WPA/WPA2-based authentication does not work when the Zone director is offline.
Clients are unable to connect to the wireless when the zone director is offline.
This is expected behavior.
In “ZD-managed mode”, APs need a centralized controller to provision the configurations. All configurations are stored in the controller. This mode requires all APs to run the LWAPP protocol to negotiate with the controller. There is a shortcoming of this kind of design that is, when APs are disconnected from the centralized controller, APs will not provide service until they reconnect to the centralized controller again.
The solution/workaround here is to enable one or multiple WLAN's with the Autonomous mode.
No advanced features of the Zone Director like 802.1x / Captive portal / MAC authentication / DPSK can be used as these features are powered by the controller.
