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Wireless Controller needed for VoIP over WLAN?

pbanholzer
Level 1
Level 1

Hello,

I am a German Student working on my Bachelors thesis for Wireless IP Telephony. I have some basic question: Do I need something like the WLSE Express for my environment to enable roaming between the different APs?

I have four Aironet 1200 APs but no wireless controller. (there is no money for that)

So is it possible to roam without any controller?

Thanks,

Patrick

1 Accepted Solution

Accepted Solutions

dancampb
Level 7
Level 7

Sure. You could setup WDS on the AP's and use a local radius server on one of them. With this setup you then could use CCKM and take advantage of fast secure roaming.

You will be able to roam between AP's even without WDS but with each roam you will do a full reauth.

View solution in original post

6 Replies 6

dancampb
Level 7
Level 7

Sure. You could setup WDS on the AP's and use a local radius server on one of them. With this setup you then could use CCKM and take advantage of fast secure roaming.

You will be able to roam between AP's even without WDS but with each roam you will do a full reauth.

If they are 1200 or 1230, ensure you have 12.3(8)JEA2 or later. 12.3(8) is the last train for those AP platforms though.

For roaming to occur correctly, all APs would need to be in the same native VLAN, where IAPP can be exchanged successfully.

We then recommend to have a secondary non-native VLAN for the voice SSID.

If you have a large # of APs, then WLSM was the solution there providing a "controller-like" solution where GRE is utilized.

If you are deploying the 7921 or 7925, see the following deployment guides for further info.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/voice_ip_comm/cuipph/7921g/6_0/english/deployment/guide/7921dply.pdf

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/voice_ip_comm/cuipph/7925g/7_0/english/deployment/guide/7925dply.pdf

Hi, thanks for your reply.

I got all the 1200 APs on 12.3(8)JEC2 they are already configured for one VLAN so the IAPP should work.

So my question is: does it work without any dedicated controller.

the first reply to my question was, that i should use the radius-server on the APs. Would it work without authentication (only WPA)

No, you don't need a WLAN controller with this ap type as the version you have is an autonomous / standalone image.

As far as authentication, you can use open, open+wep, shared key+wep, or AKM (WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK).

Then for 802.1x types, either EAP-FAST, PEAP,EAP-TLS or LEAP can be used.

CCKM can be used for fast roaming with these 802.1x types, but with autonomous you must configure a WDS server, which can be an ap, and have the client serving aps register to the WDS, which points to the RADIUS server.

You can use local radius on the ap as well, but then only EAP-FAST or LEAP can be used.

Keep in mind that roaming is a nature of the wireless client and not the access point or the controller for that matter.

Of course you need to make sure your access points are configured properly. But roaming is client driven...

Controllers allow for centralized management as well as other nice features.

"Satisfaction does not come from knowing the solution, it comes from knowing why." - Rosalind Franklin
___________________________________________________________

The ap can direct a client to an ap, but our 792x phones make the roaming triggers.

And of course the ap has to support a roaming protocol (lwapp/capwap, iapp, etc.).

And the ap has to support cckm for the client to do fast roaming.

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