cAP ax 7.10 roaming - no internet for 5+ min

RouterOS Wireless Networking
1

Upgraded my 2x cAP ac to 3 x cAP ax together with 7.10

Just basic home setup - 5ghz only, country, 20/40 non-dfs channels, WPA3 off, connected to RB5009

While roaming on default config most(all) devices reported no internet for 5+ min randomly. Turn on/off did not help.

Traced it down to:
In some cases devices roam cleanly, disconnect from ap1, connect to ap2
Other times it does not disconnect from ap1 but at the same time connects to ap2

It sits in registration table on e.x. AP1 for 6+ min, timeouts (from logs) and internet is back.
While it’s down I can access AP gui but can not ping RB5009

While device is down there is no arp entry for device on RB5009
Doing “interface bridge host print where mac-address=…” shows empty
Once registration time outs, RB5009 shows entry for bridge/ether7 (or whatever current port AP is on)

Turned off rstp on all bridges, did not help.
ip->settings->arp timeout did not allow me to go lower than 30sec
But once I changed bridge->arp timeout and arp ageing to 10sec devices still report no internet but only for 3-6 seconds which is more acceptable than 5+ min.


Today I was shutting down my macbook air while registration table was open on pc and noticed that entry did not go away.


Could be new wave2 has some issues with stations disconnecting ?

2

Q: why replace 2x cap AC with 3x cap AX ? AX has better range/coverage then ac from my experience ?
Just wondering.

Have you already tried downgrading to 7.8?
Does the same happen then?
Can be interesting to know …

I know, I know but there are simply too much wifi issues since 7.9 and 7.10 for quite a lot of users though I must say I am not one of them. My devices are on 7.10 and (knock on head … errm, wood) so far stable.

3

Ahh, more AP’s just to cover some dark areas and can tune power down together with more flexibility to do scheduled wifi on/off depending which area it is :slight_smile:

7.10 is okay for me as well, disabled wpa3 and some errors/warning went away, just that roaming stickiness bug. Don’t want to downgrade, I’ll wait for 7.11

4

Would you mind sharing your config? Especially on the channels?

As you mentioned 40MHz non-DFS, there could be overlap (unless you are using channels from 149 and up as well).
Did you optimize transmission power?
How about RSSI numbers? How high is the signal strength on the places where you have roaming issues?

5

With rssi you mean signal strength ?

Which brings me to: did you already try to use access list rules to actively kick of devices with a too low signal level ?
Clients tend to hang on to an AP for as long as they can, sometimes even way below what is still acceptable.
Access rules can help to “convince” them to move over.
On my devices:


/interface wifiwave2 access-list
add action=accept allow-signal-out-of-range=30s disabled=no interface=any signal-range=-67..120 ssid-regexp=""
add action=reject allow-signal-out-of-range=1s disabled=no interface=any signal-range=-120..-68 ssid-regexp=""
6 
/interface bridge
add admin-mac=48:A9:8A:C2:8D:89 ageing-time=10s arp-timeout=10s auto-mac=no name=bridge protocol-mode=none
/interface ethernet
set [ find default-name=ether2 ] disabled=yes
/interface wifiwave2
set [ find default-name=wifi2 ] channel.band=2ghz-ax .skip-dfs-channels=all .width=20mhz configuration.country=\
    "New Zealand" .mode=ap .ssid=w security.authentication-types=wpa2-psk,wpa3-psk .wps=disable
set [ find default-name=wifi1 ] arp-timeout=10s channel.band=5ghz-ax .frequency=5180 .skip-dfs-channels=all .width=20/40mhz \
    configuration.country="New Zealand" .mode=ap .ssid=w disabled=no name=wifi5 security.authentication-types=wpa2-psk \
    .group-key-update=1h .wps=disable
/interface list
add comment=defconf name=WAN
add comment=defconf name=LAN
/interface bridge port
add bridge=bridge interface=ether1
add bridge=bridge interface=wifi5
add bridge=bridge interface=wifi2




/interface bridge
add admin-mac=48:A9:8A:C2:94:D5 ageing-time=10s arp-timeout=10s auto-mac=no name=bridge protocol-mode=none
/interface ethernet
set [ find default-name=ether2 ] disabled=yes
/interface wifiwave2
set [ find default-name=wifi2 ] channel.band=2ghz-ax .skip-dfs-channels=all .width=20mhz configuration.mode=ap .ssid=w \
    security.authentication-types=wpa2-psk,wpa3-psk
set [ find default-name=wifi1 ] arp-timeout=10s channel.band=5ghz-ax .frequency=5220 .skip-dfs-channels=all .width=20/40mhz \
    configuration.country="New Zealand" .mode=ap .ssid=w disabled=no name=wifi5 security.authentication-types=wpa2-psk \
    .group-key-update=1h .wps=disable
/interface list
add comment=defconf name=WAN
add comment=defconf name=LAN
/interface bridge port
add bridge=bridge interface=ether1
add bridge=bridge interface=wifi5
add bridge=bridge interface=wifi2

it roams okay, just does not disconnect some times from old AP which by the looks causes ARP issues

Don’t think I need to kick as devices nowadays start looking for new AP around 65-70db and even if I do kick, client is disconnected, it’s just stuck on old AP I guess ?

They are around 10m apart, through 3x dry walls, still need to move one 5m or so away.

I have not done power down tune yet as have to move one of them, but would it affect disconnect ?

One is on 5180, other 5220

7

Same issue here. Hunted it down to the 5min bridge ageing time, reduced that to 10 and things are OK. Interestingly same setup works with ac wifi.