I think there is a fix in the new 4.2.11 software on this. it is only for windows version yet.

 

 

5. Fixed the bug that the controller's band steering range is inconsistent with the actual supported range of EAP, resulting in the configuration not taking effect.

@Leonarit 

 

At at RSSI of -70 or higher you the device will start to consider roaming to achieve a better signal.   If this is 5Ghz at -70 the signal is weak enough that you will achieve better connection via a roaming action, if you are a single AP it wont have that option so will move you to 2.4Ghz as the only alternative due to its slightly better penetration.  Any clients connecting at -70 wont ever go 5Ghz and that doesnt come as a suprise to me.   Controllers will ultimately always try to maintain connection over speed at that weak a signal  

 

I cant say for 100% sure but from experience -70 is the limit for 5Ghz.   Yes with other vendors you can sometimes change that to -80 or higher.. however its only going slow you performance overall and cause drop-outs.  I would recommend against this.

 

TP Link Contoller appears to set this as -72 indicated by the RED section (screenshot bottom and thankfully my APs have none in that range)

 

If you have -70 signal on your clients, you should consider another AP on your network and allow the clients to roam to it.    Speaking as an installer of WiFi, if a customer hits -70 its dead air and at -75 we kick them off the AP regardless of frequency.

 

 

 

@shberge 

 

Hey shberge

 

Would you have a link to that new version?  Cant find it and fancy a read :)

 

https://www.tp-link.com/en/support/download/omada-software-controller/#Controller_Software

Danke!

Thanks i will try to do some tests with the Windows Version.

@Philbert 

 

Thanks for the help, i know that -70db is considered “bad” but i'm using this AP in my home and i have a static/interference free RF environment, I only need the cover a small area and I only notice this high values in on some spots.

Besides the rssi value being high, I always get good throughput values in all the spaces on 5Ghz, regarding the 2.4Gh, due to the channel utilization being around (30%~90%)  during the course of the day I get varying throughput/high latency.

I'm using the 2.4Ghz radio manly for all my iot devices(Shelly's, etc), I previously was using a Meraki AP (MR33) in the same spot and didn’t noticed any problems with band steering but I also didn’t do any comparison of the 5Ghz rssi values.

 

I tried to do some debugs on the AP but it seems that the Omada Controller/AP doesn’t have any advanced debug capabilities.

@Leonarit 

 

If you can get sub -70 then yes they should be roaming back to the 5Ghz.  I done some testing there and took a walk (slowly) into the garden until it decided to roam me.. 

From my very rudimentary test it is -72 as indicated in the controller UI

 

After some digging a bit deeper it appears you can set the 5Ghz threshold lower...  its under the Device Options for the AP and goes to -95

 

Hopefully that helps you!

 

 

 

@Philbert 

 

Thanks for the effort :) but I think that the RSSI Threshold  feature should not influence the band steering, the RSSI Threshold feature should only affect the already associated clients, nevertheless I enabled the RSSI Threshold and set it to -95 but the behavior was the same.

 

I don't know how TP-Link implemented their band steering but on another vendors that feature has some good technical documentation that explains how its implemented.

 

It would be very helpful if I could do some debug to the 802.11 association process, I will try to use a cisco AP as wireless sniffer to verify what’s the 802.11a behavior between the client and the ap.

 

@shberge 

 

I've tested with the Omada controller version 4.2.11 and in fact the maximum values for the band steering settings are different but the behavior it’s the same, if the 5Ghz rssi its above -70 and the 2.4Ghz below -70 the client always connect to the 2.4 band, but one thing i noticed  if both bands rssi are in the between -70~-80 the client always connects to the 5G band.

 

Band steering settings differences:

Connection Threshold: changed from (2-256) to  (2-40)

Threshold: Changed from (1-20) to (1-8)

 

I've connect the Meraki AP again and simulated the same rssi levels as the EAP225, and with the band steering enabled on the Meraki AP i always connect to the 5G band, even if the rssi is above -80db, if i disable the band steering i always connect to the 2.4 band due to the preferred rssi level, so I’m starting to assume that the band steering on the TP-Link is broken, i will try to open a case with the support.