8821 Phones Import WLAN Settings Issues

[Adan Zuniga]

All,

I have exported the WLAN settings of an 8821 to a .cfg file but when I import it to the next phone it does not connect to the WLAN. All settings import correctly, so I am not sure what the issue is. What I have noticed is that if I go back to the wireless phone web page and re enter the PSK then the phones connect properly. I know that these phones are fairly new, but I hope someone has a solution to this. 

[Bobby Stojceski]

I'm sorry i'm not familiar with this particular issue, but I can say that it is well worth the money to buy at least one of the 8821 docking stations and a USB-to-Ethernet adapter to plug into it. Ensure your User VLAN has Cisco's TFTP option 150 set and setup a WLAN profile in CUCM.

Then dock the handset and it will find CUCM, download it's config including wifi settings and you're off! So much easier.

The USB-Ethernet adapter I use is a regular one I got from Dell. Nothing special.

Also highly recommend running at least firmware 11.0(3) on the handset.

[Adan Zuniga]

Bobby! 

Thank you, I did not know exactly how this worked but your explanation greatly helped. I have created the WiFi Profile and Profile Group. I used a Microsoft USB to Ethernet adapter (though it is not on the list of supported ones it is working). On the layer two switch I can see the phone being connected but not picking up an IP address.Thus, it will not connect to CUCM to grab its configuration, did you ever experience this? 

[Bobby Stojceski]

No I haven't had this issue myself. If you are running firmware prior to 11.0(3) then the phone will use the data VLAN to pickup an IP address (NOT the Voice VLAN), so make sure the switch port the dock is now connected to has a regular access VLAN on it and that your option 150 TFTP address is set on that VLAN in DHCP.

Might be worth resetting all setting son the phone too, in case your failed imports broke anything.

[Adan Zuniga]

Bobby,

With extensive troubleshooting we have determined that the issue lies with the PSK. We are using WPA2 for authentication. We have a 63 character ASCII PSK that works fine when we configure the phone manually via USB but not when we export and import a configuration file to another phone or when we do the WLAN Profile. We think that the issue is that when the configuration key is exported it is getting corrupted. Do you happen to know what the PSK requirements/limitations are?

[Bobby Stojceski]

Good find. It's not something I have come across but i've been working with Cisco for almost 3 weeks now on our 8821 handsets. Firmware 11.0(3) resolves over 100 bugs, with more still to be fixed. I don't see your issue in an export of 8821 bugs I received so best if you raise it with TAC to get it identified and fixed.