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WAP200E and WAP200 as repeaters, external antennas, poor signal

RobertLewisNJ
Level 1
Level 1

I am having some weird things happen...

I have setup a WAP200E external w/o optional antenna and using (2) WAP200 internal units in separate buildings setup as repeaters.  I have added a external

Yagi 10Dbi directional antenna to both repeaters with short cables and using the standard antenna for the internal wireless needs.

Both buildings are about 200' line of sight from the WAP200E with a angle of less then 45 degrees from the WAP200E,

I am getting a signal that continually jumps from 20% - 60% Channel keep changing etc...  looks like a typically poor signal connection

I am able to access the internet from either repeater, but not reliably

Question 1: External Antenna....

I was going to install a similar external Yagi antenna on WAP200E but I was reading that the external antenna in turned on automatically when the WAP200E

senses a antenna. Cisco only certifies one particular antenna to connect to the WAP200E and that is the  HGA9N which is a 9DBI omni directional antenna

I would much rather use a directional antenna, but I was reading that the WAP200E may not reconize any other antenna's, plus I cant find any way to determine if the WAP200E actually turns on the external antenna.   Does anyone have any experience using the WAP200E with external antennas?

Question 2:

SSID's on repeaters

On the WAP200E and WAP200 units, It show that that repeaters can have unique SSID's I tested them using the same SSID as the A/P and also with unique SSID's  Which approach would be the more reliable?

Question 3:

Freq Channels setting:

Typically I would set the channel to be fixed on all three units to keep them from hopping from channel to channel. Is my logic correct?

Is there any way to determine which channel is the best, beside trial and error?

Also, can I lock the speed to a slower setting to help improve reliability?

Question 4:

Bridging:

I was considering setting up one of the repeaters as a bridge can the WAP200E A/P handle communicating with a bridge and a repeater at the same time?

Does anyone have any experience using these as bridges?  I see a few issues online regarding briging with these units

Wireless is tough enough, but flakey wireless product can make you wish had a wire

Firmware... 1.20 on the WAP200E A/P unit.. I guess I will try 1.20a but the blogs say it doesnt matter

Firmware on the WAP200 unit is unknown at the moment

Thanks in advance

3 Replies 3

alissitz
Level 4
Level 4

Hello,

Is this still open?   Do please update this post so I know as to whether or not to respond.  I figured you may have called our support center, but I should ask first.

Kindest regards and have a wonderful day,

Andrew

RobertLewisNJ
Level 1
Level 1

Update...

After speaking with Linksys support staff, they informed me that the antenna jacks on the WAP200 are slightly different

One jack is TX & RX and the other jack is RX only...

It is not documented or labeled as such on the device.

The support person told me it was the right jack when facing the rear of the unit with the network jack facing you. but this is the way I

had it configured... so for giggles I swapped the antenna jacks and presto it works fine

Many thanks

Bob

Hello and thanks for the update. Good work getting this sorted, we are also discussing this on the SE team.  Dave Hornstein is leading this and seeing what we can do to make this easier / more clear.

Thanks again Bob, have a great night,

Andrew Lee Lissitz

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