On Mon, 15 Oct 2007 10:53:02 -0400, WirelessMD
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>My building is about 70 years old and made of block and concrete. Like
>a hospital or a school.
>
>We have two hallways that run parrallel and are about 100 feet long,
>and are about 40 ft apart with a corridor that connects them to for
>basically an H.
>
>I have 4 Cisco Aironet 1100s and 4 Cisco Aironet 1200s.
>
>I am looking to spread them out evenly down each hallway to provide
>good coverage for each office.
>
>What I am wondering is:
>1. Is that overkill?
Yes. You can do it with two wireless access points. Locate one
access point at where the hallways hit the connecting corridor. Hang
them from the ceiling. Cisco has ceiling mounting kits that hang on
the frames used for acoustic tile. Use either omnidirectional 5dBi
antennas, or two 8dBi directional antennas with a power splitter. Aim
each 8dBi antenna down the longer hallways. There should be enough
side lobes to deal with the connecting corridor.
The problem is that this will only covers the hallways, and not the
connecting rooms. If you plan to have access inside the rooms away
from the hallways, you'll probably need one access point per room, if
the walls are block, concrete, and steel rebar. Illuminating just the
hallways isn't going to work very well. At best, you might get some
coverage if you leave the doors open.
>2. What channels should each go on?
There are only 3 non-overlaping channels (1, 6, and 11). I've had
some luck using 4 channels (1, 5, 8, 11). If you need to use more
than 4 access points, you will have some channel overlap or
duplication. Try to put the access points with duplicated channels as
far away from each other as possible.
>3. What power level should they be set to?
The same or a bit more than what the clients are using. You want a
symmetrical system, where clients and access points both have roughly
the same range. That works out to about 50-100mw for the access
point.
>4. How far apart should they be?
As far as possible? I can't answer that without knowing more about
the coverage area, and the exact building construction. My experience
with concrete block buildings is fairly dismal. I usually illuminate
those from the outside, entering through the typical large windows.
One access point outside, with a carefully designed antenna system
that only "illuminates" the side the building (not the entire
neighborhood), works quite well if the windows are penetrateable.
(Watch out for aluminized mylar tinting). However, when I try to
illuminate the rooms, from a right angle, through a hallway, it never
quite works right.
--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
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#
http://802.11junk.com (E-Mail Removed)
#
http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS
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