Channel Management - Cisco WAP371 Administration Manual

Single Point Setup

Channel Management

Channel Management
Cisco Small Business WAP371 Wireless Access Point Administration Guide
• Signal—The strength of the radio frequency (RF) signal the WLAN client receives from
the access point. The measure is known as Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI),
and is a value between 0 and 100.
• Receive Total—The number of total packets received by the WLAN client during the
current session.
• Transmit Total—The number of total packets transmitted to the WLAN client during
this session.
• Error Rate—The percentage of time frames are dropped during transmission on this
access point.
To sort the information shown in the tables by a particular indicator, click the column label you
want to sort by. For example, if you want to see the table rows ordered by signal strength, click
the Signal column label.
The Channel Management page shows the current and planned channel assignments for WAP
devices in a Single Point Setup cluster.
When channel management is enabled, the AP automatically assigns radio channels used by
WAP devices in a Single Point Setup cluster. Automatic channel assignment reduces mutual
interference (or interference with other WAP devices outside of its cluster) and maximizes Wi-
Fi bandwidth to help maintain efficient communication over the wireless network.
The automatic channel assignment feature is disabled by default. The state of channel
management (enabled or disabled) is propagated to the other devices in the Single Point Setup
cluster.
At a specified interval, the channel manager (that is, the device that provided the configuration
to the cluster) maps all clustered WAP devices to different channels and measures interference
levels of the cluster members. If significant channel interference is detected, the channel
manager automatically reassigns some or all of the devices to new channels per an efficiency
algorithm (or automated channel plan). If the channel manager determines that a change is
necessary, then the reassignment information is sent to all members of the cluster. A syslog
message is generated as well indicating the sender device and the new and old channel
assignments.
To configure and view the channel assignments for the Single Point Setup members:
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