This document discusses challenging Wi-Fi deployments in warehouses, retail stores, stadiums, and outdoor areas. It provides tips for planning and surveying in these environments, including using directional antennas in warehouses to deal with high ceilings and shelves, performing on-site surveys between shelves to check for gaps in coverage, and using multiple survey adapters to quickly survey large outdoor and stadium areas with many access points and clients. Hands-on demos are also provided to illustrate Wi-Fi planning and analysis tools.

1. Challenging Wi-Fi Deployments
Jussi Kiviniemi, Vice President, Wi-Fi Tools
Twitter: @jussikiviniemi
Mail: jussi@ekahau.com

2. Agenda
1. Why are we here?
2. Warehouses & retail
3. High density
4. Outdoor
+ hands-on demos

3. Jussi
@JussiKiviniemi
11 years at Ekahau

4. Sales slide of the day
Site Survey
& Planning
Mobile Survey
Troubleshooting
Spectrum Analyzer
Fight interference

5. Amanda Björnberg
• Ekahau technical marketing
• Hosts dozens of training
videos
• Helps you master Ekahau

6. Keith Parsons “Dr. Dre of Wi-
Fi”
• Trained Wi-Fi for 10+ years
• 3,000+ engineers trained
• Deployed Wi-Fi from arctic
circle to antarctica
• Knows how to fix your Wi-Fi

7. Bad Wi-Fi
• Some Wi-Fi deployments are
more challenging than others.
• Office with low capacity
= straightforward
• Warehouses, retail stores,
stadiums = not so easy

8. Warehouse
Retail

9. Warehouse / Retail designs
• Dynamic environment
• Tall shelves, clients close to floor level
• Legacy client devices
• Typically low bandwidth
• High speed vehicles
• Interferers likely

10. Standard Omni = Not Great

11. Directional or Downtilt Omni = Better

12. Tall shelves block some, not all

13. Choice of antennas
• Standard omni = not the best with high ceilings
• Highly directional = flexible
• Downtilt omni = easy, deterministic
• Don’t go with max power

14. Warehouse / Retail: Keep in Mind
• Aim for high SNR
• Know your client devices:
• Make a list of clients & their radios & supported rates
• Low-power clients  avoid max power in APs
• Check if low data rates are required
• 802.11b = Astronomical airtime consumption
• Account for ceiling height, shelf height
• Low data rates may also be good for
reliability

15. What about channel overlap?
• Exotic AP locations increase the risk for
excessive overlap
• Visualize overlap on a map and find a trade-off
between high signal strength and low
overlap (=good SNR, good capacity)

16. Get Help!
• There are folks who know a lot:
• Charlie Clemmer@charlieclemmer
• Andrew Von Nagy @revolutionwifi

17. Demo:
Warehouse design

18. Spectrum Analysis – Warehouse /
Retail
• Perform spectrum checks here & there
• Microwave ovens
• Bluetooth barcode scanners
• Wireless security cameras
• Leave analyzer running for hours during peak
hours

19. On-site surveys
• In “RF difficult environments”, an on-site survey is vital
• Survey carefully between the shelves
• Active and passive surveys
Passive = signal levels, SNR
Active = packet loss & delay
Observe roaming areas, use Survey Inspector
• 2.4 AND 5GHz
• For quick surveys, use multiple adapters at once

20. Demo:
Analyzing surveys
Survey inspector

21. Stadiums

22. About Stadium Deployments
• Ultra-high capacity requirements
• Tons of unassociated (probing) clients
 try to get them on the network
• Limited possibilities for AP placement
• Open environment
• A single AP can hear 100 other APs
• A single client can hear 100 APs

23. Planning Stadium Deployments
• First and foremost: Ask for help!
• Wi-Fi vendor, Twitter, online resources
• Industry has its experts: AT&T: Kevin, Cisco: Matt
and Josh, Aruba: Chuck
• Plan 3D on a 2D map
• Under seat, through concrete,
etc
• Aesthetic restrictions

24. Surveying Stadium Deployments
• First and foremost: Ask for help!
• Wi-Fi vendor, Twitter, online resources
• Industry has its experts: AT&T: Kevin, Cisco: Matt and Josh, Aruba: Chuck
• Empty vs full stadium = huge difference
• Multiple surveyors at once
• Survey direction can make a difference

25. Outdoor Deployments

26. Planning Outdoor Deployments
• Account for height of buildings
• Limited AP placement locations
• Antenna considerations
• Height
• Direction
• Downtilt
• If mountainous terrain, specialized tools are
required

27. Surveying Wide Areas
• GPS plots your location
 no clicking on the map
• Drive through surveys require fast scanning
during surveys
 Use multiple adapters
• Use external antenna on survey adapter?

28. Demo:
Outdoor Coverage Planning

29. High Capacity

30. “Capacity planning sucks,
because it’s complex”

31. Capacity calculations 101
How many users?
x How many devices per user?
+ How many other devices?
---
= Devices and their types
x Which applications are run on the devices?
====================
= Total capacity required

32. What else affects capacity?
- Areas to cover
- Types of end user devices
- Types of access points
- Channels/bands used
- Single / multiple floors
- Wall materials

33. ekahau.com/wifidesign
Twitter: @ekahau
Mail: wifidesign@ekahau.com
Blog: ekahau.com/wifidesign/blog
Phone: 1-866-4EKAHAU