Channel Management

When Channel Management is enabled, the U.S. Robotics Professional Access Point automatically assigns radio channels used by clustered access points to reduce mutual interference (or interterference with other access points outside of its cluster). This maximizes WiFi bandwidth and helps maintain the efficiency of communication over your wireless network.

How it Works in a Nutshell

At a specified interval (the default is 1 hour) or on demand (click Update), the Channel Manager maps APs to channel use and meausures interference levels in the cluster. If significant channel interference is detected, the Channel Manager automatically re-assigns some or all of the APs to new channels per an efficiency algorithm (or automated channel plan).

Configuring and Viewing Channel Management Settings

The Channel Management page shows previous, current, and planned channel assignments for clustered access points. By default, automatic channel assignment is disabled. You can start channel management to optimize channel usage across the cluster on a scheduled interval.

From this page, you can view channel assignments for all APs in the cluster, stop/start automatic channel management, and manually "update" the current channel map (APs to channels). On a manual update, the Channel Manager will assess channel usage and, if necessary, re-assign APs to new channels to reduce interference based on the current Advanced Settings.

By using the Advanced settings you can modify the interference reduction potential that triggers channel re-assignment, change the schedule for automatic updates, and re-configure the channel set used for assignments.

The following sections describe how to configure and use channel management on your network:

Stopping/Starting Automatic Channel Assignment

Click Start to resume automatic channel assignment.

When automatic channel assignment is enabled, the Channel Manager periodically maps radio channels used by clustered access points and, if necessary, re-assigns channels on clustered APs to reduce interference (with cluster members or other APs outside the cluster).


Note	Channel Management overrides the default cluster behavior, which is to synchronize radio channels of all APs across a cluster. When Channel Management is enabled, the radio Channel is not synched across the cluster to other APs. See the note under Radio Settings in Settings Shared in the Cluster Configuration.

Click Stop to stop automatic channel assignment. (No channel usage maps or channel re-assignments will be made. Only manual updates will affect the channel assignment.)

Viewing Current Channel Assignments and Setting Locks

The "Current Channel Settings" shows a list of all access points in the cluster by IP Address. The display shows the band on which each AP is broadcasting (a or b), the current channel used by each AP, and an option to "lock" an AP on its current radio channel so that it cannot be re-assigned to another. Details about Current Channel Settings are provided below.


Field	Description
IP Address	Specifies the IP Address for the access point.
Band	Indicates the band (b/g or a) on on which the access point is broadcasting.
Current	Indicates the radio Channel on which this access point is currently broadcasting.
Locked	Click "Locked" if you want to this access point to remain on the current channel. When the "Locked" checkbox is checked (enabled) for an access point, automated channel management plans will not re-assign the AP to a different channel as a part of the optimization strategy. Instead, APs with locked channels will be factored in as requirements for the plan. If you click Update, you will see that locked APs show the same channel for "Current Channel" and "Proposed Channel". Locked APs will keep their current channels.

Update Current Channel Settings (Manual)

You can run a manual channel management update at any time by clicking Update under the Current Channel Settings display.

Viewing Last Proposed Set of Changes

The Last Proposed Set of Channel Changes shows the last channel plan. The plan lists all access points in the cluster by IP Address, and shows the current and proposed channels for each AP. Locked channels will not be re-assigned and the optimization of channel distribution among APs will take into account the fact that locked APs must remain on their current channels. APs that are not "Locked" may be assigned to different channels than they were previously using, depending on the results of the plan.

Configuring Advanced Settings (Customizing and Scheduling Channel Plans)

If you use Channel Management as provided (without updating Advanced Settings), channels are automatically fine-tuned once every hour if interference can be reduced by 25 percent or more. Channels will be re-assigned even if the network is busy. The appropriate channel sets will be used.

These defaults are designed to satisfy most scenarios where you would need to implement channel management.

You can use Advanced Settings to modify the interference reduction potential that triggers channel re-assignment, change the schedule for automatic updates, and re-configure the channel set used for assignments


Field	Description
Advanced	Click "Advanced" toggle to show / hide display settings that modify timing and details of the channel planning algorithm. By default, these settings are hidden.
Change channels if interference is reduced by at least	Specify the minimum percentage of interference reduction a proposed plan must achieve in order to be applied. The default is 25 percent. Use the drop-down menu to choose percentages ranging from 25 percent to 75 percent. This setting lets you set a gating factor for channel re-assignment so that the network is not continually disrupted for minimal gains in efficiency. For example, if channel interference must be reduced by 75 percent and the proposed channel assignments will only reduce interference by 30 percent, then channels will not be re-assigned. However; if you re-set the minimal channel interference benefit to 25 percent and click "Update", the proposed channel plan will be implemented and channels re-assigned as needed.
Determine if there is better set of channels every	Use the drop-down menu to specify the schedule for automated updates. A range of intervals is provided, from "1 Minute" to "6 Months" The default is "1 Hour" (channel usage re-assessed and the resulting channel plan applied every hour).
Use these channels when applying channel assignments	Choose a set of of non-interfering channels. The choices are: b/g channels 1-6-11 b/g channels 1-4-8-11 IEEE 802.11b/802.11g modes (802.11 b/g) support use of channels 1 through 11.
Apply channel modifications even when the network is busy	Click to enable or disable this setting. A checkmark showing indicates it is enabled and channel modifications will be applied even when the network is busy. If this is not checked, channel modifications will not be applied on a busy network. This setting (along with the interference reduction setting) is designed to help weigh the cost/benefit impact on network performance of re-assigning channels against the inherent disruption it can cause to clients during a busy time.

Update Advanced Settings

Advanced settings will take affect when they are applied, and influence how automatic channel management is performed. (The new interference reduction minimum, scheduled tuning interval, channel set, and network busy settings will be taken into account for automated and manual updates.)