SonicWallSonicWave432eandSonicWave432iGettingStartedGuide
17
WirelessAccessPoint
PlacementConsiderations
PhysicalplacementoftheSonicWave432eorSonicWave432i
wirelessaccesspointhasameasurableeffectonwhocanand
cannotaccessyourwirelesssignal.
AccesspointsshouldbekeptclearofRadioFrequency(RF)
interferencesources.RFbarrierscanbecircumventedby
deployingmultipleaccesspoints.
Asitesurveycan
helpfindtheoptimum wirelessaccesspoint
placement,butyoucanfindusablelocationswithoutit.
Considerationsinclude:
•NumberofAccessPointsVersusUserDensity–Iftoo
manyusersareservicedbyasingle accesspoint,
maximumtransferratesarereachedandthataccess
pointmaybecomeabottleneckfor
thewholesystem.
• Bandwidth–Howmuchdataismovingupstreamand
downstreamforagiventypeofuser?
•EthernetCabling–Whereareyourunningthepowered
Ethernet(PoE)cabletoandhowareyousecuringthat
cable?Areyouusingamulti‐gigabit802.3atcompliant
PoEinjectororswitchto
powerallaccesspoints?
TomaintainpowertotheSonicWave432eor
SonicWave432i,therecommendedmaximumlengthof
CAT5ecablefromthe802.3atPoEinjectortothe
SonicWave432eorSonicWave432iis100meters(333
feet).
•Hubs/Switches–Yourwirelessdeploymenthastotie
backintoyour
networksecurityapplianceandLAN
resources.Considerwhereyourkeynetworkingdevices
aredeployedandhowtheywillconnectefficientlywith
yourwirelessappliances.Whatspeedisneededfor
yourEthernetconnectiontoaccommodatethenumber
ofaccesspointsyouareinstalling?AGigabitEthernet
interfaceisrecommendedwhenconnecting
a
SonicWave432eorSonicWave432itoyourSonicWall
networksecurityappliance.
•LegacyClients‐Olderlaptopsandmobiledevicesmay
notsupport802.11ac.Althoughclientswith802.11a/g/
bhardwarearesupportedbytheSonicWallSonicWave
432eandSonicWave432i,thepresenceoftheselegacy
clientswithinrangeofyourwirelessnetwork
could
affecttheconnectionspeedofyour802.11acclients.
Forexample,an802.11bdeviceauthenticatedtothe
SonicWave432eorSonicWave432icouldlimitall
clientsconnectedtothatradioto802.11bdatarates.