Understanding and Troubleshooting Cisco Catalyst 9800 Series Wireless Controllers

Chapter 7

RF Deployment and Guidelines

Wireless networking relies a lot on the characteristics of the physical layer, the transmit medium, the so-called radio frequency (RF) layer. Other technologies do as well, but for example, in the case of wired Ethernet networks, the cable is an isolated and dedicated piece of wire and hence often considered to be reliable (and even if not, it becomes reliable if replaced) and to perform consistently. It also connects only two devices although this was not necessarily the case in the past. Wi-Fi relies on a shared medium: it’s a half-duplex technology, and this brings many complexities. It definitely does not have consistent operations and performance even when considered in the same physical area because ...