Transmit power control settings in 9800 controller

[Linkwave]

Hello,

I hope someone can help me figure out how to set up manually specific Tx power levels, channels and channel width in the 9800 series controller for each AP or groups of APs. 

Thank you in advance.

[Flavio Miranda]

Hi

  It is not good idea manually define power, channel and channel width. But, if you want to do that, you can change it using cli.

 This link has all you need in CLI and GUI

https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/wireless/controller/9800/config-guide/b_wl_16_10_cg/802-11-parameters-for-cisco-access-points.html 

[Linkwave]

Thank you very much, Flavio.

I am not sure why you suggested that it is not a good idea to set up manual profiles. Can you be kind and elaborate?

We have spent a great deal of time and effort designing the system using Ekahau Pro. The design considered both RF environment, capacity and user requirements in specific zones of the targeted coverage area. This is a standalone customer environment. It is expected to have [very] low risk of RF environment changing (such as introduction of rogue APs or some non Wi-Fi RF noise sources), so we do not think that we will need to rely on controller having to dynamically adjust the settings as the environment changes.

Keeping your advice and concern in mind, I suppose we could try to let the controller control Tx power, but I still think we want to do RF/channel planning and channel width manually. 

Do you think this is an acceptable compromise strategy?

Thank you again, I really appreciate your input.

[Flavio Miranda]

"This is a standalone customer environment. It is expected to have [very] low risk of RF environment changing (such as introduction of rogue APs or some non Wi-Fi RF noise sources), so we do not think that we will need to rely on controller having to dynamically adjust the settings as the environment changes."

I need to agree  with you but ,unfortunatelly, my experience tells me the opposite. Unless you tell me this company is in the middle of the desert and not surrounded by anything,

 Otherwise I will desagree.

 People think that they can control wifi and create a interference free, stable environment. You are using a free frequency spectrum. This will change all the time for reason you can not imagine.

 If you did your home work which is install necessary amount of AP and put them on the right place, the rest should be done by the WLC.

 I like the idea to control the power on the radio, for 2.4 mostly, but what I do is give to the WLC a smaller range so that it decided where to stay inside that smaller range. That´s it.

  Channel width is also something good to define but there´s no maggic also.

[Linkwave]

Thank you again, Flavio.

Although this venue is kind of "in the middle of the desert" (it is a large company HQ building in a suburban area, literally kilometers away from any other potential source of Wi-Fi RF), I think we will follow your advice and implement a compromise solution and indicate the threshold TX power to allow WLC to have control until.

I will try to remember to share the experience after the implementation. 

I really appreciate your input.

[denmendoza]

Hi everyone, I follow these steps with 17.8.1 and I end up with error messages to the effect... "Channel cannot be modified via CLI" and "Transmit power cannot be modified via CLI" 

Any advice?

[Arshad Safrulla]

Below guide provides you an overall idea if you want to do it globally or for a selected group of AP's using policies and profiles.

C9800 Radio Resource Management Deployment Guide - Cisco

However of your requirement is to change power levels per AP, the go to configuration>>wireless>>Access points>>>Select the band>>>AP Name and then click on the AP name it will open a configuration box which will allow you to change the radio settings per AP. If you want to do it via CLI @Flavio Miranda has already shared a link with the cli commands.

I wouldn't really look at changing the power levels manually without a proper understanding of connecting client capabilities, AP positions, antenna's connected to AP's, overall RF environment etc. So it is highly recommended that you conduct a RF survey to gather the requirements and then another post deployment survey to validate the changes.

[Linkwave]

Thank you, Arshad.

I provided a detailed response to Flavio explaining why we want to set it up manually. I am fairly confident that we are addressing all the concerns you listed in your response.

[sanmar26]

So to do this on a group you will most likely have a group of APs tagged with RF profiles. Below show an example of how this is done for a RF profile which then will be linked to a RF Tag.  I would side with Flavio & Arshad on changing just one AP as in most deployments you will have several. Cisco does use RRM which will assist in the RF setting for the deployment. TX power and width selections should be followed with the deployment one has created for a site around clients being used in the environment, so keep that in mind.

On a RF Profile it will be the following:

ap dot11 24ghz rf-profile HQCorp-24GHz-RF-Profile

description "HQCorp-26GHz-RF-Profile"
channel chan-width (Width Value)
tx-power max (value)
tx-power min (value)
no shutdown

ap dot11 5ghz rf-profile HQCorp-5GHz-RF-Profile
description "HQCorp-5GHz-RF-Profile"
channel chan-width (Width Value)
tx-power max (Max Value)
tx-power min (Min Value)
no shutdown

Linking RF Profiles to RF Tag:

wireless tag rf HQCorp-RF-TAG
24ghz-rf-policy HQCorp-24GHz-RF-Profile
5ghz-rf-policy HQCorp-5GHz-RF-Profile

Hope it helps.

[Linkwave]

Thank you very much. We are giving it a try next week.

[Gaurav Kansal]

Dear Linkwave,

Please go to Configuration > Wireless > Access Points > 5GHz Radio and open your access point from list. There you find RF Channel Assignment and Tx Power Level Assignment . In both section you find assignment method, change it to custom from global and you will be able to make change Tx power levels, channels and channel width. If you face any issue then reply me, I'll make it more clear for you. 

GoodLuck
Regards
Gaurav Kansal

If you find this post helpful then please vote as Helpful and if it solves your issue then please mark as Solution.

[Linkwave]

Thank you very much!

[denmendoza]

Thanks Gaurav,

My query was specifically for configurations via CLI not GUI

Of course, I cannot speak for Linkwave

[tobies]

I know, this topic is quite old, but since I have the same issue and it is still unanwered, I'd like to raise it again. For me, it makes no sense offering CLI commands that don't work.

ap config 90e9.5e0a.xxxx
slot 0
band 24Ghz
transmit-power 2

I need to configure 200 APs in a warehouse environment with fixed channel, tx-power and ext-antenna-gain (RRM is NOT an option in this specific case). That would be 1200 values I have to enter via the GUI and I'd really like to avoid that.

Setting "no dca" makes no difference. Does anyone here have a solution?

[denmendoza]

The strategy I settled on was to begin with a baseline representative startup-config file, then use CLI commands to ftp desired startup-config onto WLC and then reboot. Sure, the drawback is the need to reload the WLC. But, a big advantage is the confidence knowing that you are indeed removing all on-the-fly changes that may have been made since the previously loaded startup-config. Then, incrementally edit any existing startup-config (in text editor), being aware of dependencies of related settings/configurations, and then save as next incremented startup-config filename. My "library" of startup-config files has Profiles with groups of APs at my desired Tx Power levels (and Channels too). As such, CLI command to deploy any desired set of Tx Powers is simply specifying the desired startup-config filename to ftp onto WLC. This method has worked nicely for me...