At the well-intended advice of a friend, I’ve started my mikrotik affair with an hap ac2. Clearly, as I see it, it’s not a noob-friendly equipment but i managed to have it working ok - probably i’m using @ <10% of what it could do in professional hands but..
Now, it seems that the overall coverage is less than i need (I really don’t know what the hell this apartment is made of) and i bought an ac-lite, to “pair” it with ac2 as to cover the entire area ok. My plan is to install the ac-lite in the totally opposite corner of the apartment, connected via cable to the existing ac2, with both having same SSID.
Could any of you, kindly enough and willingly to aid a noob, guide me to this? Are any special configs that should be made to have it working properly? What should i set up for a computer linked to ac-lite to see & access the shares on a PC connected to ac2?
Status right now: hap ac2 (H1) is on 192.168.1.x and hap ac lite (H2) is on 192.168.2.x
Both have same SSID and pass and devices seem to switch to the stronger signal.
I am able to access the shares of a PC located behind H1 with a laptop behind H2.
Devices can access internet no matter what H they are connected to.
However, speed either on wired or wireless, while on H2, is very slow (wired is about 80 Mbps / max 450 Mbps) and wireless 5GHz about the same.
And i cannot connect to H2, by its given IP address by H1 - with a device behind H2, i can connect to webfig of H1. But with a devices behind H1, i cannot connect to webfig of H2.
I assume it has something to do with how the 2x Hs are set up but i’m clueless on what should i do next - any help would be deeply appreciated.
If you want to have seamless wireless coverage, then both APs should be in same IP network. If you’re using one of them as gateway to internet, then the other one (connected to first one’s LAN side) should only bridge wireless and ethernet interfaces, without any other functions whatsoever (routing, firewall, DHCP server, etc). Which means that the other one is currently over-configured.
If you’re comfortable configuring things from scratch, then you can do the following:
reset the other RB to no config
connect to it using winbox via MAC connection
create bridge and add all wired and wireless interfaces to it
add IP configuration to bridge interface - either static IP addess and set the first RB as default gateway and set DNS server … or enable DHCP client. IP setup is needed only by RB itself - management access and ROS upgrades download. Wireless devices, connecting to it, won’t use the other RB’s IP, they only need r+the bridge between ethernet and wireless
configure wireless … copy settings from first RB
This way devices connecting to the other RB will get IP address from DHCP server on the first RB. And connectiviry between all devices (regardless which RB serves the signal) will be as if they were connected to the same AP.
Hey Metod! Thanks for the guide - lacking the knowledge of doing it, last night i’ve spent some time to setting up as you said in the guide and.. it works
I mean, it works about almost as it should do but i think there are some things i probably need to set them correctly:
in the 2nd RB (H2), both wireless interfaces are set up as ap bridged; is this correct? the same in 1st RB (H1), both wifi interfaces are ap bridge
(happens mostly on iphone) - while on phone, if i erase the network details and try to connect to one of the wifi networks while being close to 2nd RB, there’s an error message; if i move closely to 1st RB, then registration is ok. is this normal?
1.) “ap-bridge” mode is default setting for access point and in addition to create access point for “normal” wireless clients it allows to construct a wireless bridge between wired parts of same network (the other end is tunning in station-bridge mode). The other AP mode is “bridge” for point-to-multipoint operation only (normal clients are not allowed).
2.) It is not normal. If all settings are the same, it shouldn’t matter for a wireless client which AP it’s trying to use. However, there have been some reports about incompatibilities between some Mikrotik APs and some iPhones. I don’t use the later so I don’t have any experience. You might want to search through this forum (try the Wireless section) to see if there are some recipes how to improve compatibility.
