012-Title Featured

WN Podcast 012 – WiFi Design for Enterprise

 

Welcome to our new WiFi Ninjas Podcast episode!

In this episode Mac and Matt discuss at a high level how they design WiFi for the enterprise as they look to share their personal experience and tips with you.

Capture requirements:

  • High Density / data (to be covered in more details in future episode)
  • Voice (see episode 11 with Andy)
  • RTLS (to be covered in more details in future episode)
    • Zone analytics
    • Location tracking or wayfinding
      • Trilateration
      • Hyperlocation
      • BLE / vBLE
      • Asset tracking / tags
      • Apps or no apps

Capture success criteria:

  • Capacity
    • Apps in use
    • Head count
    • Devices in use
    • Device count
  • Physical
    • SNR
    • RSSI
    • Overlapping

Make basics right:

  • Do a proper survey (see episode 3 – predictive survey)
  • Go to the site
    • Measure walls and ceilings attenuation
    • Understand mounting limitations
    • Check RF
    • Check DFS
  • APs count, model, antenna and placement for different use case
    • Omni vs directional
    • Aesthetic considerations
      • Visible or not
      • Flat antenna under the ceiling and AP in plenum?
      • Colour
    • Architectural considerations
      • Listed buildings
      • Custom requirements – lifts, landlord owned staircases, steel beams etc.
    • High density / basic data
      • Focus on capacity and coverage
    • Voice
      • Focus on roaming
    • RTLS
      • Focus on location accuracy
  • Physical APs mounting considerations
    • Obstructions
      • Reflectors
      • Absorbers
      • Scaterers (is that a word?)
    • Consider wavelength if mounting really close to the obstructions, especially if they’re highly reflective
      • AP at least 1 wavelength away
      • 2.4GHz wavelength: 12.5cm
      • 5GHz wavelength: 6cm
    • Consider close field interference
    • Consider overlaid wireless (not only WiFi) networks
    • Consider other interferers

Vendor / partner choice:

  • Staff skills
  • Managed services?
  • Fit for purpose
    • Is on-prem or cloud a preference?
    • Consider the complexity of the solution vs benefits

Architecture:  (to be covered in more details in future episode)

  • All the above will dictate architecture choices
  • Management
  • Data switching
  • Authentication

Keith Parson AP Power Level Chart:

Thanks for listening and please don’t hesitate to leave a comment, feedback, subscribe or follow us on social media.

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This WiFi Ninjas Podcast archive consists of all the podcasts we have ever recorded!