Unable to Connect wirelessly to Aironet 1200 AP

[DaftLad123]

I've been using wireless LAN's now for a while, but have had some difficulty with getting connected wirelessly to the Cisco 1200 AP. I've effectively taken it out of the box and told it to connect to DHCP on the network and all is fine there, it gets allocated an IP. I've not enabled any security or encryption as yet, as I want to start at the botton and work up. I've added in the MAC address of the wireless card in my laptop and attempted to connect. This fails. I'm sure I'm missing something daft, but am sure I've checked all of the settings. Open to suggestions!

[scottmac]

There are some variables, depending on the version of IOS (or VxWorks) that you're running.

Check out things like whether Cisco Extensions are enabled (non-Cisco NICs may have issues), and the "Optimize Throughput" tab is selected (non-Cisco NICs may have issues), "Short Preambles" enabled (non-WiFi compliant), "Slot Time" ...

Probably the best course wold be to determine which version of operatig code you are using, then check Cisco's site for the Release Notes pertaining to that version to see what caveats have been noted.

Current IOS is 12.3(2)JA. We've had pretty good luck with it's predecessor ( 12.2(15)XR2 ).

Good Luck

Scott

[DaftLad123]

Many Thanks Scott.

I've made a little progress since i last posted. I can connect the AP fine if I use an adaptor which is Wireless G enabled. The adaptors in the laptops I've tried are all Wireless B. Are you aware of any settings that would be needed for this to function correctly?

KR

James

[DaftLad123]

OK, got it sussed.

If you have maximum throughput enabled on the Wireless AP, it won't allow Wireless B devices to connect. I just enabled default throughput settings, and now this works fine.

James

[jmagnusson]

Scott,

I see you are running 12.3(2)JA - Have you had any issues ? We had 350+ 1230G AP's - running 17 WDS domains..We have WLSE and are testeing the WLSM - which works GREAT!! But with 12.3.2JA deployed I had non-cisco clients (Vocera - VOIP badges) that could not get a DHCP address on some AP's until I rebooted the AP. It was a major issues and had to backout to 12.2.15XR2. In some of my AP's flash i had .rcore files which I found out are new to 12.3.2JA - they are radio core files. Cisco can not redupliate my issue. Several users have posted DHCP/Broadcast issues with 12.3.2JA in the wirless general and other forums. I do have a case opened....

Thanks in advance for your input !!

[scottmac]

I've had some connection and DHCP issues on my 1231 (a/b/g) at home with non-Cisco NICs.

I took it up to play with it and to try to get AES lit up (so far, no successful AES, Cisco or non-Cisco NIC).

I will probably back down to 12.2(15)XR2, which was stable & working before the update and worry about AES after the next Rev or two.

I'm just getting up-to-speed with the WLSE (we got one for our Lab last week). I don't think I'll be aboe to suggest anything you don't already know. I've anything come to mind I'll re-post.

About the only similar thing I've seen was an AP with VLANs / multiple SSIDs. The DHCP request would go out on one VLAN, and the response was being sent from the AP on the default VLAN (it was an AP problem - the DHCP response was properly tagged up to the AP). At the time, there was no work-around except to update the code (I forget which version).

If you have the tools, knowledge, and skill set, capture some traffic during the DHCP request / response cycle and verify the tagging from the AP to the DHCP server (and back).

Good Luck, thanks for the points!

Scott

[dixho]

Would like to add a comment on AES support on Cisco wireless adapters (NIC). Currently, there is no AES support on all Cisco wireless adapters.