Three Access Points for delivering different frequency and bandwidth in order to maintain performance

0

In the spirit of this question, I'd like to dig deeper into using multiple with the same for performance reasons.

As I understand it, if I have two devices on the same WAP, and one device can only communicate using 802.11g, then all devices are slowed to G speeds while that device is connected.

If this is true, is the following possible in order to maintain performance for all devices.

I'd like to set up THREE WAP's each with the exact same SSID, Encryption, and Passphrase. Each of the three WAP's would would differ as follows.

My question is, if I do this, will my N devices ALWAYS connect to N capable WAP's first (and prefer 5Ghz) if they're available? What about signal strength, does it come into play (ie: if the G WAP has a stronger signal, will an N device prefer it over an N WAP even though performance would be reduced)?

Chase Florell

Posted 2013-01-11T23:08:14.357

Reputation: 518

Answers

0

AFAIK the speed of the networking is Point-to-Point. Being so, the communication speed is measured between the AP and the client, and not adjusted for all the clients connected to the AP.

And going deeper in your question, if you overlap the APs, they will generate interference among them and get the clients confused about which one is to be connected to.

You don't need to overlap, sit more than one AP in the same or almost the same spot. But you may use the APs to keep the Clients/AP Ration of ~10/1 and keep your throughput higher.

fboaventura

Posted 2013-01-11T23:08:14.357

Reputation: 163

a single WAP can only communicate on single channel at a time. If an old iPhone3 connects to a WAP using 802.11g, then that WAP will be "locked" to 802.11g for as long as that device is connected. This is why 3 WAP's would be ideal. The iPhone3 can connect to the G router while the 4 can connect to the N (2.5Ghz) router, and the Macbook Pro can connect to the N (5Ghz) router. – Chase Florell – 2013-01-12T02:17:41.727

Indeed, you are right! The WAP will get capped at the slower connection. So you have, as I've been reading after your comment, two options: 1) get yourself a true dual-band WAP or 2) have two WAPs, one operating at 2.4GHz and other exclusively at 5GHz. I believe they won't get interference from one another, since they are operation on different frequency, but I can't tell for sure about the clients. The N will prefer the 5GHz WAP, but will work on both. The G client won't be able to connect to 5GHz WAP. Got something from here: link

– fboaventura – 2013-01-12T05:12:40.017

Asked: 2013-01-11T23:08:14.357

Viewed: 612 times

Active: 2013-01-12T01:44:00.350