Common Enterprise Wi-Fi Questions

As everybody who is willing to put up with my descriptions of minutely technical features in Wi-Fi no doubt already knows, one of the key constraints on wireless LANs is that the data rate that can be achieved is loosely dependent on your range from the access point.   There are a number of subtle...

When talking about 802.11ac, beamforming is a common topic of conversation. Yes, it was first standardized back in the 802.11n days, but it was never widely implemented. Significant work was devoted to making beamforming simpler to implement in silicon in 802.11ac, which I expect will pay off in...

Our friends at WiTS (Wireless Training & Solutions) have done it again – another awesome HTML5 reference tool! This time, an interactive MCS tool. Click an MCS rate or modulation type once to see just those items, and click it again to return to the main screen. This is helpful when you want to know...

Well, you knew it had to happen. The makers of Wi-Fi Channel Simulator have brought us a 2.0 version. Yes, now with 80 and 160 MHz wide channels and in HTML5 for all of you Apple-lovin’, iPad-packin’, Flash-hatin’ geeks out there. Oh, by the way, that describes me too. SWEET!           (For a...

Halloween is right around the corner, and one thing I learned from last month’s Wireless Field Day is that 802.11ac is apparently scary. Quite a few of the delegates asked me why the industry appears to be scared of 802.11ac. I guess we’re just weird at Aerohive because we love 802.11ac.Why? Several...

Meraki has taken Wi-Fi infrastructure to a whole new level of ridiculous with the “Split Controller.” My inner sarcastic comedian couldn’t keep quiet about this.Meraki devices (APs, switches, and routers) connect to their cloud management platform for management and control. To be absolutely clear,...

It’s been exactly 3 years since I started at Aerohive, and I’m pretty dang sure I mentioned that every Wi-Fi infrastructure company would be forced to “copy Aerohive or die.” Wait for it … wait for it… I TOLD YOU SO! Ah … that feels nice … OK, I’m over it. So … moving on.  Here we are, after all...

Because I have been in the Wi-Fi industry for 12+ years, I sometimes forget that the technology is still a young technology. To this day I find that many Aerohive customers and even some Aerohive partners are just getting introduced to the basic concepts of 802.11 wireless networking. Therefore, I...

Aerohive cheat sheets series: This is the next installment in a series of blogs that provide an at-a-glance look at how our technology works – controller-less Wi-Fi architecture as well as supporting features - and the benefits it provides. Last time we covered BYOD management and Aerohive’s Bonjour...

Maybe. Maybe not. Every manufacturer brags that their AP is the fastest AP in history. I'm here to tell you that Wi-Fi network speed is based on a large set of variables, such as: Mix of client population. AP and client radio capabilities and specifications (data rate support, beam forming, TPC,...