User's Manual

538 | Secure Enterprise Mesh Dell Networking W-Series ArubaOS 6.4.x| User Guide
Do not delete or modify mesh cluster profiles once you use them to provision mesh nodes. You can recover
the mesh point if the original cluster profile is still available. It is recommended to create a new mesh cluster
profile if needed. If you modify any mesh cluster setting, you must reprovision your AP for the changes to take
effect (this also causes the AP to automatically reboot). See “Provisioning Mesh Nodes” for more information.
If you configure multiple cluster profiles with different cluster priorities, you manually override the link metric
algorithm because the priority takes precedence over the path cost. In this scenario, the mesh portal uses the
profile with the highest priority to bring-up the mesh network. The mesh portal stores and advertises that one
profile to neighboring mesh nodes to build the mesh network. This profile is known as the “primary” cluster
profile. Mesh points, in contrast, go through the list of configured mesh cluster profiles in order of priority to
find the profile being advertised by the mesh portal. Once the primary profile has been identified, the other
profiles are considered “backup” cluster profiles. Use this deployment if you want to enforce a particular mesh
topology rather than allowing the link metric algorithm to determine the topology.
For this scenario, do the following:
l Configure multiple mesh cluster profiles with different priorities. The primary cluster profile has a lower
priority number, which gives it a higher priority.
l Configure the mesh radio profile.
l Create an AP group for 802.11a radios and 802.11g radios
l Configure the 802.11a or 802.11g RF management profiles for each AP group.
l If your deployment includes high-throughput APs, configure the mesh high-throughput SSID profile. The
mesh radio profile uses the default high-throughput SSID profile unless you specifically configure the mesh
radio profile to use a different high-throughput SSID profile
l Create an AP group for each 802.11a channel.
If a mesh link breaks or the primary cluster profile is unavailable, mesh nodes use the highest priority backup
cluster profile to re-establish the uplink or check for parents in the backup profiles. If these profiles are
unavailable, the mesh node can revert to the recovery profile to bring up the mesh network until a cluster
profile is available. For information about the procedure to configure a mesh cluster profile, see Configuring
Mesh Cluster Profiles on page 547
Mesh Radio Profiles
The mesh radio profile allows you to specify the set of rates used to transmit data on the mesh link. This profile
also allows you to define a reselection-mode setting to optimize the operation of the link metric algorithm.
The reselection mode specifies the method a mesh node uses to find a better uplink to create a path to the
mesh portal. Only neighbors on the same channel in the same mesh cluster are considered.
The mesh radio profile includes the following reselection mode options:
l reselect-anytime: mesh points using the reselect-anytime reselection mode perform a single topology
readjustment scan within 9 minutes of startup and 4 minutes after a link is formed. If no better parent is
found, the mesh point returns to its original parent. This initial scan evaluates more distant mesh points
before closer mesh points, and incurs a dropout of 5–8 seconds for each mesh point. After the initial
startup scan is completed, connected mesh nodes evaluate mesh links every 30 seconds. If a mesh node
finds a better uplink, the mesh node connects to the new parent to create an improved path to the mesh
portal.
l reselect-never: connected mesh nodes do not evaluate other mesh links to create an improved path to
the mesh portal.
l startup-subthreshold: mesh points using the startup-subthreshold reselection mode perform a single
topology readjustment scan within 9 minutes of startup and 4 minutes after a link is formed. If no better
parent is found, the mesh point returns to its original parent. This initial startup scan evaluates more distant
mesh points before closer mesh points, and incurs a dropout of 5–8 seconds for each mesh point. After