Wireless Issue

[aayaa.ben.jemaa1]

Hello,

We have an issue with our clustomer who need to install 2 Cisco 2504 Wireless Controller and 75 Cisco Aironet 702i.

The first controller operate as a primary and the second one as a back up.

We need to know if all of Cisco Acces Point need licences in both of controller (primary and secondary). It means that the 75 Access Point need 75 licences in the first one and 75 Licences in the second one.

Otherwise, is it possible to activate all of Access Point  with only 75 licences in both of controller without service interruption if the first controller fails.

Thanks,

[Ric Beeching]

Hey,

Normally with other WLCs like 5508 you can utilise a feature called HA SSO which permits for the secondary WLC to not be licensed and just the primary. I don't think the 2504 WLC supports this which means in theory yes you are required to license both WLCs.

There is always the option too make use of the evaluation license on the secondary WLC but I'm not sure how Cisco would feel about that as really you're not paying for a feature you are relying upon.

To achieve non-disruption in the event of an outage, be above board and cost-effective I would upgrade to WLCs that support HA SSO for APs and Clients.

Cheers,

Ric

[Milos Megis]

You can switch WLC 2504 to HA mode where you get automatically 75 licenses.

But HA SSO feature is not supported, so in case that first WLC fails, the APs must reassociate to second WLC what means short outage of each AP.

Feature which you are finding is called "N+1 HA"
Try this link (but I am not sure if it is correct configuration):
https://rscciew.wordpress.com/2014/06/07/n1-high-availability-configuration-on-cisco-2504wlc/

[aleopoldie]

Hello,

This is a correct configuration.

If you follow these instructions you shouldn't need an additional license on the secondary WLC :

Go to Secondary Controller GUI and navigate to Controller then enable the AP Fallback (Enable on both WLC) & HA SKU secondary unit from drop down option.

Via CLI:

Execute the config redundancy unit secondary command to obtain support for Max AP count licenses on a given hardware.

-AL

[Milos Megis]

Just for info...

AP Fallback is not necessary.

If you enable it, then AP will return back to primary controller immediately when it will run again.
Otherwise AP should return back to primary controller after 90 days.
(90 days is restriction of HA SKU unit. After 90 days AP must be disconnected. However in case of another failure of primary WLC, AP can associate to secondary unit for another 90 days)