Are there AP's that will function with 100+ clients?

Helping a church consider a wireless system upgrade. They were using a mesh wireless system to cover their auditorium that seats 1,000 people, then moved to using four Engenius AP's. Neither solution has held up well when any of the ap's get more than about 50 people online at once. In total, there are 200-300 people online at any time. Keep in mind, these people don't seem to be using a bunch of data, there are just a lot of them connecting to the wireless at one time in a single auditorium with their phones picking up an email, opening a bible app, etc. It's NOT a bandwidth issue (they have 100/100 fiber service and can monitor bandwidth usage).

Are there AP's that will handle 100-200 clients or does one need to use a half dozen AP's to cover a room like this?

Thanks for your guidance. Sean

I'd go with a lightly managed WiFi system so users can be force ably evenly distributed among neaerst APs.
Aruba is a leader.

Consumer WiFi won't get you there.

Xirrus has arrays that support from 120 clients to 5000 clients.

I've tested the 630 and 520....

A Xirrus AP might do it, but big $. They basically pack multiple APs into one box, so might not cover the area you need if it is large.

50 connections/AP is too much. Even if people are using low bandwidth, enough of them simultaneously hitting an AP will exhaust WIRELESS bandwidth using the 1x1 N radios most mobile devices have.

More APs with a proper frequency plan and band steering to 5 GHz is your best bet. And per client bandwidth cap to ensure no one is streaming.

SeanFL said:

Helping a church consider a wireless system upgrade. They were using a mesh wireless system to cover their auditorium that seats 1,000 people, then moved to using four Engenius AP's. Neither solution has held up well when any of the ap's get more than about 50 people online at once. In total, there are 200-300 people online at any time. Keep in mind, these people don't seem to be using a bunch of data, there are just a lot of them connecting to the wireless at one time in a single auditorium with their phones picking up an email, opening a bible app, etc. It's NOT a bandwidth issue (they have 100/100 fiber service and can monitor bandwidth usage).

Are there AP's that will handle 100-200 clients or does one need to use a half dozen AP's to cover a room like this?

Thanks for your guidance. Sean

Click to expand...

Engenious should handle this. We use Ubiquiti....typically want to cap it out around 50 clients per AP....we've also used higher end HP ProCurve APs. I still like to cap it around 50 users max per AP. So take your total amount of expected clients....divide by 50..and there's the minimum amount of APs that you want to sprinkle around. Add a couple more just to leave elbow room.

I know you say it's not a bandwidth issue....but I will say that you have to have good bandwidth management.
Several things to be aware of...
*Using a guest/client isolation mode...basically VLAN each/every guest. Reduced local network traffic, browsing, netbios overhead, etc.
*Use a good, fast DHCP service. This means no residential grade router....some stinksys/dstink/nutgear router will get overwhelmed by a couple of hundred clients.
*Use a good, fast DNS service. Same as above....no residential grade hardware will handle this well.
*Having a proper business grade router...with enough horsepower under the hood to easily handle lots of concurrent connections...the NAT tables, good fast DNS response, and good QoS.
*Using a centrally managed wireless setup that also allows good QoS.