Thursday, April 18, 2019

Wireless Site Survey Tools/Software Recommendations

Does anyone have any recommendations for software or tools to plan new wireless deployments or improve legacy ones?

Some background: My organization consists of about 70 sites of various sizes from tiny 5 person offices, up to multi-floor locations with 200 staff. Multi tenant locations are common. We currently use Aerohive APs and Hivemanager NG. We've had complaints regarding poor performance, disconnections, dead zones, speed issues, etc. Sometimes these are valid, but sometimes we simply can't recreate them on demand in order to get anywhere with Aerohive support. I do have interest in improving things, and was looking for recommendations on tools I could use for mapping and planning with the intention of improving coverage in the placement of the APs, adjusting radio power levels and avoiding interference. I also want to ensure we have the right number of APs (it seems it often just an arbitrary amount that was placed without careful consideration or any surveying of any kind).

I freely admit I am not an expert in this area, I'm the low man in a small team.

Has anyone been in a similar position, and can you offer some recommendations on tools or techniques you use to improve wifi at sites you manage or for new deployments?

Hivemanager NG has a heat mapping tool, but parts of it seem really rough, though I admit I only started digging in to it recently.

Thank you for your thoughts on this.



No comments:

Post a Comment