Can't Stream 1080p Video Using Single R500 Unleashed AP

[chiper_chips]

Hi All,

Looking for some advice on real world performance from a single Ruckus R500 Unleashed AP.

Attempting to stream 1080p video from a physically cabled Mac mini (running plex) to a Roku Wireless Streaming stick. Have also tried streaming to a Raspberry PI 3, MS Surface Pro 3 and iPhone 6s.

The video stream requires at max 20Mbps of continuous bandwidth. Monitoring shows the stream averages around 6-10Mbps.

The property is a residential two story town house and the AP is located upstairs mounted vertically on the wall (not upside down).

The Roku streaming stick is plugged into a 55" Samsung TV wall mounted downstairs.

As the devices are downstairs I am running them on the 2.4Ghz band. I tested wifi performance using the SpeedFlex app on both my iPhone and Surface Pro 3 and both achieve 160Mbps.

Note unlike other installations I have done which typically hit their max speed and then stay their continuously for the length of the test. This r500 jumps wildly from around 130Mbps to 220Mbps and lands on an average of 160Mbps. It can't seem to hold a continuous speed. Is this indicative of interfereance?

Things we have tried
- turn 5ghz radio off
- 2.4ghz radio channel/channelisation set to auto
- 2.4ghz radio channel set to 1 (least saturated)
- 2.4ghz radio channelisation set to 20
- 2.4ghz radio channelisation set to 40
- 5ghz radio turned on
- tested stream to iPhone upstairs on 5ghz
- SpeedFlex test to iPhone upstairs on 5ghz (160Mbps)

We mostly focus on warehouse wireless deployments so don't have much experience with video but this is the home of our biggest clients CEO :(

Been pulling my hair out for a couple of weeks trying to work out why the wifi can't support a single 20Mbps stream when it can achieve 160Mbps?

I'm also a little surprised that even on the 5ghz band with 80 channelisation and channel 132 the max speed both my iPhone and Surface Pro 3 can achieve when 2m from the AP and clear line of site is 160Mbps? Never used R500 before but I know the r600 can easily achieve 760Mbps to my iPhone using the SpeedFlex app... It is 3x3 though so possibly that's why?

Would appreciate any advice.

Thanks,
Don

[andrea_mijares]

Hello Don, 

Have you tried using a solo or standalone firmware? I'm asking you this because I haven't had really good experiences with the unleashed firmware and I considered it really slow compared to aruba. So I don't know if maybe this issue could be cause because of the firmware.

[jeremiah_ostros]

I know this is an old post, but many are still running R500's (like myself) and I can DEFINITELY say that I get much better and more stable performance using the Standalong AP firmware (I believe it's a 100.******* version.  But I used the Unleashed firmware on my SINGLE R500 for a few weeks and found the connection was pretty wonky, I appeared to be losing connections in the middle of file transfers, SSH sessions, remote support sessions (TeamViewer, AnyDesk) and most of those issues have subsided since I reset the AP and flashed the Standalone AP firmware.

[michael_brado]

Take measurements, and compare against the latest Solo R500 firmware, version 110.0.0.0.2005, found here:

https://support.ruckuswireless.com/software/2431-zoneflex-solo-access-point-110-0-0-0-2005-ga-softwa...