2702I Not reaching N Speeds.

[dreyes13]

We have several 2702i's that are managed by our 5508 WLC, several users are complaining about slow speeds in general. We tested a couple of AP's in 2.4 and 5ghz only and both cap at around 18-20 mbps up and down. We even forced N connections only but the speeds seem to be capped at 18-20. We are using WPA+WPA2 Enterprise with TKIP Encryption and our SSID is hidden.. Could this be an issue with why we arent coming close to N speeds? 

Any light that can be shed on this would be greatly appreciated. 

[Scott Fella]

You shouldn’t ever have both WPA and WPA2 defined. Configure WPA2/AES. Also depending on how many devices are connected to that given AP, can affect your throughput. 2.4ghz is so over utilized and that can also be the reason you are seeing slow speeds. You should utilize the 5ghz and have 40MHz channel width if you want better throughput.

[dreyes13]

Thanks for the reply.

During my testing I configured one lone AP to operate in 5ghz mode ONLY, with 1 device attached/connected to it. The speed still hovered around 20 meg max. Are you able to explain why both WPA and WPA2 shouldn't be used? 

Thanks!

[Jhosbell Verdesca De Aguiar · Accepted solution]

If they use TKIP it won't let them use N speeds. TKIP allow only 802.11b/g speeds.

If they use WPA2-AES then you can get 802.11n or even ac speeds. also check the WMM setting, it must be on either allowed or required to be able to get 802.11n and above speeds.

[dreyes13]

I tested another SSID in our environment that was not using TKIP encryption and speeds were hitting N speeds.

Thank you for clearing this up for me guys!