Wireless network signal optimization method during WLAN system implementation

In project practice, we have spent a lot of money and material resources to build wireless campuses, wireless cities, wireless parks, wireless medical projects, etc., but most of the experiences have more or less poor signals, slow network speeds, inability to authenticate, or either unable to connect or unable to open web pages for a long time after connecting, or frequent disconnection, etc. These phenomena make the user experience very poor, resulting in user dissatisfaction and even complaints. So what is wrong with the wireless WLAN network? What is the culprit for these phenomena?

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Generally speaking, there are several factors: design and deployment issues, channel resource issues, limited user capacity of AP, equipment, power supply, transmission issues, etc.

1. Design and deployment issues

• Weak coverage areas or coverage blind areas are ignored during wireless WLAN design;

• Errors in ground surveys, obstacles that block wireless signals are not correctly recorded and processed;

• Design deviation: failure to select appropriate coverage solutions or antennas for appropriate scenarios;

• The characteristics of user terminals and the actual needs of customer applications were not considered during the design of wireless WLAN;

• The impact of the wireless WLAN device's own network co-frequency and adjacent frequency interference on the signal;

• Other wireless WLAN network signal interference issues;

2. Channel resource issues

• There are too many low-speed messages on the wireless network;

• Old 802.11b user terminals slow down the entire network;

• Too many wireless network management and broadcast messages;

• Some users use Xunlei and BT for high-speed downloads, which consumes excessive resources;

• The wireless network capacity is insufficient and too many users access it, which intensifies conflicts and collisions, causing users' network speed to slow down;

3. Limited user capacity of wireless AP

• The user distribution is uneven, some APs are saturated, and performance degrades;

• When the number of users carried by an AP reaches the upper limit, new users cannot access;

4. Equipment, power supply, and transmission issues

• AP lost, AP restarted, unstable operation;

• PoE power supply module failure;

• Layer 2 and 3 transmission failures between the AP and AC;

However, due to the different actual user scenarios, each scenario usually has corresponding wireless signal coverage characteristics and common problems. Usually, according to the deployment of wireless WLAN networks, the actual user scenarios can be divided into the following 7 categories: university scenarios, hospital scenarios, conference rooms or exhibition centers, hotels, leisure and vacation places, transportation hubs, and internal areas of enterprises. The specific wireless WLAN coverage scenario characteristics and common problems are as follows:

Wireless WLAN network optimization

Optimization steps

1. Network testing

Use dedicated testing software to conduct on-site field tests on key aspects of wireless WLAN (such as AP signal strength, signal-to-noise ratio, network delay and packet loss, network throughput, association success rate, WEB authentication delay, roaming stability, same-frequency AP, channel occupancy, etc.)

2. Problem Analysis

According to the results of the wireless WLAN network test, analyze the causes of various problems and keep records. For example, in more than 95% of the locations in the design target coverage area, the WLAN coverage receiving signal strength is less than -65dBm. It is found that there are obstacles blocking the site, causing excessive signal loss. Therefore, the signal coverage strength cannot be achieved.

3. Optimization plan

According to the cause of the signal problem analyzed in step 2, adjust the installation location of the device, the transmission power or replace the antenna, etc., so as to ensure that the signal coverage strength of the wireless WLAN reaches the required standard value.

4. Network optimization verification

After human optimization, we use dedicated testing software to verify on-site at the user site to ultimately ensure that the wireless WLAN meets various performance indicators after optimization.

Commonly used wireless WLAN optimization methods: