd need to look into the "Receiver Sensitivity" - so in example for the AP3805 on page#6 you'd need a min. signal of -85dBm for 24Mbps from the client to the AP.
http://learn.extremenetworks.com/rs/extreme/images/AP3805-DS.pdf

Every client works that way but unfortunately only few WLAN adapter vendors publish this values.
Could be that one client need -80dBm for 24Mbps and another one only -85dBm.

So you'd need to meassure the signal in the roam to see what min. basic rate would be feasible in your installation - that is normaly part of an site survey.
Might be that the door has such a high absorption that a stable WLAN connection isn't working in the room so you'd need to place one directly in the room to get a good coverage.

-Ron

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

FES — Mon, 11 Apr 2016 22:08:00 GMT

Hi,
i have seen that you have Long Guard Interval... Actually in my network that i have with 7000 clients I dont have 802.11b clients... yo may only configure Radio 2 with g/n.
By the other side, actually is posible that you have probles with probe suppresion.
https://gtacknowledge.extremenetworks.com/articles/Solution/Access-points-getting-into-a-locked-stat...
I dont see 9.21.08 version... Is it published now?

In avanced settings of Radio 2 you have STBC, LDBC, ABBDDA support that the help says that is recommended to be enabled. Consider see the help in each window to enable or disable your specific options.

I have more options configured different than yours, but depends of each network.

Apologize for my english

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Doug — Mon, 11 Apr 2016 22:08:00 GMT

Hello Francisco,

The 9.21.08 release should be posted on our Extranet for download no later than tomorrow afternoon.

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Doug — Mon, 11 Apr 2016 22:08:00 GMT

9.21.08 has been released.

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Ronald_Dvorak — Mon, 11 Apr 2016 22:08:00 GMT

Thanks Doug,

any idea what the difference is to the non -1 APs.

wns0014251
Added support for AP3825i-1 and AP3825e-1 models

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Doug — Mon, 11 Apr 2016 22:08:00 GMT

usually different compliance tables (ie max tx power for a particular channel)

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Saiprasad_Rao_R — Tue, 12 Apr 2016 10:38:00 GMT

What's new in this latest release. Any issues / bugs resolved.....is it stable?.....

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Ronald_Dvorak — Tue, 12 Apr 2016 11:09:00 GMT

It's a minor release = fixing bugs.

You'd find the release notes which include the resolved issues as soon as they are released right here...
http://www.extremenetworks.com/support/release-notes

"stable" - I think they would only release a software if it was stable in the lab.

Does that mean it doesn't include a software bug - NO - there is no software without problems.

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

FES — Tue, 12 Apr 2016 22:04:00 GMT

Hi,
in addition to the post, to work properly with load balancing the aps should be near one to other. Also the messages to do the roaming between aps are send using multicast. Then you must enable multicast in the aps vlan in order to work properly with load balancing. Somebody can confirm this?
If you have 802.11x, have you tried to enabled at the Privacy tab in wlan service, Key Management Options, with Oportunistic & Pre-Auth option? I have read that this improve the roaming and reauthentication.
Also you have Fast Transition option (802.11r) that improves de roaming at devices that support the standard.

Otherwise I have had problems with band select with iphone devices... In my lab finally I clear this option and I dont have enabled this option in production. I can see clients that sometimes are in 2,4 and sometimes in 5.

We have testing all this options to improve the performance of the network. All the ideas are welcome.

sorry for my english

RE: Load balancing or Band Steering which is better?

Doug — Tue, 12 Apr 2016 23:12:00 GMT

Take a look at .... https://gtacknowledge.extremenetworks.com/articles/How_To/How-to-set-up-a-Client-Balancing-AP-load-g...