SSID - use one common vs area specifc ID's

As I was in our local library and discovered some kind of anomoly with their setup, which is discussed in another thread...

I was thinking about options to setup the SSID for the WiFi in the library. They currently have what appears to be several 3com WAPs that each has a "public" and a WEP enabled "secure" side. Each has it's own SSID and appear to have their own MACs.

Anyway - thoughts on having all 4 WAPs use the same SSID - XYZ ? vs specific to an area XYZ1, XYZ2, or XYZ-1st, XYZ-2nd, XYZ-meeting, XYZ-youth, etc

Since there is no real "roaming" or mobile devices, I could go either way. My problem with the common SSID, is that when a problem happens, I don't know which access point (from my laptop view) is having a problem or issue, and I can't tell if the 1st floor is weird and I'm trying to connect to the weaker 2nd floor or what...

Reply to
ps56k
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Well.. I have my house completetly blanketed in 802.11a for my WLAN, which required a number of AP's.

When I originally put it all together, I played with repeater and WDS modes, but couldn't settle on either because they cut your pipe and are nasty (collisions) in the air. My intended traffic wasn't just internet, but heavy LAN traffic.

Repeater mode is just that. Every AP in repeater mode repeats everything. So, even though you are only connected to one AP, all the other AP's in repeater mode are also throwing your traffic (garbage in, garbage out) into the air. If all I wanted to do was pass internet traffic, doing the repeater thing would have been "good enough" though. Its simple, but ugly and nasty.

WDS mode is more intelligent, as it is distributed, but it too cuts your pipe severely because the radios have to transmit/receive to each other in addition to the connected clients.

What I ended up doing was connecting a wireless-ethernet bridge (client) to each AP. Basically, you are adding another radio so the AP's radio only has to take care of connected client(s). Keeps the pipe completetly intact. It did add quite a bit of extra cost, but was well worth it.

All my 802.11a AP's (with their bridges) have the same SSID, but are well seperated on different frequencies. They are basically "stand alone" AP's, which happen to have the same SSID.

As for the connected clients, they will automatically transfer to whatever AP is stronger (nearly) seamlessly. I.e., if I carry a laptop from one floor to another, it will transfer from one AP to another. Most of the time, it is seamless. When it isn't seamless, there is only like one second with no connectivity. Even then, it doesn't have to redo DHCP.

I use (almost) all DLink hardware, so I can't comment on whether Linksys or the others behave the same way.

As for knowing what AP I'm on, DLink's client software easily displays that. All AP's are listed by name, strength, channel, MAC, encryption type, etc... Its gives much more info that Window's WZC (or whatever its called)...

Reply to
bc20

To put it even more simple, basically I am doing the exact same thing as running four ethernet cables from a router to four AP's -- then giving all four AP's the same SSID, WPA key, but putting them on different channels. The ethernet-wireless bridges are simply just cable replacements...

Reply to
bc20

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