Several clients only able to connect at 802.11.na despite supporting 802.11ac

Product Discussion Pepwave AP & Surf
1

We have noticed that we have several WIFI clients that are using new computers (e.g. Apple MacBook Pros) that can only connect on 802.11na instead of 802.11ac. We have tried all the following to no avail:

  1. Changed channels
  2. Increased broadcast strength to Max instead of the standard Medium
  3. Restarted router and computers – including forgetting the network on the computers and adding them again
  4. Placing the computers much closer to the router – although several were already <5m away with line of sight

We do not seem to have much interference on the channels we are using either. Our network is not using the Auto channel selection as we have carefully selected channels (1/6/11 & 36/44/149) that have the least interference either with our own access points or others in the vicinity.

The access point is a Pepwave AP One Rugged (3.6.3 build 1952) and it is controlled via AP Controller on a Balance One Core (8.2.1 build 5372).

Any idea what could cause this?

Btw, is there any way to disable 802.11na or other protocols specifically? The AP Controller does not seem to offer that option.

Thanks in advance for any input.

2

I have noticed that all clients that are connected to the AP One Rugged are only connecting at 802.11.na even though it is supposed to support Wifi5 (802.11.ac). I am fairly certain that clients were able to connect to it at 802.11ac previously…

Does anyone have any feedback or suggestions?

3

For the benefit of anyone interested, this was resolved after upgrading the firmware on the Balance One Core to 8.4.0.

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