For use very very very very old devices, i need to create a wireless network on band 2.4G but with B standard (11Mbits/s).
But, i’ve a problem to select the correct band, there only the old G standard.
Setting of band property on new wifi actually only limits the newest generation of wifi technology but allows all the older. So by setting band=2ghz-n one is allowing B, G and N, but not AX.
When constructing AP for really old devices, one has to be extra careful with security settings: B-only devices will likely require WEP encryption (with some luck, they would work with WPA gen 1). Some station devices also barf on seeing availability of newer encryption algorithms so it might be necessary to only add support for old algorithms and not the newer ones (WPA2, WPA3). It might be necessary to disable also mobility extensions (FT etc.).
It is even advisable to make a separate slave interface with settings only for those devices and make sure it’s properly shielded from the rest of your network (firewall, vlan, … whatever you like, as long as it is done).
If country/region is set to US, then it will be a,g,n,ac,ax . Set it to e.g. european country you should get b,g,n,ac,ax
At least with wireless (not ax hardware) you then get b,g,n,ac.
With hAP ax2, the ROS setting is not clear, and it is not in the list with " /interface/wifi/radio> print terse"
but the beacon clearly announces also the B channel, with band set to N
Even the basic rates is mainly the B channel.
(INSSIDer collects all beacons (cfr ‘export summary’ under File menu, viewed here with wireshark.)
Even worse. I don’t like the 1Mbps beacon rate on the ax hardware, but don’t know how to disable it.
1Mbps beacons, … 30 AP/SSID active and too much air-time is used for beacons only.
The RouterOS interface (Winbox, Webfig, Terminal) displayed information must be updated. The B is actually there!. The captured beacon was sent at 1Mbps (a B interface rate) with DSSS encoding , and the content of the beacon says " that AP supports B"
But a pure 802.11b might have a problem here.
E.G. a mAP Lite using WLAN driver , set to B only, generates following error: " requires more rates than we support" when requested to connect after a scan
If set to 2GHz-B/G/N and even on 2GHz-onlyN on the mAP, it will effectively work on 1 Mbps and 11 Mbps (the B rates), and then speed up if it can.
With beacons are at 1Mbps … not a very interesting wifi implementation. Wifi drivers only used on 1 ax MT here, the other 99 ac MT are still on WLAN driver.
