Aironet 600 Series users limitation

[Francesco Donadio]

Hi all, I'd like if anyone has experience with this access point and the limitation on the users connected to the SSID using a wireless lan controller.

From the installation guide I see an incredible thing:

Supported User Count

Only fifteen users are allowed to connect on the WLAN Controller WLANs provided on the 600 series at any one time. A sixteenth user cannot authenticate until one of the first clients de-authenticates or a timeout occurred on the controller.

Note: This number is cumulative across the controller WLANs on the 600 series.

For example, if two controller WLANs are configured and there are fifteen users on one of the WLANs, no users will be able to join the other WLAN on the 600 series at that time. This limit does not apply to the local private WLANs that the end user configures on the 600 series designed for personal use and clients connected on these private WLANs or on the wired ports do not affect these limits.

Is it possible a terrible limitation like this ?

[George Stefanick]

Hi Francesco,

I've had OE deployed for a few months now and we deployed a bunch of AP600s. You need to remember this is for remote home users. In most cases remote home users will only have 3 maybe 4 wifi devices max. So, I dont think its a problem.

Keep in mind, if you need romaing and more users then you should look at HREAP.

[Francesco Donadio]

Thanks George, but the issue is on the number of users per SSID. For my project 15 users per SSID is a big limitation so I can't use this Aironet --> issue solved

[George Stefanick]

its 15 per access point (AP600) not the entire WLAN.

[Nicolas Darchis]

Are you serious ?

15 clients on one access point is anyway killing your bandwitdh. If you are going with that number of clients, you should maybe look at higher end access points ...

[Francesco Donadio]

Nicolas the limitation is about the clients connected to the same SSID and not on the same AP, so if you have 100 AP on the same controller (for example on a WISM2) you can have only 15 users/SSID

Anyway, we tested in the lab and the limitation is real. So, this AP is not good for my project.

[Nicolas Darchis]

All my apologies, I had misunderstood. I didn't have the opportunity to play a lot with the 600 yet.

Indeed, it's very hard to understand why this limitation.

That would mean that if you have 4 600 APs, you can connect only 4 clients on each AP, this is very very strange.

I'll try to search the reason of this because it does not make much sense to me.

Did you verify it ? that the count of 15 users was globally on the WLc regardless of the amount of APs ?

[Nicolas Darchis]

I just got confirmation that it works like I said (15 users per AP, not for the whole WLC). So either something was wrong in your testing, either there is a huge bug :-)

[Francesco Donadio]

I hope you are in right and me not, but this is the config guide:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps11579/products_tech_note09186a0080b7f10e.shtml#user-count

and from the configuration guide I see:

Supported User Count

Only fifteen users are allowed to connect on the WLAN Controller  WLANs provided on the 600 series at any one time. A sixteenth user  cannot authenticate until one of the first clients de-authenticates or a  timeout occurred on the controller.

Note: This number is cumulative across the controller WLANs on the 600 series.

For example, if two controller WLANs are configured and there are  fifteen users on one of the WLANs, no users will be able to join the  other WLAN on the 600 series at that time. This limit does not apply to  the local private WLANs that the end user configures on the 600 series  designed for personal use and clients connected on these private WLANs  or on the wired ports do not affect these limits.

[George Stefanick]

Its poorly written. The (2) WLANs that they mention are the 2 WIFI (corp) WLANs that can be psued to the AP600. The MAX client asscoiations are 15 per AP600.