The best way to deploy wireless is with a distributed architecture with multiple radios and directional antennas per cable drop. This is how the cellular industry solved capacity issues in the late 1990’s. By placing more radios into each cell tower, they gained created capacity and coverage per location. This enabled the industry to keep up with demand while saving them enormous amounts of cash.
So that’s what we did. Our distributed, multi-AP solution is the most powerful, scalable, and trusted wireless platform in the industry. It’s easier to deploy. Is more cost effective. And can grow as performance and capacity change.
Architectural Components
There are three primary components in the Wireless Array
- Dense modular APs
- Directional antennas
- Distributed intelligence
Dense modular APs
Conventional APs contain two radios. The wireless bandwidth available on these radios is shared amongst all devices. The more devices, the less bandwidth available to each device.
To ensure sufficient bandwidth, more radios are required. You can either add more two-radio APs or you can add more radios per AP. We chose the better approach. Incorporating 2 to 16 modular APs per Array, we get much greater bandwidth to service more devices. We also get significant savings in the number of APs, cable drops, switch ports, and labor costs.
Directional antennas
Fact of the matter is national communications agencies limit the amount of energy a radio can transmit, which restricts the coverage area of that radio. Conventional APs utilize Omni-directional antennas to transmit its wireless signal in a 360-degree pattern – similar to a light bulb – limiting the coverage area.
Wireless Arrays are better in that they focus that same amount energy in a specific direction – similar to a flashlight – giving a much greater distance than those conventional APs. Again, this results in far fewer APs per deployment – typically by 75%.
Distributed intelligence
Traditional wireless architectures consist of thin APs connected to a central controller. The controller resides in the backend of the network and performs control, security and management functions for multiple (often hundreds) of APs. The three biggest issues with this approach are traffic congestion, single point of failure, and unencrypted data from the AP to the controller.
Our approach integrates the controller function into the Wireless Array to distribute the intelligence, much like wired edge switches. By distributing the network, you get better performance and encryption all the way out to the edge. What’s more, our approach simplifies the deployment, making it more flexible and cost effective.
What does it mean to you
There are numerous advantages to our approach:
- Designed for pervasive enterprise coverage, not just hotspots
- Designed for density of BYOD, not just 10 people in a conference room
- Designed for multi-media and critical applications, not just email and web browsing
- Designed to be adaptive and upgraded as requirements grow, not replaced as technology changes
- Designed to lower total cost of ownership by requiring less equipment and infrastructure, not more
Our Wireless Array platform enables far superior functionality, capacity, and upgradability not possible with conventional AP offerings. We make it possible for your workforce to communicate when and where is optimal for them and your customers. By improving communications, you improve productivity and profitability.
The following critical technologies make it possible to meet the rapidly evolving requirements for a robust wireless network:
- Modular AP system
- Integrated controller
- Multi-sector antenna system
- Dedicated security monitoring
- Dedicated wireless backhaul
- Radio optimization management
- Resource assurance management
- Device optimization management
The exploding growth of tablets and smartphones is constricting today’s wireless networks. Mandating infrastructure upgrades. Normal approach has been to add more and more APs to grow capacity, but this means costly network changes.
The better method for growing capacity was solved by the wired switching industry by using chassis with modular blades. Our modular AP platform provides a unique and exceptional value. It can adapt to meet new requirements as your needs change. The Wireless Arrays allow you to:
Add radios to an Array chassis to increase capacity
- Reposition radios within a chassis to optimize RF coverage pattern
- Migrate radios and users from 2.4GHz to higher performing 5GHz band when ready (all radios are multi-band)
- Swap radios to higher performing wireless technology as available (802.11ac and 802.11ad standard)
The flexibility provided by the Wireless Array enables capacity planning without replacement of the Array chassis itself. This ensures a long product lifespan (5+ years) that is adaptive to your business requirements and protects your investment against inevitable increasing capacity demands.
Integrated controller
We have integrated the controller functionality into each Wireless Array. We provide a host of functions, including high performance packet processing, networking, security processing, RF control, RF monitoring, inter-Array coordination and network management.
By placing the intelligence and packet processing at the network edge, you will gain several benefits, including:
- Linear scalability – Capacity is incrementally added to the network by simply adding Arrays, as opposed to adding entirely new, expensive controllers when their AP limit is reached
- Policy enforcement – With intelligence and processing distributed in each Array, security and performance policies can be applied with greater efficiency directly at the network edge as opposed to centrally
- Easier installation – With autonomous operation, Arrays integrate to the network infrastructure similar to a switch as opposed to a thin AP which is dependent on the connection to a central controller
- High resiliency – Each Array operates as a standalone device with no dependency or single point of failure from a central controller
- Superior network performance – By processing control and data traffic at the network edge as opposed a centralized location, traffic latency, jitter, and roaming times are reduced and better controlled
Multi-sector antenna system
The sectored antenna design of the Wireless Array provides a superior level of RF control within the system compared to traditional wireless solutions. RF resources can be more optimally managed with this design compared to conventional Omni-directional antenna systems in areas of channel allocation, interference mitigation, and user performance.
A sectored antenna system creates slices of wireless coverage. Each slice uses a unique channel and clusters devices. This approach creates greater physical separation between sectors and devices on a given channel as opposed to Omni-directional antennas that transmit RF in all directions. Directionality of the sectors isolates radios on adjacent Arrays from interfering with each other. This together with appropriate channel design allows the reuse of the same channels by adjacent Wireless Arrays. Channel reuse is critical for a wireless network to operate at high capacity since only a limited number of channels are available, in particular with only three non-overlapping channels in the 2.4GHz band.
With our approach, you get higher RF gain. It transmits stronger signals to the wireless clients and correspondingly receives weaker signals from them since antenna gain works in both directions. Stronger signal provides better communication data rates for a client at given distance, as well as better operational range.
Dedicated security monitoring
Another costly network component found in conventional offerings are security monitors. Unlike the competition, we have integrated a wireless threat sensor into each Wireless Array, making it possible to have a dense design without compromising radio resources for servicing users.
Most offerings are restricted since both radios in the AP are typically required for servicing users – one operating at 2.4GHz and one at 5GHz. To perform security-monitoring functions, additional APs must be added to the network or one of the two radios must time-slice between servicing users and performing security functions. Time-slicing reduces the bandwidth available to servicing users and is significantly less efficient performing scanning functions as opposed to a dedicated radio resource.
By default, a dedicated monitoring radio in our Wireless Arrays continually scans the RF environment 24x7 covering all Wi-Fi channels in about 10 seconds. When called upon, it can perform additional functions focused on a given channel or threat as required. These functions do not interrupt the servicing of user traffic on the Array in any way.
Functions of the Array’s monitor radio include:
- Wireless threat/attack detection for wireless IDS/IPS (Intrusion Detection/Intrusion Prevention)
- Rogue AP and ad hoc station detection, classification, and mitigation
- Spectrum analysis providing performance, interference, and error information across all Wi-Fi channels
- Wireless packet capture on any Wi-Fi channel
- Proactive self-monitoring by functioning as a wireless client connecting to other radios in the Array
Dedicated wireless backhaul
The multi-radio design of the Wireless Array enables radios to be configured as a dedicated wireless backbone between Arrays. This functionality is referred to as Wireless Distribution System (WDS).
WDS eliminates the need to run wired uplinks to Arrays in areas where it may be impractical or cost-prohibitive to pull cable. All security and network policies are enforced across the backhaul links, the same as if the Arrays are connected via wired uplinks. Radio bonding allows multiple backhaul links to be aggregated, providing load balancing of traffic and fail-over capabilities for a uniform and fault-tolerant deployment.
With multiple radios available per Array, wireless backhaul can be configured on radios independent of those servicing users. Traditional enterprise APs with two radios are limited to one radio for a backhaul (mesh) connection. This radio must share the same channel as all other APs on that mesh link, severely limiting the total amount of bandwidth available for backhaul. With the Xirrus Array, backhaul connections are dedicated point-to-point links between Arrays and operate without performance compromise.
We can create up to four independent wireless backhaul links per Array and bond up to three radios together in for each link. Using 450Mbps 802.11n radios, each backhaul can offer up to 1.35Gbps of total Wi-Fi bandwidth. The connections support 802.1d Spanning tree bridging services for failover and link redundancy, including with the Array’s wired interfaces.
Radio optimization
The multi-radio and directional antenna design of our Wireless Arrays provide significantly greater control of RF design and management compared to traditional APs. All radio resources can be individually controlled for band selection (2.4GHz or 5GHz), transmit power, and channel allocation. Control can be done either automatically or manually. Learn more >
Resource assurance
The distributed design of the Array provides a level of processing power and intelligence not available in traditional thin AP designs where much of the resources reside in a centralized controller. By placing these resources at the network edge, the Array can apply proactive and pre-emptive monitoring of operational resources to detect and respond to issues when they occur. Learn more >
Device optimization
The multi-radio architecture of the Array provides a high level of flexibility in allocating Wi-Fi users and devices among system resources to optimize overall performance. As wireless is a shared communications medium, clients on a given radio resource affect the performance of others using the same resource. Learn more >