[8.270][BUG][NOT A BUG] Ap50 roaming delay

[hschaa]

Ok, so the phones associate via WPA-EAP, correct?

[Eberwein]

Yes. The phone also have an separate user for connecting to the radius.

[hschaa]

Thanks for the info so far.

A typical EAP authentication of a wireless client can easily take around 500ms (depending on the network setup, the RADIUS server load etc.). However, there are mechanisms to decrease the roaming delay introduced by EAP authentications.

1. EAP Preauthentication
2. OKC - Opportunistic Key Caching
3. CCKM - Cisco Centralized Key Management

Browsing through some Cisco documents suggests that the Cisco 7920/7921 and 7925 seem to only support CCKM in order to reduce EAP-related roaming delays. Unfortunately, the CCKM protocols are proprietary and hence no specification is publicly available. This could explain the delay you're experiencing.

Could you please check your device configuration if you find anything regarding "EAP preauthentication" just to be sure?

And it would be also interesting to see if you can get shorter delays when using WPA-PSK as authentication method. Would you mind to try that as well?

Thanks,
Helmut

[Eberwein]

I searched the phone options, but there is nothing to configure in this way.
So now I will make some checks with WPA-PSK config.

regards

[Eberwein]

So now I tested with WPA-PSK and the result is that it is more bad than better. The phone needs between 2 and 6 seconds for roaming...

[hschaa]

Originally Posted by Eberwein

So now I tested with WPA-PSK and the result is that it is more bad than better. The phone needs between 2 and 6 seconds for roaming...

Hmm, that was unexpected. Was this also on a VLAN tagged SSID or on a separate zone?

Helmut

[Eberwein]

It is an VLAN tagged SSID. For voice I only have this network.

[Robert Tausend]

That is strange, i have (as i think) nearly the same setup, i have 5 AP30 and 5 AP50 running. Setup a WLAN for my Cisco 7921 phones on a seperate VLAN. Roaming from one to the other AP takes less than 1 second. Only roaming from 5,2ghz to 2,4ghz takes about 1 to 3 seconds (but have to re-test that for verification).

Robert

[Eberwein]

I check it again and have nearly the same results as you. 2-4s for roaming between 2Ghz and 5Ghz, and 1s for roaming in the same band. But let me say 1s for roaming, is for voip a long time...

[Robert Tausend]

the roaming time is less! then 1 second

Robert