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Good Day All,

I have an odd (to me anyway) problem that I would like to run past you all to see if there is something that you would be able to suggest to resolve the issue.

We are a provider of Wireless Broadband services. Our access points are mounted outside, in the elements, and serve on avaerage no more than 10 customers per AP. Very typical setup - one 19db unidirectional antenna (vertical pol) on an atheros wireless driver.

We have a problem from time to time through the course of a day/night that someone will get kicked off the AP and not be able to reassociate. The bridge that they use will show no wlan light. They will not be able to reassociate to the AP. The oddity in this situation is that there will be 9 other users connected and running without a problem. I am able to reproduce the issue - but not resolve it. The hardware manufacturer has shrugged it shoulders and are "looking into it".

I have gone out to the scene of the problem with network stumbler to find some of the channels that are in use by private WLAN devices and moved out AP to a different channel that is unused in the area. I have taken a spectrum analyzer out to the area and looked for noise. I cannot seem to find anything. When I do find something I move the channel around that as well.

Anyone encounter this in thier experiances? Any suggestions?

-John

John:

Just some general problem resolution type questions on this one:

* Is it the same people this is happening to?

* Is the anything in common with the hardware/software of the people that it is happening to? Same client device? Driver version? Chipset in the client device?

* Is this happening at random times?

Lastly, have you used a sniffer to see what traffic is being generated when they try to reassociate and fail?

Is it the same people this is happening to?

Seems to be the same access points but yet not the sma clients that experiaince the problem. One customer will have the problem and the other 3 that have the problem will be fine - but then other times - they are all complaining. This is what stumps me.

Is the anything in common with the hardware/software of the people that it is happening to?

Oh yeah! LOL! We give out a senao bridge. Nothing too fancy. It will happen with Linksys and Netgear we just found out, though it does not seem as much. We have an open case with senao right now - having them look into that. For the senao devices: There are no drivers, they just hook in an ethernet cable. For the others I am not too sure.

Is this happening at random times?

Completely! Sometimes when the wireless conjection is higher.


Lastly, have you used a sniffer to see what traffic is being generated when they try to reassociate and fail?

Yes, but we cannot seem to find anything other than association/dissassociation messages that are normal.