Let the fun begin.

[go.fast]

Let the fun begin.

Ok I got my boards today and I'm lost in this new interface.
Or maybe better, where is all the stuff hiding?

Please explain to me how to make atheros0 be the client and all the rest be ap's handing out 192.168.xx. private ips to their subs.

atheros0 is connected to my ap and it's ip addy should be 192.168.17.251

Thanks
George

[lonnie]

First off -- and I guess we had better say again -- there are no client goodies hiding here. This unit is software feature complete for running backhaul. And that is simply accomplished with AP and Client and an IP with basic routing or bridging.

It does not have DHCP client or server. There is no firewall. There is no bandwidth and there is no authentication. These things will come now that we have the solid base system.

Changing from AP to Client requires a reboot and also you have to assign an IP. make sure you leabe the first Ethernet IP alone until you are sure you have a system that you are comfortable with changing.

Did everyone figure out that the AP config program is on the download page? After you have played around and are comfortable with the new interface then perform an update to the firmware. Make sure the unit is fully usable before you do that, meaning make sure it boots clean and that you have not gone and made some other changes.

I will try and do up a quick start guide and post it to the downlaod and to the Forums.

[go.fast]

I have a few questions for you.

Cloaking: What does cloaking do?

Clock Ticks, distance: Is there a formula to convert clock ticks to miles?

Super A/G: I noticed my speed was 3x with Super A/G selected, how much extra channel space does Super A/G use verses non Super A/G ?

eXtended Range: What is the ramifications of using XR, does it slow it down, etc?

I have other questions, but I'd like to get these answered first.

Thanks
George

[mp3turbo]

I will try to bring my 0.02$ :

normal mode (without turbo = super a/g) should use 20MHz, in reality it is 25MHz.
turbo mode should use 50MHz, in reality it is much closer to 60MHz.


We are speaking of -3dB borders from reference = core frequency. The signal alone is wider than 100MHz... but very weak. Yes, super a/g is ____VERY____ sensitive to interference.

[tony]

Normal mode = 20Mhz spacing
Turbo mode = 40Mhz spacing

SuperA/G does not require any additional bandwidth.

Cloaking options are used to reduce the channel spacing to produce more usable channels, at a cost of throughput.

Cloaking 2x = 10Mhz bandwidth, and channel spacing at 1/2 the speed.
Cloaking 4x = 5Mhz bandwidth and channel spacing, at 1/4 the speed.

Using either 2x or 4x modes will also hide your AP from all other systems, and will not show up in any scan lists, etc. The distance will also be 2x and 4x that of standard modes, respectively. We will be updating the interface to support entering the distance in km and miles in the near future. Clock tick value of 8192 is the maximum distance allowed, provided by the mode and cloaking option selected.

SuperA/G should be no more sensitive to interference than normal modes.

XR, which is supported by Windows clients, should not have much of an overall performance impact to the AP.

[go.fast]

Normal mode = 20Mhz spacing
Turbo mode = 40Mhz spacing

SuperA/G does not require any additional bandwidth.



So then Super A/G is still 20MHz wide?

I noticed that my speeds from war to war were 3x with Super A/G than without.


Is there a milage limitation or easier to interfere with Super A/G ?
George

[tony]

SuperA/G is still 20Mhz (or 40 if turbo). These use Atheros-specific tricks, such as aggregation, bursting, compression, etc. There are no additional mileage limitations with these features enabled.

[tony]

Additionally, using SuperA/G will not cause your link to be more prone to interference, nor will it cause any additional interference to other links.

[mp3turbo]

oops, my apologies. Tony is correct, I've messed up super a/g and turbo. Super a/g means enhanced capabilities of chipset like compression, bursting etc, turbo is bonding two channels. Yes, Super A/G doesn't make any difference to interference (probably is influenced little bit more by interference, when you have compression and that stuff and your packets are going to be disrupted by competitior, it can't make you any good).

I had pictures from spectrum analyzer somewhere, but I can't find them right now of course.

[lonnie]

When you look at the spectrum analyzer with cloaking at X4 you will see these really nice narrow 5 MHz wide shapes. It really opens up the spectrum. It makes the 20 MHz modes seem very messy and wasteful.

[go.fast]

We will be updating the interface to support entering the distance in km and miles in the near future. Clock tick value of 8192 is the maximum distance allowed, provided by the mode and cloaking option selected.

Miles and km will be good.
But I want to go up to my main tower and replace a 2 port wrap board with this new 4 port war board I just got.

How do I adjust the milage, so that I don't have tweeky problems afterwards?

The furthest customer from my current wrap is less than 8 miles and is using 5.3 range.

I want to do the tower swap out tommorrow.

Thanks
George

[tony]

You should have no problems using the default distance setting until we have the distance calculator included in the utility. Tuning the distance option should only increase performance over the maximum setting given higher than normal interference and/or low signals.

Thanks!

[go.fast]

Additionally, using SuperA/G will not cause your link to be more prone to interference, nor will it cause any additional interference to other links.

Ok, if I select Super A/G for my existing wrap swap out to a war board, will there be any benefit even though none of the associated wrap boards have Super A/G ?

Or will there be an issue?

I would like to slowly replace some wraps with war's but not all at the same time.
But would like the benefit of Super A/G during .

I think I saw a 3x increase in speed with Super A/G

George

[tony]

SuperA/G being enabled will not hinder any associations that do not support it, as it is negotiated at association time. (for example, you can have 802.11g with SuperA/G AP, and still support 802.11b legacy clients)

WRAP boards w/StarOS all support SuperA/G, though the performance benefit is not substantial due to the performance cap on those boards.

If the AP has SuperA/G enabled, clients that do not support it will not see any change in performance.

[dastring]

I have a question about cloaking and interference...

Here is a scenario:

Say I am using a 20MHz channel... say 5800 to 5820... and I achive 20 Mb/sec on that link assuming that there is no interference.

Then, let's say a great deal of interference presents itself in the area of 5785 to 5805.

My question is:

Will this interference (that is affecting 1/4 (5MHz) of the band I am using) completely kill my link or just slow it down?

AND

Would I be better off changing my link to use a 10MHz channel (from 5810 to 5820, for example).

I hope this makes sense!

Thanks for your input...

dastring

[lonnie]

As usual the answer here is a definite maybe.

First off, the channels are centered on the frequency assignment and are 10 MHz above and below that frequency for the standard 20 MHz mode.

In your example, the use of 5785 should not have much effect. It will slow you a bit when that link makes full use of the channel, but it is not likely to take you out.

You can verify this by placing two systems on the same channel. Normally there is not even an indication that you have a total overlap. When one system makes full time use of the channel, then the other system will see a degradation. With light use they can actually co-exist quite nicely.