Ekahau Site Survey & Heatmap Visualizations
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Ekahau Site Survey & Heatmap Visualizations 7.04.2016 Contents Executive Summary ........................................................................... 4 Introduction ...................................................................................... 4 What do we mean by visualizations? ............................................ 4 What are the different types of Ekahau Site Survey (ESS) visualizations? .............................................................................................. 4 Signal Strength ................................................................................. 5 What is signal strength? ............................................................ 5 How is signal strength displayed in Ekahau Site Survey (ESS)? ....... 7 Why is signal strength important for a Wi-Fi network? .................... 8 What signal strength should I design my network to? .................... 9 AP Selection ...................................................................................... 9 Interference / Noise .......................................................................... 11 Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) ................................................................ 15 What is Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR)? .......................................... 15 Why is SNR important? ............................................................. 15 What is a good SNR value? ....................................................... 16 How does Ekahau Site Survey visualize SNR? .............................. 16 Data Rate ........................................................................................ 17 How are data rates determined? ................................................ 18 How does Ekahau Site Survey calculate data rate? ....................... 24 Channel Overlap ............................................................................... 29 What is Channel Overlap? ......................................................... 29 2 Copyright © 2016 Ekahau, Inc. All rights reserved. Channel Overlap on 2.4 GHz ...................................................... 29 Channel Overlap on 5 GHz ........................................................ 30 What happens when channels overlap? ....................................... 31 How much is too much Channel Overlap? .................................... 33 So, is the 2.4 GHz band dead then? ............................................ 33 How does Ekahau Site Survey visualize Channel Overlap? ............. 34 Channel Coverage ............................................................................. 35 Channel Bandwidth ........................................................................... 37 Number of APs ................................................................................. 39 Associated Access Point ..................................................................... 41 What does the visualization look like? ......................................... 41 What should you look for? ......................................................... 43 Spectrum Channel Power and Spectrum Utilization ................................ 44 Spectrum Channel Power .......................................................... 44 Spectrum Utilization ................................................................. 45 Visualization Options ................................................................ 46 Survey Inspector ..................................................................... 46 Contact ........................................................................................... 48 3 Copyright © 2016 Ekahau, Inc. All rights reserved. Executive Summary What are visualizations? What do the Ekahau visualizations mean? How can I optimize my design for each visualization? The abovementioned questions are discussed in detail further in this paper. Introduction What do we mean by visualizations? Visualizations are graphical representations of simulated (planning) or measured data (survey) overlaid on a floor plan that is imported by a user to depict the physical structure in which the wireless network is being or has been deployed. The graphical display helps the user understand and interpret the data more effectively than trying to decode an exorbitant amount of tabular data. What are the different types of Ekahau Site Survey (ESS) visualizations? Currently there are 19 ESS visualizations that can be selected to help design, verify, and/or troubleshoot your Wi-Fi network: • Associated Access Point – predicts where the client devices will be associated, or, if Hybrid Site Surveys have been made, displays the actual associated access point throughout the survey. • Capacity: Clients per AP – displays how the end user devices would be distributed between the access points. • Capacity Health – displays whether the network meets the Capacity Requirements. • Channel Bandwidth – displays channel bandwidth to better visualize your 802.11n and 802.11ac network characteristics such as channel bonding. • Channel Coverage – displays the channel of the AP with the strongest signal strength in each location. • Channel Overlap – shows how many APs are overlapping on a single channel in the given area. 4 Copyright © 2016 Ekahau, Inc. All rights reserved. • Data Rate – displays the speed at which the client device and the AP are communicating. • Interference / Noise – displays interference/noise as a result of co-channel interference and other noise that may have an impact on performance. • Network Health – provides a summarized overview of the network based on whether defined network requirements are met or not. • Network Issues – displays which network requirement fails in a given location. • Number of APs – shows how many APs are audible in a given location. • Packet Loss – displays the relative packet loss % over the floor map, as measured from the last 10 packets. • Round-Trip Time – shows the round trip time of the ping packets over the floor map. • Signal Strength – displays the signal strength of the selected set of APs in dBm. By default, the signal strength of the strongest AP per location is displayed. • Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) – shows the ratio of the signal strength relative to the noise. • Throughput (Max) – displays the theoretical maximum net throughput (excluding overhead) per location, given ideal circumstances and a single user accessing the network. • Difference in Interference – shows the interference difference in measured values between the Primary and Secondary surveys in a given location. • Difference in Signal Strength – shows the signal strength difference in measured values between the Primary and Secondary surveys in a given location. • Difference in Number of APs – shows the change in the number of APs between the Primary and Secondary surveys in a given location. Signal Strength To kick off the series on visualizations we will focus on one of the most recognizable and important requirements when designing a wireless network: signal strength. What is signal strength? People often mistakenly refer to signal strength as Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) value, which is an indication of the power level at the receiving antenna (e.g. Wi-Fi client device). While RSSI can give you an indication of how strong a signal is relativistically, 5 Copyright © 2016 Ekahau, Inc. All rights reserved. it does not provide an absolute measurement. There is no standardized method of determining RSSI between vendors, leading to each providing different RSSI values for the same environment. When engineers refer to power levels in dBm or mW, it is the actual measured signal strength and not a relative calculation as with RSSI. What is dBm or mW? Short answer: dBm is decibels relative to 1 milliwatt and mW is a milliwatt (one thousandth of a watt). The next obvious question is: what are watts and decibels? A watt is a unit of power named after the Scottish engineer James Watt that is used to express the rate of energy conversion or transfer with respect to time. It can be calculated relative to an object’s velocity as Joules per Second (J/S) or in terms of electromagnetism as the rate at which work is done when one Ampere of current flows through an electrical potential difference (Volt), aka Watt = Volts x Amperes. A decibel is a logarithmic unit used to express a ratio between two values. The decibel is used to conveniently represent very large or small values and allow for simple mathematical calculations that would otherwise be difficult for most humans. For the sake of saving time and not derailing the purpose of this post, I recommend checking out WLAN Pros’ “Easy dB Math in 5 Minutes” (http://www.wlanpros.com/easy-db-math-5-minutes/) to understand how to work with dBms. 6 Copyright © 2016 Ekahau, Inc. All rights reserved. How is signal strength displayed in Ekahau Site Survey (ESS)? In ESS the signal strength visualization displays the signal strength of the selected set of Access Points (APs) in dBm. By default, the signal strength of the strongest AP per location will be displayed. To display the signal strength for just one or few access points, select “Show Signal Strength for Selected Access Points” and click to select APs from the map or from the AP list as shown in the screenshot below. More about the AP selections on our next blog post. Signal strength has the following options accessible via the Visualization Options: • Viewed Signal allows you to disregard the signals from the strongest access points, visualizing the