Intel Connectivity Analytics Accelerates RF Troubleshooting

 

Solve Intel Connectivity Analytics Poor RF Problems Quickly.

Intel's corporate wireless local area network (WLAN) is essential to employee productivity. Users may get more irritated and less productive as a result of poor radio frequency (RF) conditions. It has been shown that the first step to reliable WLAN service is appropriate access point (AP) location, which is the result of effective planning. However, as the new white paper, "Optimizing and Troubleshooting Wi-Fi Networks Using Client Analytics," demonstrates, planning is not enough to guarantee the desired network stability.

Best Practices for Intel IT to Prevent Poor RF Issues

Intel IT has developed a few suggestions for the ideal AP location:

• There should be an AP every forty-five feet.
• Put an AP near to each of the four corners in small meeting spaces.
• In larger conference rooms, install one access point (AP) for every eight users.

It is estimated that these guidelines avoid poor RF coverage around 80% of the time, even if they don't always meet the 99.999% coverage objective. It's challenging to duplicate inside walls, which might be composed of cubicle panels or concrete. Additionally, the physical distribution of users near each AP can affect the dynamic power level that APs utilize.

Another problem is the potential for room layout modifications between AP placement planning and installation. Therefore, once a third-party provider installs APs in compliance with the previously specified guidelines, it goes above and above to ensure that the installed APs provide the necessary coverage.

Conventional RF Coverage Validation Is Expensive and Time-consuming

To validate RF coverage, two techniques are employed:

• Use a commercial software tool to simulate coverage; it may not accurately depict the floor plan until it is updated.
• Use a client device as you go across the floor. However, this takes a lot of time, and not all colleges have IT staff.

A few years ago, it developed an internal alternative to walking the floor since they weren't satisfied with any of these two options. The customized software displays AP power levels and user counts per AP on a dashboard. It may look for signs of APs with limited coverage if it has a high power level and a sizable user base.

However, this internal software was not flawless. Every five minutes, it had to manually get data from the WLAN controller throughout the whole company. This also required complicated algorithms to account for geographical variances, define interesting values, and eliminate non-prime-time data (e.g., Friday is a working day in some regions but not in others). With hundreds of thousands of APs deployed throughout the world, such human efforts are nearly impossible.

This approach to network certification is not scalable and wastes important IT resources.

A Better, Quicker Method for Validation

Recently developed in collaboration with Cisco and Intel's Client Computing group, Intel Connectivity Analytics is a more scalable and cost-effective approach to network validation.

Prior to using Intel Connectivity Analytics, it was only able to gather AP data; it had no understanding of the client side of things. Although it could use AP data to determine the number of users and transmit power level (Tx), it only used these facts as markers of inadequate coverage. It was not possible to measure the coverage directly from the client's perspective.

Conversely, Intel Connectivity Analytics continually gathers information from the real client devices. The client data reflects the actual client experience.

For any client connected to a Cisco wireless network that is compatible and using Intel Wi-Fi technology. This solution provides comprehensive wireless client information at the driver level for any client with Intel Wi-Fi hardware connected to a compatible Cisco wireless network. Client-sent Wi-Fi telemetry is automatically collected by the APs and securely transmitted to a Cisco Catalyst controller, Cisco Meraki Cloud management platform, or Cisco Catalyst Center management platform. Following data processing, the system generates informative reports for network management.

Intel Connectivity Analytics provides a targeted, efficient approach by identifying customers experiencing radio frequency issues by detecting low Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) occurrences. Without needing to collect and analyze a lot of data, the issue may be looked at right away by looking at the specific AP power level history and deployment.

Investigating further shows that the same AP is the source of every low RSSI event on a certain day.

Note: A weaker signal is indicated by a larger negative value. The unit of measurement for RSSI is decibel milliwatts (dBm). For example, an RSSI of -70 dBm is stronger than one of -85 dBm. The RSSI of a very weak signal is -85, whereas that of a strong signal is -50 dBm.

To sum up

It can quickly locate areas with poor coverage and utilize Intel Connectivity Analytics to discover the reason. It eliminates the need to walk the floor or manually collect and analyze RF data from the whole company. The efforts may now be focused only where they are needed.

A considerable amount of time is saved. Without Intel Connectivity Analytics, troubleshooting a client-side connectivity issue may take ten to fifteen minutes, and the IT administrator could only fix one client at a time. With Intel Connectivity Analytics, the average repair time has been lowered to 10–15 seconds, and the system can simultaneously detect several damaged connections.

Finding the underlying reason of a wave of network connectivity issues might take days. According to Intel Connectivity Analytics, it can now determine the root cause of a problem in a matter of seconds. Additionally, there is no longer a need to maintain the own tool or create internal custom scripts and automated procedures for collecting and preserving client data.