Migrating to Wave 2? …Definitely

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Cisco’s New 802.11ac Wave 2 Solutions

Cisco unveiled the new 802.11ac Wave 2 solutions that help organizations reinvent their approach to mobility at Cisco Live2015 in San Diego. Migrating to Wave 2 offers tremendous opportunities for organizations to easily take advantage of increased wireless bandwidth and to handle the demands of many more devices at one time.

Closer to 802.11AC Wave 2

Wave 2 of 802.11ac is now rolling out on new access points, right? Well, Wave 2 is a wifi milestone, as it can now outperform wired Ethernet. But it also has a few ripples that need to be understood, so let’s take a closer look.

The next phase of Wi-Fi, 802.11AC Wave 2, is almost upon us, and it brings wireless speeds of up to almost 7 Gigs. For the first time ever, applications will work better over wireless than they will over wired. Wave 2 also brings multi-user MIMO to Wi-Fi, enabling dedicated bandwidth to be allocated to users. 802.11AC Wave 2 will allow businesses to create new ways of working, such as being able to do medical imaging over tablets or streaming videos to mobile devices in school systems.

Having wireless speeds that are that fast, though, does have some big implications on the wired network. If the air speed is anything greater than a Gig and the backhaul connection from the AP to the access switch is a Gig, then there’s an obvious problem, as the wired network becomes a choke point. Also, the Wave 2 solutions will require PoE+ (30W), and many businesses only have PoE (15W) in the access edge now. Also, with today’s switches, Cat5E has a limit of 1 Gig for speed.

So, what’s a network manager to do? Rip out all of the old switches and put new ones in? Pull all new cable to the locations where there are access points? Put new power supplies in all the wiring closets? Having to do all of that could make the migration to 802.11AC Wave 2 an expensive, disruptive process.

Now, let’s get a sneak peek:

Cisco Aironet 1850 Access Point: An entry-level 802.11ac Wave 2 access point that offers faster client performance — enabled in part by multi user, multi-in, multi-out (MU-MIMO) — and offload to wired network with 2GbE ports.
Cisco 8540 Services Controller: A highly scalable and service-rich platform that supports 802.11ac Wave 2 for large campus wireless deployments. Offers up to 40Gbps of throughput and support for 6,000 access points and 64,000 clients.
Cisco 5520 Services Controller: Supports 802.11ac Wave 2 for medium-sized to large campus wireless deployments, offering up to 20Gbps of throughput and scalability for 1500 access points and 20,000 clients.

Designed to handle the tsunami of new traffic demands from the next wave of connected devices and increased use of media-rich applications such as video streaming, the network backbone remains a critical part of an organization’s infrastructure. In addition to extending our Wave 2 portfolio to the access point, Cisco is unveiling new additions to our Catalyst switching family:

Cisco Catalyst 6840-X Series Switch: Future-proofed for ever-increasing network traffic with next-generation fixed backbone. Based on the Catalyst 6K DNA, offers smart and simple network operations, support for high-bandwidth with up to 2x 10G/40G uplinks, and is the smallest MPLS aggregator and Instant Access controller in the Catalyst family.
Cisco Catalyst 3850 10G Series Switch: Future-proofed for ever-increasing network traffic with 1RU fixed aggregation that features a programmable data plane, enabling the deployment of software-defined networking services. Supports high-bandwidth with 10G downlinks and 10G/40G uplinks.

The future of mobility doesn’t need to be complex. With our expanding 802.11ac Wave 2 portfolio from the access point to the network backbone, we want to help our customers build a foundation that keeps their mobility strategy agile and simple, and ready to handle what the next wave in mobility brings us.

Video Show-Get the Most Out of Wave 2 Wi-Fi

Let’s got a inside look at the all-new Cisco Aironet 1850 Series access point, uniquely built to meet the 802.11ac Wave 2 standard. See how to get better coverage and performance with this groundbreaking solution, and what it can mean for your organization.