Multiple Laptop connections - SLOW!

[smitho1990]

We have about 60 laptops shared throughout the Science department and on a regular basis they are all used between two classrooms which share one wireless access point. I think since all of them are going through the one AP, this is the cause of slowness on policies/scripts on startup and logon.

Has anyone else got a similar setup that actually works at a good speed?

 

Thanks in advance,

Dan Smith.

[Pete10141748]

What Wireless Access Point do you have?

Is it managed or unmanaged?

 

Putting 60 laptops through 1 AP, even a decent managed AP, is going to cause slowness.

I'd suggest 4 WAP's taking around 15 connections each, at minimum, if you want anywhere near a decent wireless connection speed.

[K.C.Leblanc]

We have about 60 laptops shared throughout the Science department and on a regular basis they are all used between two classrooms which share one wireless access point. I think since all of them are going through the one AP, this is the cause of slowness on policies/scripts on startup and logon.

Has anyone else got a similar setup that actually works at a good speed?

 

60 Laptops and one AP. Ouch. If you make that work you're well on the way to be sainted.

 

Generaly the largest number of laptops that'll reliably connect to an AP is about 15. One thing to consider is that although wireless is 56mb/s it's shared between the clients, so your laptops will be getting very little bandwidth. If you add more unmanaged APs you need to read up on the different wireless frequencies and how to prevent them overlapping. If your laptops support it look into wireless 'A' APs. They have less range but work better when placed near each other.

 

Search the forums for 'Managed Wireless', ruckus and aruba. This should give you lots of info about the sort of systems people use to support large numbers of laptops.

[danrhodes]

We have about 60 laptops shared throughout the Science department and on a regular basis they are all used between two classrooms which share one wireless access point. I think since all of them are going through the one AP, this is the cause of slowness on policies/scripts on startup and logon.

Has anyone else got a similar setup that actually works at a good speed?

 

Thanks in advance,

Dan Smith.

 

 

Jees you must be running like a snail there, 60 on one AP is alot even for a well managed wireless network, for a short term, consider buying a second and third AP and split the laptops onto them 20 / 20 / 20 that will ease the issue a little until you can put in place a more robust system.

 

D

[smitho1990]

Is there a method by which a laptop is forced to connect to a particular AP, say by MAC address? End of the day, there's always the possibility they may connect to the same one each time, even after two more are put in place etc, right?

[sted]

Is there a method by which a laptop is forced to connect to a particular AP, say by MAC address? End of the day, there's always the possibility they may connect to the same one each time, even after two more are put in place etc, right?

 

a managed system should spread the load round so even if the closest ap to say 30 laptops as long as they can get a decent signal from another it will move spme laptops to the next best signal etc

 

its also wort mentioning that even supposing each laptop had 54mb to the ap there is still only 1 100mb (usually) connection back to the switch so still a bottleneck 60 pcs sharing a 100mb connection

[danrhodes]

Is there a method by which a laptop is forced to connect to a particular AP, say by MAC address? End of the day, there's always the possibility they may connect to the same one each time, even after two more are put in place etc, right?

 

Give the AP's different names eg SchoolAP1 SchoolAP2 SchoolAP3 then set 20 laptops to connect to AP1, 20 to AP2 and 20 to AP3. Its only a simple solution to tide you by until you get a proper managed service.

 

D

[SimpleSi]

But as an aside - what make of AP do you have a the moment because if it can handle 60 (but slowly) then I'ts doing very well

 

regards

 

Simon