Pointing the Cisco 3850 as a Mobility Controller to a central 2504 WLC anchor

[airinmotion]

There are multiple sites running 3850 as MA/MC with local Wireless access.

There is a 2504 running at a central location setup with a SSID for Internet access. The 2504 is running on software 7.6.120.

Can I setup a mobility anchor from the 3850 MC to the 2504 (with new Mobility enabled) to utilize the Internet Service ?

Most documentation I read seem to suggest to have the 3850 setup as MA and use a 5760 as a MC.

[Rasika Nayanajith]

I do not think 2504 can be mobility anchor for 3850/5760.

But if you could test it out that would be great.

This post gives you the reference UDP ports used for mobility.

https://supportforums.cisco.com/discussion/12030136/5760-mobility

Let us know if you get it working successfully

HTH

Rasika

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[ktan62]

What if I deploy a 5508 WLC at the central location.

1) Can I anchor the 3850 (running as MA/MC) back to a 5508 ? Do I need to convert all the 3850 to MA and deploy a 5760 as a MC in order to anchor back to the 5508 ?

2) If I am running new mobility on this 5508, can I also anchor the Cisco SRE 300 ISM back to the 5508 ?

Regards,

SK Lai

[Rasika Nayanajith]

1) Can I anchor the 3850 (running as MA/MC) back to a 5508 ? Do I need to convert all the 3850 to MA and deploy a 5760 as a MC in order to anchor back to the 5508 ?

If you have 5508 at central location, then branch 3850 running as MC/MA should be able to anchor to 5508 for guest traffic.

2) If I am running new mobility on this 5508, can I also anchor the Cisco SRE 300 ISM back to the 5508 ?

Not sure about this . if you  have a router, you could test that out.

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HTH

Rasika

[ktan62]

Hi Raski

"If you have 5508 at central location, then branch 3850 running as MC/MA should be able to anchor to 5508 for guest traffic."

For this case, is it a controller to controller link between the 3850 and 5508. We have tried to setup the anchor in this way, but failed. The reason we get after consulting Cisco is that the 5508 need to be upgraded to support new Mobility. 

Do you know what is the difference between a new and old mobility anchor. My undestanding is that anchor uses EOIP and CAPWAP is used between AP and MA. 

[Rasika Nayanajith]

Hi,

Yes, you have to enable "new mobility" on your 5508 in order to configure mobility peering with 3850/5760 MC. See the below post as it will illustrate the config involved.

http://mrncciew.com/2014/05/06/configuring-new-mobility/

With new mobility, WLCs  use UDP 16667 for inter-controller user data traffic instead of EoIP used in flat mobility (used between AireOS controllers).

HTH

Rasika

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[airinmotion]

Rasika,

I tested the NME-AIR-WLC6-K9 (Software version 7.0.230) on a Cisco 2821 (I cannot find a spare Cisco SRE 300 ISM to test). It cannot connect to a Cisco 5508 (Software version 7.6.130) running New Mobility. I must turn off New Mobility on the Cisco 5508 before the anchor connection can be established.

If I turn on New Mobility, Cisco 3850 MC connection will fail.

NME-AIR-WLC6-K9 only support Old Mobility and Cisco 3850 only support New Mobility.

Just an observation, Cisco 3850 connection to Cisco 5508 (New Mobility) takes about 5 minutes to come up completely.

Regards,

S.K Lai

[Rasika Nayanajith]

I tested the NME-AIR-WLC6-K9 (Software version 7.0.230) on a Cisco 2821 (I cannot find a spare Cisco SRE 300 ISM to test). It cannot connect to a Cisco 5508 (Software version 7.6.130) running New Mobility. I must turn off New Mobility on the Cisco 5508 before the anchor connection can be established

This is expected as 7.0.x only support EoIP based tunnel for inter-WLC data traffic. Once you enable new mobility on 5508, these inter-controller Data tunneling based on UDP (16667) instead of EoIP.

Unless both end configured for same tunneling method, it won't work. New mobility support in AireOS 7.6.x & 8.0.x as supported software version (it was supported 7.3.x & 7.5.x , but all those codes are deferred)

HTH

Rasika

[Dhiresh Yadav]

Hi ,

Very much possible.

Two ways:

> 3850 as MA , 5508 at central location as MC for all the location and anchor also for guest traffic. Please remember here all the client information (clients connecting to 802.1x) would be shared with 5508 as it is an MC.

>Can I anchor the 3850 (running as MA/MC) back to a 5508 ? Do I need to convert all the 3850 to MA and deploy a 5760 as a MC in order to anchor back to the 5508 ? This is also possible. This is a standard solution like CUWN Guest Anchor where 5508 can be placed in DMZ , 5760 as MC and 3850 as MA.5760 talks to 5508 instead of 3850 MA directly.

Regards

Dhiresh

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