Users Guide

635 | Secure Enterprise Mesh Dell Networking W-Series ArubaOS 6.4.x| User Guide
Mesh Deployment Planning
Following considerations are recommended when planning and deploying a mesh solution:
Pre-Deployment Considerations
l Stage the APs before deployment. Identify the location of the APs, configure them for mesh, provision them,
and verify connectivity before physically deploying the mesh APs in a live network.
l Ensure the controller has Layer-2/3 network connectivity to the network segment where you plan to install
the mesh portal.
l Keep the AP packaging materials and reuse them to send the APs to the installation location.
l Verify the layout of the physical location to determine the appropriate configuration and placement of the
APs. Use this information to avoid problems that would necessitate a physical recovery.
l Label the AP before sending it to the physical location for installation.
Outdoor-Specific Deployment Considerations
l Provision the AP with the latitude and longitude coordinates of the installation location. This allows you to
more easily identify the AP for inventory and troubleshooting purposes.
l Identify a “radio line of sight” between the antennas for optimum performance. The radio line of sight
involves the area along a link through which the bulk of the radio signal power travels.
l Identify the minimum antenna height required to ensure a reliable mesh link.
l Scan your proposed site to avoid radio interference caused by other radio transmissions using the same or
an adjacent frequency.
l Consider extreme weather conditions known to affect your location, including: temperature, wind velocity,
lightning, rain, snow, and ice.
l Allow for seasonal variations, such as growth of foliage.
For more detailed outdoor deployment information, refer to the installation guide that came with your
outdoor AP.
Configuration Considerations
l On dual-radio APs, you can configure only one of the radio for mesh. If you want a dual-radio AP to carry
mesh backhaul traffic and client services traffic on separate radios, it is recommended to use 802.11a
radios for mesh-backhaul traffic and 802.11g radios for traditional WLAN access.
l If you configure more than one mesh node in the same VLAN, prevent network loops by enabling STP on
the Layer-2 switch used to connect the mesh nodes.
l Mesh nodes learn a maximum of 1,024 source MAC addresses; this cannot be changed.
l Place all APs for a specific mesh cluster in the same AP group.
l Create and keep separate mesh cluster profiles for specific mesh clusters. Do not overwrite or delete the
cluster profiles.
l Enable bridging on mesh point Ethernet ports when deploying LAN bridging solutions.
l APs configured as mesh points support secure jack operation on enet0. APs with multiple Ethernet ports
configured as mesh portals support secure jack operation on enet1. If an AP with multiple Ethernet ports is
configured as a mesh point, it supports secure jack operation on enet1 and enet0.
l Mesh networks forward tagged/untagged VLAN traffic, but do not tag traffic. The allowed VLANS are
controlled by the wired ap profile.
l Mesh APs provisioned on different controllers can interoperate if those APs are configured with the same
country code, cluster name and cluster key.However, the mesh recovery profile created on one controller is