topic Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing in Community and Online Support Services

Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

erik_farey — Tue, 11 Nov 2014 17:09:23 GMT

I have a ZF7372 running 9.8.1.0.101 and trying to find out how to enable band-balancing via its CLI. I am not running the AP with a ZD as it is a stand alone device. I see the CLI for band-balancing but am not sure how to enable or configure it. I have both the 2.4 & 5Ghz radios running the same SSID's and security settings. Below are you readouts when I look at the band-balancing settings.

Can someone tell me how the commands work and/or the correct settings to move dual band clients over to the 5Ghz radio.

rkscli: get band-balancing
Band Balancing:
Under Mesh AP : Off

rkscli: get band-balancing wlan0
Band Balancing:
wlan0: Disable
Rssi Threshold limit: wlan0, 20
Band Bal limit: wifi0, 0
MinStaThreshold limit: AP, 10
Under Mesh AP : Off

rkscli: get band-balancing wlan8
Band Balancing:
wlan8: Disable
Rssi Threshold limit: wlan8, 20
Band Bal limit: wifi1, 0
MinStaThreshold limit: AP, 10
Under Mesh AP : Off

rkscli: set band-balancing
parameter error
Usage: set band-balancing {options}
-- {|all}
-- mesh-ap {enable|disable}

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 01:31:08 GMT

Ruckus doesn't actively promote customer use of AP CLI commands. This might be one reason. An unofficial internal 9.8 AP CLI guide says the commands to balance dual-band clients between AP radios is "band-steering", but as you and I find when we are on an AP, there is no get/set "band-steering", only "band-balancing" options.

On ZD managed APs, band-balancing is enabled by default. On standalone APs,
I cannot determine how to enable it on non-mesh APs. A 'set band-balancing all
15' command takes, and applies the RSSI value, but still shows the feature as
being "Disable". Your single standalone AP may rely on the client driver to make
the band/radio decision. Some Apple devices will prefer 5G in fact.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

erik_farey — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 14:33:55 GMT

That is a little dis-heartening as this is a feature that is very helpful. Obviously this is something that is configurable as the CLI commands are there. Ruckus even changed the CLI recently from "band-steering" to "band-balancing" proving that someone is looking at this feature.

Is this just a product of something not working as designed or something that isn't intended to be in the CLI?

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 22:12:02 GMT

On one hand, our capabilities in standalone mode APs today, with multiple internal
VLANs and DHCP, bridge or routing local or NAT, giving even more flexibility for
use at home than any popular wireless router, makes great leaps, allowing Ruckus
advanced antenna APs to replace the Media and MetroFlex product line APs.

But when we look at trying to extend ZoneDirector centered design features down
to a standalone mode AP, there might be differences in standalone *alone* code.
This may be why we don't promote AP CLI usage. 9.8 ZD WLANs have both client
load balancing and band steering enabled by default.

I've found the standalone AP command to both enable band-balancing, set with a
default RSSI value of 20 for initial evaluation, is applied with the 'mesh-ap' option
included (and only), except standalone APs can't do mesh...

I think some AP CLI commands might be for tuning ZD managed APs and/but
don't go away if running in standalone mode. I am investigating this band steering
or balancing configuration on standalone APs issue, and will report back.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

dmitry_ivanko — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 15:51:59 GMT

What about the investigation? Will band steering/balancing work on a stand alone AP? When will this feature work?

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Tue, 16 Dec 2014 00:46:20 GMT

Thanks for your patience. Still waiting for the final word from engineering, but here
is some data. Band-Steering is an intelligent way to direct 5G capable clients to
the 5G radio due to its higher capacity. This is done by analyzing client probes, and
clients tend to probe both band radios on an AP, allowing recognition of dual-band
clients. Monitoring tables of client MACs, bands detected and average RSSI, APs
may withhold probe responses or authentication responses to encourage/steer those
clients to the 5G band.

Band-balancing is an intelligent distribution method to try and balance the number
of clients on each band radio. The default minimum station threshold is 10 clients.

You can determine if Band-Steering is enabled and configure the radios to perform
band steering with get/set withholding-limit wifiX commands. On a factory
defaulted 7372 running 9.8.2.0.15, band-steering appears to be enabled with a
7 response parameter, determined by our DEs as best for Mac OSX, Windows 8,
IOS, Android Playstore and Windows RT tablets. ie.

rkscli: get withholding-limit wifi0
wifi0: Withholding limit (auth response): 7
OK
rkscli: get withholding-limit wifi1
wifi1: Withholding limit (auth response): 7
OK
rkscli:

The above results imply that band-steering is enabled on both radios by default.

However, I'm still trying to get Engineering to explain if Band-Balancing is on too,
since the AP CLI "get" command, shows wlan0:Disable in the output.

rkscli: get band-balancing wlan0
Band Balancing:
wlan0: Disable
Rssi Threshold limit: wlan0, 20
Band Bal limit: wifi0, 0
MinStaThreshold limit: AP, 10
Under Mesh AP : On
OK
rkscli:

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Tue, 16 Dec 2014 22:05:45 GMT

I have received confirmation from the developers, that not all band-steering and
band-balancing commands are present/working in 9.8 Standalone AP CLI.
They are all being added/fixed in 9.9.x.

BB is enabled by default in ZD mode. Need the same in SA mode.
RSSI Thresh default value is 20 in both modes. No change needed.
BB Percent default values are 25:75 in ZD mode. Need the same in SA mode.

We do have a fairly comprehensive description of both features with default values
in the KBA database: https://support.ruckuswireless.com/an...

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

erik_farey — Tue, 23 Dec 2014 04:41:06 GMT

I appreciate your help on this. I am more interested in the actual Band-Steering over the Band-Balancing. I am in a noisy 2.4GHz environment and want to steer as many devices to the 5GHz range. About 90% of my devices are dual band.

Can you clarify what my commands would be to steer as many device to 5GHz once it is implemented in 9.9?

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

primoz_marinsek — Tue, 23 Dec 2014 20:30:30 GMT

Two things you need to understand here:

1. the decision is always on the client side
2. If the AP is too aggressive on the balancing it might cause the client to not connect to any AP radio at all. So the balancing mechanism NEEDS to be very gentle and clients must be persuaded to the other band not kicked to it.

Yet another thing we saw at a recent stress test was that clients now tend to prefer the 5GHz over 2.4 so you might not be seeing this problem for long anyway.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

primoz_marinsek — Tue, 23 Dec 2014 20:53:23 GMT

Another thing you might do is to lower the transmit power of the 2.4G radio. Maybe try -6dB. It will make the cell smaller but the speeds should remain the same. If they drop considerably try using -3dB.

Yet another thing you plan your cells for different RSSI values. Try -67dBm for 5G and -72dBm for the 2.4 band but these values are application specific also.

There are other things to try and consider also but this is what I usually start with.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

john_d — Wed, 24 Dec 2014 15:32:08 GMT

I've had similar experiences as Primoz with modern clients. Before I thought I had roaming/2.4 stickiness issues, when in reality I had poor 5GHz coverage. Now that I have enough AP's to provide a strong 5GHz signal on my premises, I've found that even with no smart-roam and load/band-balancing at play, my clients generally prefer 5GHz.

Currently on my network I have 25 5GHz clients and 4 2.4GHz clients. Of those, 3 only support 2.4GHz. And this includes several Macs and iOS devices that roam around.

I find that especially with smart phones, their 5GHZ reception (And wifi reception in general) is not as good as a laptop/desktop. So while an area might seem sufficiently covered on 5GHz when testing with a laptop, it might be a different story with a mobile device.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

bram_ueffing_69 — Mon, 29 Dec 2014 19:56:55 GMT

Glad they're being fixed/added in standalone mode. Band balancing/steering is one of the reasons I selected Ruckus. Is there an ETA for 9.9?

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Tue, 30 Dec 2014 22:42:28 GMT

Discussion ongoing, announcement soon, thanks.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Tue, 06 Jan 2015 01:25:32 GMT

Officially, ZoneFlex AP firmware 9.9 will be labeled a 100.0.0.0.128 designation, and will be compatible with ZD, FlexMaster, or Standalone mode. Initial testing of band-steering/band-balancing shows the developers have fixed the problems reported in ZF 9.8. Keep an eye on the AP firmware Downloads page, and on this Forum listing, for the official notice when the new firmware is posted. Thanks.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

bram_ueffing_69 — Tue, 06 Jan 2015 12:31:31 GMT

Sounds good, thanks for keeping us in the loop. Much appreciated.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

blake_bernhard — Tue, 06 Jan 2015 21:21:48 GMT

will this firmware be released for EOL products? e.g. 7962

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

michael_brado — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 18:41:50 GMT

I'm afraid 9.8 is last release for 7962.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

blake_bernhard — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 20:16:09 GMT

Ok thanks for that I have found that FW above 9.7.0 have several issues preventing my ability to use 40MHZ or for my AP to authenticate my connection.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

primoz_marinsek — Fri, 09 Jan 2015 12:10:08 GMT

Thanks for the star, but I made a mistake here. It should be the other way around; it's -67dBm for the 2,4gig and -72dBm for the 5gig, since the noise floor of the 5gig band is a lower and the obstacle penetration is somewhat worse.

Re: Stand alone AP (ZF7372) and band-balancing

erik_farey — Thu, 15 Jan 2015 14:54:19 GMT

I see that there is a 100.0.0.0.127 release out. Is this the latest firmware for the AP? If so does this have the fix for the band steering?