AP's reporting high channel utilization

[kYutobi]

We had a wireless expert come in and use 3 different spectrum analyzer (very sensitive) and he's getting clear readings. For some reason the Meraki AP is showing that interference is crazy. We then moved it over to another spot where we knew interference wasn't present and there it was again. Any thoughts?

[Nolan H.]

I don't see anything on your spectrum that is showing it crazy

Are you talking about the % reporting (not in your screenshot)

[kYutobi]

Sorry @Nolan Herring might've not caught the screenshot in time. DOH! If you do check the solid "red lines" coming across the channels and it shows. Ch1 Ch5 Ch9 Ch11

[Nolan H.]

Oh I see now

Yeah so I personally take the 'spectrum' part with a grain of salt. I've never seen those line up with expensive 'legit' spectrum analyzer tools. In fact I had a thread (possibly on these forums but on twitter also) where I was asking people around the globe to show me their spectrum for 2.4GHz on the MR33 model and they all were showing the same thing.

Some 'massive interference' on channel 5, which in reality did not exist. Once I saw that I knew there was a big flaw in how it functions (at least with the MR33) but it stained my respect for that feature ever since.

I have however been able to confirm that the channel utilization 'live' bar (the one that moves around every second or so, with % from 0 - 100) is actually fairly accurate, so that was comforting.

[Nolan H. · Accepted solution]

Aaaaaaaaaaaand I'm an idiot lol

Here is the link for the Twitter thread I created:

https://twitter.com/NoLANWiFi/status/1034870853375279106

I also totally forgot that I wrote a blog about it too --_--

https://nolanwifi.com/2017/02/02/meraki-rf-falsehoods/

[kYutobi]

@Nolan Herring Thank you. I thought I was alone in this. FYI this all started when people on the 5GHz on channel 40 were getting kicked out form wifi and when I looked at live RF data it showed 50% interference on channel 40. What I've done for a workaround is just disable that channel but from what I can gather it might be the hardware itself and from what it collects it makes "bad decisions" thinking it's helping.