Greetings, this is first post here.

A pair of AP-905s, and their environment is: asdl line via a Zyxel router (that's set to handle the DHCP and set to allocate a static IP to both) & ethernet to the first AP-905. That's fine, and setting it up as a standalone access point was a breeze.

I've not had success in setting up a Vigormesh network. With the first given the role of 'Root' and connected to what will be the node access point by ethernet, I can see that the latter has an IP address that can be pinged.

I can use AP adoption to bring it into the mesh and the Mesh Status page lists it as 'Online' - it's still linked by ethernet to the mesh root. It then appears that the mesh root doesn't automatically configure the mesh node - though on the 'Device list' tab the 'edit' button against the  mesh node settings allow a one-time push of the settings to the node.

When the ethernet cable to the node is disconnected, the node retains the settings but the mesh status page shows that the wifi link between root and node is at zero strength and the node is inactive.

On the 'Role Setup' page I'm unsure what 'Enable AP management' means - that is, management by who or what? (The group account and password that were set as part of the set up do not allow me to log in to the access points management page).

Not having a background in networks, I'd be interested in other people's experience with this...

Mark

 

Having tried setting up a Vigormesh without success, followed that by updating the firmware to 7.06 on both (worked fine) and setting up an Easymesh, (didn't work). The firmware version 7.06 extends the set of tools available to monitor wifi activity which is useful.

Those two range extending options put aside for now, I set things up for WDS distribution. Or rather, didn't. No joy.

The solution to this (my skills aside) might be to wait and allow the web based management to mature a bit - it's capable of being out of date as to the current status of a particular device (e.g. earlier it was still listing it as having the previous firmware version after the access point had accepted the current version, and it's currently indicating that the access point that was set to be a node is online - which it is not, it's unplugged from its power supply and sitting on the naughty step).

Next though... I'll set things up as a range extender and see what happens.

Mark

Setting the 2nd access point as a range extender worked and the setup now meets my needs, so, thoughts of a WDS or mesh network are put aside.

It took me a long time to get the 2nd access point working as a range extender, and when it did start working, not sure if that coincided with me changing anything in particular - perhaps the system's in DHCP hell for some reason or another.

A new issue though: it would be good to make a backup of the successful configuration, but on both access point, this fails with "Download failed. Incorrect input format."

Mark

 

A new issue though: it would be good to make a backup of the successful configuration, but on both access point, this fails with "Download failed. Incorrect input format."

Hi @Mark A ,

DrayOS5 strikes again!
I'm prepared to wager that you have some spaces in the device name field. If you delete all spaces from the device name, then you should be able to save the config.

John.

That was it, thanks for this. That works now..

Less positive is that the sucess with setting one AP up as a range extender did not persist. I'm not near to trapping the issue yet, but it reeks of DHCP badness, the client on the range extender access point becomes persistently unpingable from the root AP let alone the router that's handling the IP addresses.

Mark

Just checking - before you disconnected the ethernet cable from the node did you go into the mesh setup page and tick the "wireless uplink" box? With my 906 (and previous 960c's) the "find and configure" nevre seemed to work over wifi, I always had to connect by cable first.