Point-to-Multipoint issues

[glennt]

I recently hired a company to install a wireless point to multipoint network. I am having a lot of connection issues. I am beginning to belive that the bugs will never be worked out. There is a backbone or backhaul link between the main office and the tower, 1000 feet apart. the side of the bridge on the tower plugs into a switch where 2 other bridges are pluged into. One antenna is pointed to three small buildings in one area, each of these buildings have external antennas that plug into little switches or directly into computers. The other bridge on the tower points to just one building. The remote workstations approximately 15 total are members of the Windows domain. All the bridges and workstations are on the same network as the lan. I was told that all the remote workstations would be able to logon to the Domain, access shares, browse shared internet, and use outlook to connect to the exchange server, it would be just like they were on the lan except a little slower. This works spotty at best. Currently my vpn is more consistant. These Bridges slow down so I have to reboot them daily to get the speed back. Sometimes they locks up completely and have to be manually rebooted. From the server I can ping all the bridge ips and the workstations behind them and get anywhere from 3ms to 7ms on average. From the workstations back to the server the ping times are usually longer. Is this a sign of a problem? What are decent ping times? What other tests can I use to determine what can be the problem. One thing that may be strange is that there are no routers or other equiptment between the lan and bridges, a network cable goes right out of our switch into the 1st bridge. Is a device required there to manage traffic? I like everything on the same network but am willing to try anything to get reliable performance, even if its slow. Sorry for all the rambling, this is my first post and I don't know what else to do.

Glenn

[M/Q]

I have several questions first.

What is the make/model of the devices being used? Are there any physical obstacles in the paths? What channels are being used. For instance are the three devices on the tower all using the same channel?

Are there any other wireless networks in the immediate vicinity? If so what channels are they on?

What is the total number of users that will be on this system at any given time? What is the average bandwidth requirement per user? Are they authenticating to the domain at this time? What do you mean when you say your VPN is more consistent?

Sorry for the amount of questions, but they are important.

[FlaWireless]

Answer the questions that M/Q have and use this product also......its free :)
http://www.ixiacom.com/products/performance_applications/pa_display.php?skey=pa_q_check

[marlehole]

Hello Glennt,

It was with passing interest I started reading your story, but when I got to the last paragraph is when the horror hit me.

You hired a company, no problem! what do you mean, "Want all users to be on the same network"; You seem to be confusing the words "same network" with a phrase "Network Interoperability"; and it's frightening.

That company seem to have taken the phrase, "Same network..." and did not install proper routing, by your account "no router between the LAN and Bridges" in your network. This seem frightening; How is the traffic segented? Where is the Authentication? anyone having access seems to have a direct path to your servers; in fact, the only prevention seem to be a password. Where is the Security? The QoS?. 3ms - 7ms is fair since you're directly connected; question is what's the ping times on the wider Internet; but that's not a quarter the issue.

You seem to have greater issues than connectivity. I hope you can find someone not a "company" that sees the difference, and more understands what's truely needed.