Hi

I have a new project and i need some guidance in which direction to go:

My setup will be something like this:

I have a main router and i have the entire building cabled. I will have 5 AP all connected to the main router with cables.

I need a way so i can cover the entire building, but when a wireless user will go from a certain part of the building to another place not to loose connectivity, to be transparently switched to another AP.

I saw some WDS docs, but from what i know that works over wireless, but in my case the AP are connected to my router via Cat5e cables. Will it work having the same ssid on all the routers and the same shared key? Or i need a more advanced solution? The network settings will be assigned via DHCP (private ip addresses) and all will be src-nated on the main router.


Thank you.

I don't know much about wireless and roaming, but just configuring the same SSID and PSKs is not going to be seamless. 802.11 is designed to drop association with the old AP before associating with a new AP, this significantly simplifies the protocols as otherwise you'd have to run something like spanning tree to ensure that you're not introducing loops into the network (if the client is connected to two APs at the same time, he's potentially bridging traffic between them creating a loop).

So then what can i do then? Since WDS is only suitable over wireless, and i would have to double the wireless network card for wds otherwise the traffic would be really low...

On a cisco wireless i tried it and i used same SSID and key + non overlapping channels and it worked like a charm.

I've done something similar in several buildings here. Essentially by ip bridging the ports that the ap's are connected to on the main router and then binding each ap to the hotspot worked for me.

Hope this helps

Darci

If you're happy with how it worked on Cisco APs without WDS you'll be happy how it works with Mikrotik APs without WDS. Just saying that it isn't seamless.

I've done something similar in several buildings here. Essentially by ip bridging the ports that the ap's are connected to on the main router and then binding each ap to the hotspot worked for me.

Hope this helps

Darci

Can you please elaborate a little on the solution?

So u have the main router and you set up and ip (the gateway) on the bridge on which you you add all ether ports from the ap?

Binding each ap to the hotspo??? -don't understand this

And what about the wireless for the channels overlapping? u use nonoverlapping channels? or WDS?

Please give me some more info thank you.

Sure - Sorry for the delay in response.

Each of my AP's are RB411a's with a r52 wireless card, and the lan and the wlan are bridged together. Assign it a particular ip in your choice of range....I like 10.5.50.x. Make sure that your WLAN is in AP/Bridge mode.

My main router is a rb493.....each of the AP's are directly connected to it. Create a hotspot on a bridge port consisting of all of the ports that the AP's are connecting to. In the hotspot settings, make sure that each of your AP's are bound in the IP Binding tab, and VOILA Works great for me.

I have 6 buildings here that each have configurations this way. I work for a small college with an enrollment of 2500-ish students, and I hear great feedback on the service. If there is anything that I can help with, feel free to msg me. I know that I was equally confused with I first started

Darci

Hi, mikrotikgrrl could you please send me sample config of your main router and one of the APs? I need to create the same setup you are using, but Iam kinda lost in your instructions in the last post:/

Thanks a lot for the reply

Are the AP also in a WDS ? or you use non overlapping channels? Or how you manage not to interfere one with another?

Basically you do the following:

On your access points:
Create a bridge
Add your wireless interface, and the LAN interface to this bridge

Do this for any other access points you have.

On your main MikroTik:
Create a bridge
Add the ethernet ports that your access points are plugged into to this bridge
Create your hotspot on this bridge

I don't think you should be using WDS unless you are wirelessly bridging APs. And even then running a VPLS/MPLS tunnel might work better.

And i don't configure any ip addresses on the AP bridge interfaces?

I add a different ip address for management only right?

But will i configure the same ssid on every AP?

What about when they move from 1 ap coverage to the next 1? won't that create a layer 2 loop or something ?

Hi all,

From my point of view and testing the best setup is the below as im using in in a university housing witch contain around 4000 users .

Main Router setup is hotspot on wlan , Wlan mode AP-Bridge with WDS, all the AP's are configured as repeaters (WDS Slave) mode is WDS-slave also you may make a bridge port on wlan1 and ether1 if you are planing to use the wds-salve Router to any other networked devices.

SSID is the same for all , now in some areas the signal is week you will notices that the clients will be disconnected other than that thy can roam smoothly only the windows (XP) will tell them that signal is very low then signal is very good every time thy jump from AP to another AP

Sure - Sorry for the delay in response.

Each of my AP's are RB411a's with a r52 wireless card, and the lan and the wlan are bridged together. Assign it a particular ip in your choice of range....I like 10.5.50.x. Make sure that your WLAN is in AP/Bridge mode.

My main router is a rb493.....each of the AP's are directly connected to it. Create a hotspot on a bridge port consisting of all of the ports that the AP's are connecting to. In the hotspot settings, make sure that each of your AP's are bound in the IP Binding tab, and VOILA Works great for me.

I have 6 buildings here that each have configurations this way. I work for a small college with an enrollment of 2500-ish students, and I hear great feedback on the service. If there is anything that I can help with, feel free to msg me. I know that I was equally confused with I first started

Darci

Hello, you wrote that you have a working configuration of WiFi roaming services. You can to see it?

I need to make the network at the institute and any experience is very important.

It's work but, on Bridge interface must be turn on RSTP protocol!

It might work better (*maybe* more 'seamless-ish) with EoIP tunnelling.

Try it with a couple of APs linking back to another mikrotik as the 'server'