Hi All, 

I have several wireless mikrotik deviecs all hardware wired to to my network and the wireless is bridged to the LAN, i use WPA2 for authentication.

I find that when mobile device roam around they don't move between access point very well the seem to hang with the current access point rather than move to one with a stronger signal, is the a better way of doing this, should i be using WDS or something similar to allow the client to move more natural?

Thanks, 

Rooneybuk

Hi
you should set same ssid on all your wireless device
you should bridge wlan1 and ether1 on all your wireless device
your should all your wireless device connect to switch with ether1
you should buy Ethernet router (RB951Ui-2HnD)
you should run dhcp server and nat on interface on a ethernet router and then interface on ethernet router connect to switch
Good Luck

Hi
you should set same ssid on all your wireless device
you should bridge wlan1 and ether1 on all your wireless device
your should all your wireless device connect to switch with ether1
you should buy Ethernet router (RB951Ui-2HnD)
you should run dhcp server and nat on interface on a ethernet router and then interface on ethernet router connect to switch
Good Luck

Thanks for this, I already do what you have mentioned but it the technology to allow roaming between the AP's more intuitive

also you can use CAPsMAN for this project

Will CAPsMAN allow seamless roaming between APs

You can use signal level for disconnection, but without support 802.11 r,k,v in RouterOS you have all that is possible for now.

Not knowing of 802.11r until yesterday, I have tried co-channel, same SSID & different channel SSID. Both attempts resulted in VoIP disconnect when moving from one AP coverage to another. My test mobile device is a Pixel-XL on undated and current firmware and Android OS, part of ProjectFi. If that pocket device is not ready to do roaming, what would be? It is supposed be a wifi enabled telephone, and it has a conventional telephone number and can do SMS. My test APP is Zoiper.

As a radio person I know I can set up this way: The same channel, SSID, and MAC address. Signals will interfere, but VoIP does not use much transmission capacity. As my APs have pretty nice coverage without too much overlap, it may work. If the radio frequency were in sync, and the encryption code in sync, interfering signals would look just like bounces off walls. If the speed is locked down to the lowest rate possible, that being 1 mb/s, then signal would be very robust against interference. (SEE Shanon's law). So I will try this. The problem is that if I do this, use of the signal for purposes requiring higher data rates will suffer and the scheme would fail in large places like schools and airports.

For better results I could turn off encryption, removing encryption sync as a problem. So I intend to try that, and use MAC access control. Then maybe run a second SSID overlay.

Mikrotik: Get with it. You are so good. 802.11r cannot be beyond your capacity. We should march forward to the future. Not back to a slow past.

I will try my home experiment. I will report back.

P.S. Maybe I should use my time trying to get my SDR up and running with an LTE signal on an empty cell channel, with just enough power to cover this property. And not waste it with this stuff of the past. Argh.

Hi Lansman,

any news on your home experiment? I am keen on your insights..
Thanks a lot, empy

[edit: I just noticed the dates: this is almost two years old thread]

@rooneybuk Lower the transmit power on your APs.

Client devices will decide when to roam. Most devices will just track RSSI and when it is strong enough they won't roam even if there is a better signal available. The RSSI doesn't tell anything about the connection quality, since the connection is always bidirectional. Even with a strong RSSI the connection can be terrible if the AP can't receive the client. This is a common phenomenon when you have a big difference in the transmit powers between the AP and the client. Mobile devices transmit at 12-14dBm typically. There is no point in transmitting with higher power on the AP.

When you lower your transmit power on the AP the client device will see the RSSI degrade at the same pace as the AP sees the client's RSSI degrade. The AP can't do anything about it, but the client will start looking for a better AP. Of course there are bad clients (iPhone 4 was notorious) that won't roam no matter what.

CAPsMAN is for management only and won't have any effect on roaming. Wi-Fi roaming is client's decision and responsibility (as opposed to cell phone roaming, where it is the opposite).

@petri thanks for replying, I never really came to a good solution for this how would you recommend reducing power I've read you can increase antenna gain or the tx power.

Either way, the net effect is the same.

I usually set the Frequency Mode to regulatory-domain, Tx Power Mode to default and then adjust the antenna gain. That will protect me from doing anything silly. Check the Status tab for actual power level.