Networking
The full domain, and the other capabilities within it.
Enterprise Wi-Fi
Coverage is the easy half. Capacity under density is the other one.
What this is
Enterprise wireless is radio-frequency design, controller and policy configuration, and validation by survey. The deliverable is a network that performs at the density and in the physical conditions you actually have.
Most complaints described as coverage problems are capacity or roaming problems. Adding access points to a capacity problem makes it worse, because more radios in the same spectrum is more interference. Diagnosis before hardware, always.
When you need it
If more than one of these is true, this is usually the right place to start.
- Wi-Fi that works in the morning and degrades as the building fills.
- Users dropping calls while walking between areas — a roaming problem, not a coverage one.
- Access points placed by convenience of cabling rather than by RF design.
- A new fit-out, warehouse or outdoor area that needs designing before the walls go up.
What the scope covers
- Predictive RF design from floor plans, with construction materials accounted for rather than assumed.
- Site survey: passive and active measurement of what the building actually does to the signal.
- Controller and policy design: SSIDs, authentication, segmentation per user class, and quality of service.
- Roaming design so sessions survive movement, which is where voice and video actually fail.
- Post-installation validation survey, with the results measured against the design targets.
What you receive
| Deliverable | What it contains |
|---|---|
| RF design | Access point placement, channel and power plan, and predicted coverage with the assumptions listed. |
| Survey report | Measured signal, noise, interference and throughput, with the areas that miss target named. |
| Controller configuration | SSID and policy design, authentication integration, and per-class quality of service. |
| Validation report | Post-installation measurement against the design targets, with remediation for anything that misses. |
Reference architecture
A reference, not a template. Your estate decides which parts apply and in what order they arrive.
How success is measured
Targets are agreed with you before the work starts, and reported against for its duration.
- Signal and signal-to-noise against target, by area, measured rather than predicted.
- Client throughput at design density, tested with the number of devices the space actually holds.
- Roaming success rate across boundaries for latency-sensitive traffic.
Questions we are asked
Will more access points fix our problems?
Sometimes, and sometimes it is the cause. In a dense deployment, adding radios on overlapping channels raises the noise floor and every client gets slower. Measurement first tells you which case you are in.
Is a predictive design enough, or do we need a survey?
A predictive design is a good start and it is built on assumptions about walls and materials. A survey tests those assumptions. In a straightforward office the predictive design is often close; in warehouses, older buildings and anywhere with metal or glass, it is frequently wrong.
Should we move to the newest Wi-Fi standard?
It helps most in dense environments, and only if the clients support it — a network full of older devices gains little. It also does nothing for a design problem: a newer standard badly placed still performs badly.
How should guest access be handled?
On its own segment, with no path to internal resources, its own bandwidth limit and its own logging. That is a network design decision more than a wireless one, and it is where guest networks most often go wrong.
Can wireless carry voice reliably?
Yes, with roaming and quality of service designed for it. Voice is unusually sensitive to roaming delay, so a network that is fine for browsing can be unusable for calls — which is why roaming is designed rather than left to defaults.
What about outdoor or warehouse coverage?
Both need their own treatment: different antennas, mounting and weatherproofing outdoors, and in warehouses a design that accounts for stock height changing the RF environment as the racking fills and empties.
Continue reading
SD-WAN & SD-Branch
Application-aware path selection, local internet breakout and central policy across branches — with the security design decided before the circuits change.
Network Access Control
802.1X, device profiling and posture-based access — deployed in monitor mode first, so enforcement is based on what is actually on your network.
Start with an assessment
The fastest way to a useful answer is a short, scoped look at what you already have.