EAP225-Outdoor Only 5 channels available on 5GHz
I have a new EAP225-Outdoor(US) just set up. It works but there are only five channels available on the 5 GHz band, the top 5 ones in the UNII3 band. This is a problem for me since my neighbor's wifi signal is very strong and is operating in this same band. A friend told me that he had the same problem with a EAP225-Outdoor and returned it for this reason. Is there any way to restore access to all the other 5GHz channels that have been disabled?
If anyone has an EAP225-Outdoor that has more than 5 channels available, please tell me which firmware version it is running.
Thanks.
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Dear @Lucidus,
I have a new EAP225-Outdoor(US) just set up. It works but there are only five channels available on the 5 GHz band, the top 5 ones in the UNII3 band.
May I know the S/N of your EAP225-Outdoor, and where you purchased it from(a link would be appreciated)?
A friend told me that he had the same problem with a EAP225-Outdoor and returned it for this reason.
The real US version should support 5G UNII-1 band as well, it's possible that you and your friend got an EAP with CA firmware.
If you are located in the US, I could forward your case to the senior engineer to help you.
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Thank you Fae for your informative reply and offer to help.
Per your request, the product S/N is 22074X8002007 and the vendor was amazon.ca.
https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B07953S2FD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Yesterday I reached TP-Link customer support in China and spoke with a very supportive, technically informed and patient rep. She first requested that I update the firmware to the latest v5.0 and stayed on the phone while I did this. That did not resolve the issue, still only the same 5 channels available., i.e. those in the UNII3 band (Ch 149-165) She then checked with other staff and determined that the problem arose because I was in Canada and was using the Canadian firmware. Her, i.e. the TP-Link company view, was that 'The government of Canada does not allow outdoor access points to operate on any channel other than those five and thus the EAP225-Outdoor must have all the other channels disabled to comply with legal requirements'. I said that I had seen information that led me to believe that that this was not correct, that the limited channels made the device unsuitable for me and that I would be returning it to the vendor. She offered to pass along my comments.
The information that led me to believe that the TP-Link statement is not correct is available at
https://www.semfionetworks.com/blog/5ghz-regulations-in-canada-2018-update
This indicates that the Canadian regulations do in fact allow outdoor access points to operate on the four UNII2 channels (52-64) and on nine of the twelve UNII2-Extended channels (100-144 channel range) but only if DFS (Dynamic Frequency Selection) is implemented to detect and avoid frequencies on which radar is operating. I surmise that TP-Link has chosen not to implement DFS for the EAP225-Outdoor, or at least not with the Canadian Firmware. The result is that the EAP225-Outdoor is able to operate on only 5 rather than 18 20MHz wide channels, 2 rather than 8 40MHz wide channels, and 1 rather than 3 80MHz wide channels. This device is thus quite handicapped. I will look for another device unless the channel restrictions can be removed quickly.
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Dear @Lucidus ,
Sorry for my delayed response. I didn't realize that you are located in Canada earlier.
The link you attached was updated in 2018, which may be not applicable now. As far as I know, the outdoor EAP is limited to UNII3 band due to the Canadian regulations since 2019. And there was other user mentioned this before. I give you one link for your reference.
https://community.tp-link.com/en/business/forum/topic/215394?replyId=459686
If I get anything wrong, please do not hesitate to correct me here, thank you!
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Hi Fae,
The Canadian regulations on LE-LAN (License Exempt LAN) has not been updated since 2017 when RSS-247 version 2 was published.
https://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/smt-gst.nsf/eng/sf10971.html
Sectiion 6 is for LE-LAN.
DFS is detailed in Section 6.3.
Section 6.2.1: channels 36,40,44,48 are not allowed outdoors (some exceptions for vehicles)
Section 6.2.3: channels 120, 124, 128 not allowed at all due to weather radar
Section 6.2.4: refers to channels 149-165, such as power limits
Secton 6.3: DFS details
Section 6.4: manufacturers have to prevent us from doing something we are not allowed to do, like enable channels 36-48 outdoors, or disable DFS functionality (so those channels would keep transmitting even if they detect DFS radar)
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Dear @nojak,
The Canadian regulations on LE-LAN (License Exempt LAN) has not been updated since 2017 when RSS-247 version 2 was published.
https://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/smt-gst.nsf/eng/sf10971.html
Thank you for the link above, I really appreciate it.
@Lucidus Apologize for the incorrect statement. It seems that we (I and the TP-Link customer support) got a stereotype that the outdoor EAP in Canada is limited to the UNII3 band, but we don't really know why DFS is not implemented for the EAP (not only for outdoor AP), I've reported this to the senior engineer to check the reason and see if it is possible to support in the future version.
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Thought i'd add my support for this. I am looking this week to purchase a wireless ap solution and ive learnt the hard way over the years to do my research in advance. This shortfall for the EAP225 has prevented me from going down the TP link EAP route.
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