Smart Mesh is an excellent innovation of the Nebula Cloud Solution, which allows Nebula access-points to interact wireless and repeat the signal throughout your home or facility.
Smart Mesh works in a way that out of a multitude of access-points, only one of the access-points remains cabled to the main infrastructure ("root AP"), while the other units can be placed throughout the facility within the coverage range of the root AP. These units ("repeater AP") will interconnect with the root AP and build a wireless bridge and repeat the SSID in which the root AP is propagating.
This makes WiFi-installations so much easier, as you do not necessarily are dependent on ethernet-cabling on-site anymore.
Get rid of all the boundaries which come with traditional cabling and mesh your home today, the smart way!
6. Successfully connected (Verification)
7. Smart-Mesh enhancement #1 - Disable Mesh Downlink
8. Smart-Mesh enhancement #2 - Specify Uplink AP
9. Smart-Mesh enhancement #3 - Failover in Smart-Mesh
1.Supported model list:
2. Configuration Guide
In order to set up Smart Mesh, first, you need to have two Smart Mesh compatible access-points connected to the same site, one of them being connected via Ethernet cable to the main network infrastructure.
Set up respective SSID-profiles to your likings via
AP > Configuration > SSID
Afterward, navigate to
Access point > Configure > AP & port settings
and make sure to activate the "Smart Mesh"-Slider:
3. How "Smart Mesh" works
Root AP – Any AP that is directly connected to the wired network and can reach the gateway. If a Root AP loses connection to the gateway, the Root AP will change to the repeater role.
Repeater AP – Any AP that is not directly connected to the wired network or has no connection to the gateway.
Default Mesh – The mesh that forms between Root AP and Repeater AP's BEFORE Repeater AP's has been successfully added to the site. This mesh uses a common mesh ID among all Nebula AP's.
Site Mesh – The mesh that forms between Root AP and Repeater AP's AFTER Repeater AP's has been successfully added to the site. This mesh uses a unique ID shared between AP’s in the same Nebula site.
That means that the AP's (from a specific firmware) not necessarily need to be connected with a cable to be provisioned by NEBULA. Only adding them to your site will allow them to communicate with the root AP via Site Mesh.
4. Configuring a wireless link to bridge to a wired network
Note! Bridging to LAN requires Nebula Professional Pack
5. Things to consider
- Establish mesh across multiple wireless hops (no limit)
- Recommended wireless hops: less than 2 hops from wired network
- Rule of thumb: throughout is halved across each wireless hop
Building up a mesh network, the smart mesh will usually build up via 5G first and if the signal is not good enough, it will change to 2.4G connection.
6. Successfully connected (Verification)
The units should show online and by different symbols:
The hollow-green-symbol indicates that the respective AP is working as a repeater AP, while the color-filled icon displays the AP is running as a root AP.
Congratulations, you have set up successfully Smart Mesh on your Nebula devices!
7. Smart-Mesh enhancement #1 - Disable Mesh Downlink
Since Firmware 6.30 we can now disable the Smart-Mesh Downlink on Repeater APs to avoid other Mesh APs siphoning away Bandwidth.
To deactivate the Downlink, go to:
Access Point > Monitor > Access Point > "Specific AP"
Then edit the Smart-Mesh and disable the Downlink.
Please note that the AP will still be functioning as a Mesh AP.
8. Smart-Mesh enhancement #2 - Specify Uplink AP
We can now specify which AP should be used as the main Uplink.
To do so, go to:
Access Point > Monitor > Access Point > "Specific AP"
Then edit the Smart-Mesh and chose the main root AP for this repeater AP.
9. Smart-Mesh enhancement #3 - Failover in Smart-Mesh
This function depends on having chosen a specific root AP for this repeater AP (see point 8 above).
When the repeater AP fails to connect to the specified root AP, it will then connect to other available APs to keep the Internet connection up.
The Error status will be displayed on the AP List:
Access Point > Monitor > Access Point
The Administrator can manually trigger a reconnect from the AP status list.
Comments
1 comment
Hi,
at the beginning of the article it is explained that the mesh devices (AP without ethernet) must be within the coverage of the root access point (AP ethernet)
"Smart Mesh works in a way that out of a multitude of Accesspoints, only one of the Accesspoints remain cabled to the main infrastructure ("root AP"), while the other units can be placed throughout the facility within coverage range of the root AP."
Subsequently, however, it seems possible to perform the mesh configuration across multiple device
"4. Things to consider
Smart Mesh
So if I have an access point on the 1st floor (AP ethernet), one on the 2nd floor (AP without ethernet), and one on the 3rd floor (AP without ethernet)
Will the connection follow the following example?
or the following scheme?
Thank you
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