Site Survey Master

A VOLUME 1 – Summary of Site Review Process and Introduction

Wireless Site Walk Report

Issue Status: FINAL

This document contains proprietary information of MSA and is provided upon the condition that the information contained herein will be held in confidence and will not be duplicated

or disseminated to others, in whole or in part, without the written permission of MSA.

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Contents

1 Introduction .................................................................................................. 32 Background .................................................................................................. 43 RF Requirements for Planning & AP Layout ................................................ 64 WLAN & Network Equipment for Survey Planning ....................................... 95 Procedure for survey planning, AP layout & reporting................................. 10

OTHER REFERENCE DOCUMENTS:

”Company” Solution Architecture – Aruba Global Wireless Deployment”Company” Design and Architecture TemplateClearPass Design Case Descriptions and Instructions, including:o OnBoarding Instructionso Guest AccessSite Survey Protocol DocumentHTF Pilot – Test Results Document

ABBREVIATIONS LIST



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1. Introduction

“Company” is progressing to an ARUBA Networks Wireless Access Layer for primary and full access to their Communications and Network Infrastructure. “Company” operates a BYOD culture for Employees and Contractors, needing monitoring, management, security and reporting features to maintain the network performance, security and experience.

“Company’s” global roll-out of Aruba WLAN, Security and Management Network Suite of Products is founded upon the Aruba Global Wireless Deployment Solution Architecture Document completed after “Proof of Concept” and “Pilot” Projects proving the Aruba WLAN Solution, ClearPass for Network Authorization and Access, AirWave for Network monitoring and management; and inter-operation with existing other OEM legacy WLANs currently in place, to allow a phased execution of their transition Plans.These planning documents are split into a volume 1 Master Document setting out the approach and goals for the Site Reviews, and volume 2’s which will give the specific results, BOMs and define the Scopes of Work for individual “Company” Buildings and Campuses.

The access network is to provide a 802.11 ac/n/a/g WLAN, achieving the highest performance levels and identical experience to a wired environment, enabling real time communications applications, business services functionality and application use, for user devices, with multi-factor authentication, with monitoring and management functionality.

This document, and its individual site report addendums, will confirm the “Company” model of Critical Site, Medium Site or Small Site; producing the AP Layout for assigned location, WLAN BOM, Cabling BOM, and LAN infrastructure requirements required to support the new roll-out incorporating the requirements of the agreed Infrastructure Architecture.

Each site will be added as an addendum to this master document and lay out the detail and methodology of the work for completion of each assessment, whilst also giving an over-view of the building, infrastructure and functional use – tailoring the WLAN so performance to the Solutions Architecture Plan is achieved.

Note: Employees should be advised to purchase equipment that is dual band capable (2.4 & 5 GHz), and be encouraged to buy ~ac and ~n devices, as these minimize “On-Air” time and achieve the highest throughput in that minimum time.



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2. Background

ABOUT “Company”:“Company” is installing a new ARUBA Networks 802.11ac WLAN in many of their Building location, to replace their existing legacy WLAN Networks. Also this refresh will be undertaken at their other primary theatre Campus’s, and in some of their other Office locations in the US and around the World.

“Company” operate a BYOD environment, where workers (employees and contract staff) almost exclusively use personally owned devices to perform their duties; unless security or corporate requirements predicate the use of company owned laptops.

The network is designed for building full occupancy with high capacity users, each with multiple devices (up to 3), with the key delivery preferred layer being the high performance 5 GHZ (a/n/ac) frequency; using data, voice and video WLAN application services, and to allow Lync, with full quality functionality with video/voice /presentation features, and other business services to be delivered over the WLAN.

ABOUT “Company’s” WLAN:

This Summary Design & Logistics Pre-Implementation Document is to provide“Company” with an AP layout for a new Wireless Local Area Network matching“Company” Requirements in their Architecture Aruba Global Wireless DeploymentDocument, and to provide physical details of existing core network equipment to review against architecture requirements, for high capacity users having multiple and different types of devices are ranging from Laptops through tablets to phones on the WLAN. The WLAN is to be the high availability primary network access delivery mode for all users.Types of devices that users will use for the majority of their network requirements are:

o Laptops (Windows & MAC OSX)Receive sensitivity usually 0-5 dBm from baseline

o Tablet Computers (Win8.x, such as Surface Pro 2 or variants)Receive sensitivity usually 0-5 dBm from baseline

o Tablets (Droid & iPads)Receive sensitivity usually 5-10 dBm from baseline

o Smart Phones (Droid & iPhones)Receive sensitivity usually 5-15 dBm from baseline

o Soft VoIP phone applicationso Monitoring Devices for maintenance use



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The WLAN design criterion and requirements are to provide 100% high availability WLAN 802.11 ac/n/a/g wireless coverage in both the 2.4 GHz (g/n) and 5 GHz (a/n/ac) frequency bands, delivering 802.11ac performance for capable devices and full performance for the other legacy devices that are 802.11 n/a/g.

The WLAN will be configured to VoLAN standards in both frequencies, and priorities for both Voice & Video Packet Signatures will be made; Lync optimizations will be added, and QoS tagging set to match the “Company” end to end standards for Lync and other prioritized services.

AP layout and density has been optimized for the plan user density, for up to 10-12 Lync users per AP with concurrent other general WLAN use; and with a very even AP distribution and spacing to assist with service high availability, and facilitate roaming so devices maintain the best performance by keeps the highest MCS/NSS data rates.

“Company’s” CAMPUS and OFFICE REQUIREMENTS:

The “Company” WLAN design for end user sites is broken down into three different classes.

Critical (Large) Sites/HQ (Multiple MPLS and Multiple Internet)Medium Sites (MPLS and Internet) – 100 to 500 people.Small Sites (Single MPLS Only) – less than 100 people

RF PREDICTIVE TOOL - VisualRFIn the Pilot phase of “Company” Aruba Project in Building HTF of their Campus, the RF planning tool, AirWave’s VisualRF was proven against testing and AirMagnet Survey Tool data to validate its settings and results plots created.

These are comprehensively described in those documents:“Company” Solution Architecture – Aruba Global Wireless DeploymentHTF Pilot – Test Results Document



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3. RF Requirements for Planning & AP Layout

The 802.11ac design criteria metrics below will provide the highest levels of ~ac and legacy performance meeting “Company” requirements criteria for Lync and other Business Service requirements.

The general level of RF floor coverage, for ~.ac performance, is:-50 dBm to -55 dBm levels with minimum -65 dBmSNR values of 25 - 30 dBmPlanned AP spacing of 40 to 50 feet (12 – 16 m) on centre40-50% cell overlap of graded RF dBm levelsPlanned spacing 40-50 feet center to center between AP’s

The WLAN is designed to provide multi-layered inter and intra frequency AP coverage, that is tuned by power and OS configuration to promote fast roaming and allow sticky clients to relocate to a near AP. Device roaming is largely controlled by the client device, but with the features of current ARUBA OS and best practice configuration settings clients can be directed to optimum performance.

AP layouts are also critical to achieving or maintaining these performance targets, and can be overridden in the final design, to the detriment of the WLAN, by requirements of undesirable numbers of APs, uneven spacing of APs, aesthetics and architectural compromises, or impracticalities due to mounting issues – these have been mitigated in the analysis for this building.

Each Building and layout of APs often requires different optimization and tuning due to differing architectural features, uses of different building techniques or construction materials, space layout and use cases.

TARGETS FOR PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND TESTING:

The High Capacity and High Availability AP Layouts designed for these buildings will be tuned by power settings and the Aruba OS Configuration features, to the provide coverage within the ranges of RF Levels & distance of AP individual coverage settings defined above.

Power settings – all devices types will be used in these buildings, laptops tablets & phones. All devices have different transmit & receive sensitivities, so tablets and phones can register received level -5 to -15dBm lower than PCs, and PCs have variability due to NICs and driver SW updates. AP power will be set to mirror or be slightly lower than the median device – here a Tablet with a transmit power range maximum of +12 to +15dBm TX.



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Individual APs “cells” are to be well-defined and set to provide localized coverage for each AP to maintain devices on high MCS/NSS rates. Then as devices move away roaming is promoted so devices transition to other APs and maintain high rates, before degrading service by sticking to an AP for too long and being to distant thus degrading PHY rate with low RF dBm and SNR values.

Roaming - Devices should roam as they move 2-3 APs away on a well optimized network. As a computer /device moves and transitions away from an AP, it needs to decide to or be directed to change to a new closer AP with a stronger RF signal to maintain the best PHY and Data rates for throughput and performance. Note: as a device roams on a 802.1x WLAN a re-authorization is required.

Device Performance – Device models and classification types can have very different performance levels and characteristics due to:

different OS Systems or release levelswireless NICs (network interface cards) and driver levelstransmit and maximum power levels available

Consequently a devices effective range is set where they can optimally be able to “talk” bi-directionally to APs, in the 802.11 half-duplex environment.

PLANNED USE OF RF FREQUENCIES:

The WLAN and future additional WLAN clients will be directed and configured to use the 5 GHz Spectrum Band for Primary Access for delivery of voice/telephone applications and services for optimum performance, fast throughput and carrying capacity.

Additionally the WLAN design will be VoWLAN tuned and ready on the 2.4 GHz Band as many devices still currently only have the capability to use that g/n frequency and modulation protocol. In a discrete location, several APs offer excellent coverage at graduated stepped power levels (-5 to -10dBm lower each) on orthogonal channels, so load can be shared between adjacent APs, and with Aruba OS features between frequencies.

Note: Employees should be advised to purchase equipment that is dual band capable (2.4 & 5 GHz), and be encouraged to buy ~ac and ~n devices, as these minimize “On-Air” time and achieve the highest throughput in that minimum time.



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This WLAN will provide 802.11a/g/n/ac wireless coverage to VoWLAN standards in both bands, with highest available speed throughput in the 5GHz band with the following maximum standards:

AP-225 3x3 MIMO Antenna, 256 QAM modulation, up to 80 MHz channel bonding~ac – 1.3 Gbps max data rate~a/n – 450 Mbps max data rate~g/ac – 600 Mbps max data rate~g/n - 150 Mbps max data rate

This WLAN is designed to support mobile potentially jitter sensitive 802.11a/g/n/ac VoWLAN SW & HW telephone clients, mobile Wi- Fi enabled smartphones and tablets, and portable 802.11a/g/n/ac notebook computer clients running local data applications, email clients, normal business application software to network or cloud infrastructure, voice video data communications software and web-browser applications.

The WLAN has had configuration compatibility with old legacy clients with ~b performance removed, while legacy 2.4 GHz ~g/n and 5 GHz ~a/n standards for client support have all been preserved.



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4. WLAN & Network Equipment for Survey Planning

Prior to the initial planning of each survey, reference must be made to the most current issues of the “Company” Aruba Design and Architecture Documents.

CURRENT EQUIPMENT and INFRASTRUCTURE

The following is a guide to Aruba WLAN Equipment requirements:WAPs /APs /AMs – AP-2252x 1G new Cat6 (existing Cat5e may be approved) per WAPEdge Switches – 2x stacked Cisco 3750-X 24 or 48 Port

o Dual 1100W PS eacho Stacking Cables and Powero 2x 10G links to Core each switch, 4 per stack

Core Switch Dimensioning for Edge Switch Links and Network Traffic4x Aruba 72xx ControllersGateway Equipment & Circuits (MPLS or ISP) of sufficient BW

This equipment will be differently distributed within the differing location sizing models, and will be varied by location, or final agreed design



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5. Procedure for survey planning, AP layout & reporting

PRE-REQUISTITES PRIOR TO SURVEY

The following are required before commencement of the survey process:Layout Drawings for all floors of the Location (AutoCAD preferred)Contact information of “Company” representative at the location

PREDICTIVE AP LAYOUT

The following are required tools or applications in this process:AirWave Visual RFConversion or AutoCAD drawings to other bases – Visio, PDF, Word

o Snagit is a great tool for use hereMicrosoft Visio & Word

Predictive AP Layouts should be created referencing all the information of room layouts, observed use cases, population density to site key APs, while maintaining the Aruba 802.1ac recommended spacing of 40-50 feet (12 – 16 m) center on center.

Predictive coverage models should be created in Aruba’s AirWave VisualRF Planning tool, for each building floor. APs should be placed consistently at 40-50 feet center to center (12 – 16m). RF planning should be performed using 5 GHz only. Once planned, an assessment should be made to identify the best method to mitigate 2.4 GHz channel utilization. Settings in VisualRF utilized should include AP selection AP-225 at 5 GHz Medium power (12 dBm), with a -65dBm Signal Cutoff, with a geometric spacing of 40-50 feet.

Visual RF predictive heatmaps to be generated are, RF coverage for 5 GHz only, and Voice coverage for 5 and 2.4 GHz frequencies.



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Additionally the following should be considered in AP placement choices:floor plan informationconstruction typeceiling or atrium architectural detailsspecial WLAN use requirementsroom use

Conference rooms that have more than 10 chairs should have a dedicated AP, or one that is located very close to it, while maintaining the very even AP layout, and duality of AP service to provide resiliency and redundancy.

If there are multiple conference rooms next to each other, and/or very large meeting rooms then sufficient APs should be located around the room grouping again to maintain optimum even AP spacing, but also sufficient for the density of users and devices.

LOCATION WALK:

The Site Walk Protocol Document should be used

After the AP Predictive Layout has been completed then a walk is arranged to review all floors rooms and other space use. Appointments are booked with local staff and the visit arranged. It is important either to have escorts with full building access, or arrange security passes to visit all locations.

AP Mount positions must be fully reviewed and optimized to primarily use suspended ceiling positions were the best practice AP layouts and spacing can be maintained, of course other mount locations can be used but these will add complexity, time and cost to the installation process where different Architectural features or ceiling types have to be accommodated.

In all cases APs are to be mounted below ceiling surfaces, and beneath and away from ceiling and building furniture.

During the walk, APs are moved as necessary, due to differing observed use cases, construction materials identified, but the layout must be balanced to maintain the ideals of ~ac design and optimal spacing of APs.

Also if circumstances are seen where different APs or Antennas are required, then these will be changed and noted survey notes.

The AP Layout is then Finalized and a Final Predictive run to these adjusted positions, and both these drawings and heat-maps are included in this report.



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Also during the walk the cabling and its layout should be reviewed, to see if newCat5e/6 cables are required and the IDF /MDFs they will aggregate to. IDFs andMDFs should be checked for unused or re-useable Fiber, it quantity and type.

Edge, Core aggregation and Gateway Switches /Routers should be reviewed to see if meet WLAN requirements, and to review physically to quantify additional equipment required at each level, whether chassis, line cards, modules, optics, powers supplies, stacking cables.

IDF and MDF space and their constraints should be reviewed to see if this impacts the new WLAN network. Also inter closet cabling should be reviewed to see if adequate and sufficient for new WLAN network requirements.

In many cases the walks will generate further discussions over use cases, or further L2 /L3 definition required of the core network, these should be dealt with quickly to prevent delay in assembly of the survey findings, and allow the BOMs and Services Scopes of Work to be developed for the Aruba WLAN deployment.

REPORTING OF SITE WALK PROTOCOL FINDINGS

The findings will be presented in the Volume 2 – Specific Building findings and summaries.

The key initial data that defines the other report contents are:Final Building AP LayoutAP aggregation to the IDF /MDFsDocumentation of the existing Cabling, network equipment in IDF/MDFs

All other presentation materials, BOMS for WLAN and Core Network Equipment are derived from these fundamental documents.

The format, structure and examples of the Volume 2 report will be provided to those authoring further building investigations; so the materials can be developed and presented uniformly for the “Company” Team.

Development of the Core Network summaries might need further analysis by theArchitecture and Operations Teams, for specific buildings and their existing infrastructure.



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