How To Design A Network For High Capacity?
When designing a network for high capacity, keeping a few basic things in mind will take you pretty far. Some of those are listed below. At the bottom of the article are a example images on creating a high capacity Wi-Fi network.
- You now will have two basic requirements: Signal coverage, and capacity. Both requirements need to be met.
- You may have additional requirements too, like minimum AP overlap, or minimum data rate
- Carefully calculate how many Wi-Fi client devices (laptops, smartphones, tablets, etc) you have today, and how many you will have 2 years from now
- Estimate which applications are used on each device type. For example, smartphones that are used for Skype calls and Youtube HD videos cause much more – and different type of – traffic than laptops used for e-mails.
- Take the number of client devices and their types into consideration when figuring out the placement and capabilities of the access points
- Careful with the walls: Thick and thin walls, windows, and doors make a difference to the coverage. Very rarely is the coverage pattern of an AP circular in a real-world environment.
- Think 3D! When talking about high capacity, the signal (and intereference) bleed through floors plays an increasingly large role: Staggering the APs in different locations between floors is critical, as is floor-to-floor channel optimization.
- Go with 802.11n (minimum 2 spatial streams, utilize channel bonding on 5GHz)
- As a general rule, force all the devices you can to 5GHz. Leave 2.4GHz to legacy and specialty devices.
- Minimize the cell size of the access points so that enough calls can be served and enough overall data can be transmitted
- If done manually, pay extra attention to channel planning
- Reduce the Tx power on the access points to avoid interference (if dynamic Tx power adjustments are not used)
- After planning the network, perform walk-through site surveys on-site to see how well the real world matches with the plan
- Once the network has been taken to production use, monitor it from the client device perspective, using actual client devices. Tools like Mobile Survey Wi-Fi Android App are great for continuous monitoring from the client-device point-of-view.
Below are a few examples of how it looks like when planning a network for coverage and capacity using a software tool.
The software tool suggests AP locations and configurations after you tell it how much coverage and capacity is needed. It also accounts for walls, and different floors of a building.
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Jussi Kiviniemi
Ekahau
Starting to create a network plan automatically. The tool allows you to insert coverage and capacity requirements. Once you hit "Create Plan", the tool will suggest AP placement & configurations.
Going into details: When planning for capacity, consider the applications run on the devices
End result: Dual-radio 802.11n access points placed and configured automatically on 3 floors. Showing signal strength coverage map. You can (and should) fine-tune the computer-generated plan.
The same end result looking from the capacity point-of-view: The number of devices for the entire building, and for this map shown in the bottom right corner. All is green so all is good. If there were different shades of red on the map, it would have indicated problems with VoIP capacity, too many associations for some APs, or an overall RF capacity overload.
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