@BD1,

 

in my opinion it's a bad idea to mesh and EAP225-Outdoor with an EAP225-Indoor.

 

EAP225-Outdoor is restricted to outdoor-only channels in the EU (that's the U-NII-2C band), while EAP225 might use indoor-only channels from the U-NII-1 band or DFS channels from U-NII-2A not supported by EAP225-Outdoor. I did not investigate what happens if the EAP225 selects an indoor channel, but I could imagine that this causes a disconnect of the EAP225-Outdoor from the mesh if the EAP225-Outdoor is restricted to outdoor-only channels (and if you did not restrict the EAP225-Outdoor to U-NII-2C outdoor channels, you're in a big risk in the EU).

 

Within the EU I would only mesh EAP225 (indoor) with EAP225 (indoor) and EAP225-Outdoor with EAP225-Outdoor.

 

Beside this, I fully agree with @Doc2485. Meshing is no business-like solution and should only be used in the absolute exceptional case (e.g. the building is under monumental protection and cables may not be laid without official permission) and even then only if you have a free line of sight between the mesh nodes and you want to carry traffic from only the 2.4 GHz band to the other mesh node. In every other case you will have to live with the shortcomings of meshing which – in case of an Omada mesh – is implemented much like a repeater mode.

 

Edit: I just saw you live in the UK.

 

So, albeit you're not in the EU anymore (lucky you :-) regulatory provisions for RLAN are still like in the EU, thus my above satement still applies.

 

JSchnee21 wrote

So, that's all well and good. . . .

 

But, in theory, as long as the OP manually sets the channel of his indoor AP to be a channel that the Outdoor AP can use -- it should work.

 

Yes. In theory. And in practice DFS beats theory: the EAP will change the channel (or silence it if set to 80 MHz channel width) when a weather radar or any other radar, e.g. military, requests to release the channel. Then, if the indoor EAP changes to one of the indoor-only or U-NII-2A channels due to a DFS request, all bets are off, at least for an EAP225-Outdoor. Thus, if you mesh an EAP225-Outdoor in the EU, mesh it with another EAP225-Outdoor only.

 

That's BTW the reason why I never did understand that US residents demand DFS for the EAP225.

You just have no control over the selected channel.

 

JSchnee21 wrote

Interesting.  See in the US, there are two 80MHz 5.8Ghz, non-DFS channels.  And we can freely use these indoors and outdoors.  So I can very easily lock my indoor AP onto either, and then use the same channel on the outdoor.

 

I know. Both bands, U-NII-1 (5150-5250 MHz) and U-NII-3 (5735-5835 MHz), are non-DFS and are unrestricted in the US.

 

In Canada, Europe, Russia and Japan the U-NII-1 band is alowed indoors only. In the US and Canada, the U-NII-2A (5250-5350 MHz) is unrestricted, while in Europe, Russia and Japan it's also allowed indoors only. In all mentioned regions U-NII-2A requires DFS. Canada uses a mix of US and EU rules for U-NII-1 (it's like in the EU) and U-NII-2A (it's like in the US). You can see the confusion this causes for CA firmware in some forum threads here, especially if Canadians bought an US device.

 

In the EU, the U-NII-2C (5470-5690 MHz) is the only band which is allowed outdoors.

 

BTW, channels in the 5 GHz spectrum are always 5 MHz in width as they are in the 2.4 GHz spectrum. The difference between 5 and 2.4 GHz bands is that the former has four consecutive, non-overlapping channels which form a 20 MHz channel »bundle«. This is the reason why 20 MHz wide channels overlap in the 2.4 GHz band, but not in the 5 GHz band. You can see this in the 5 GHz channel numbers, which advance by four at 20 MHz width (e.g. 36, 40, 44, 48).

 

Thus, if you set 80 MHz channel width, you are using 16x 5 MHz channels simultaneously. If your WiFi gear supports 5 MHz wide channels (as do Pharos devices) you have 4 times more channels at the price of ¼ bandwidth for each one.

 

By using 40 or 80 MHz channel width, people create overlapping channels much like in the 2.4 GHz band with all their disadvantages (overlapping with neighboring 20 MHz devices). While this is no issue if used indoors, it indeed is a big concern for 5 GHz directional links if used by outdoors APs.

 

So in the UK/EU there isn't a single 80MHz, non-DFS channel shared between indoor and outdoor?  I thought there was one (unlike the 2 in the USA)?

 

No. In the EU the 16 channels in U-NII-1 band are non-DFS but require TPC (else max. signal power must be reduced by 3dBm, that's ½ the power). The 16 channels in the U-NII-2A require DFS. All 32 channels are allowed indoors only. Same is true for Russia and Japan, except that Japan does not require TPC in the U-NII-1, but in the U-NII-2A band in addition to DFS.

 

What's more, EAP225-Outdoor uses only a subset of 16x 5 MHz channels from the U-NII-2C band. No way to select the upper half of the
U-NII-2C band (good for directional links).

 

A subset of U-NII-3, namely 5755-5875 MHz, is reserved in Germany for Broadband Fixed Wireless Access (BFWA). It provides 20x 5 MHz channels which require DFS and 4x 5 MHz channels which do not require DFS. Only commercial use of this spectrum is allowed and its permanent use must be registered with the authorities, but it's forbidden for public RLAN use. This spectrum is what you call 5.8 GHz.

 

I'm not aware of any outdoor units that support DFS in the USA

 

IIRC, UBNT AirFIber devices can use those bands in the US. And Pharos devices in test mode can use a similar broad spectrum, but it has been disabled in the EU b/c there were too many people abusing it (the EU forced vendors to remove this function since it violates the law and caused interferences with other services in non-RLAN bands).

 

Indoors, where one would potentially want to use the DFS channels -- to avoid interference from neighbors, have high AP density (like 3 or 4 AP's in my house), or use 160MHz worth of BW -- there's little or no chance of actually detecting a real (e.g. radar) DFS signal.

 

Not sure what you mean. Weather and MIL radars as well as SAT uplinks use very strong signals and also cause forced channel releases in RLAN equipment used indoors on channels which require DFS. That's the reason why DFS is required – to make room for high priority users. DFS has no functionality at all to avoid interferences with APs used by your neighbors.