In Building Cellular Coverage Over Category 5/6 Cables at WLAN Book.com

March 17th, 2011

In Building Cellular Coverage Over Category 5/6 Cables

by Zaib Kaleem

In Building Cellular Coverage Over Category 5/6 Cables

(TIL ;-) from #TechFieldDay)

A way to use existing cabling to improve cellular coverage without installing a traditional distributed antenna system (DAS) solution. The cat 5 / 6 cable has a Mobile Access “Cellular Access Pod”. The Pod can be daisy chained to an access point.

The picture shows a Cisco switch, an Aironet AP and the MobileAccessVE solution co-existent on the same CAT-5e/6 cable run while simultaneously maintaining full Ethernet capabilities.

This solution can work with any wireless vendor but has been tested and is supported by Cisco. Info below from Cisco.com about solution.

Cisco Device Compatibility

Cisco has tested the MobileAccessVE system with the entire portfolio of Aironet Wi-Fi Access Points, and with the CAT3k and CAT4k line of Ethernet switches. PoE functionality per 802.3af/at and compatibility with the Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) for enhanced PoE was verified. Note: PoE compatibility could be an issue with legacy EOL’d Cisco access points since those products were designed before the 802.3af PoE standard was ratified.

The system works assuming the 802.3af/at Type A PoE injection convention is used. Any Ethernet client equipment which operates outside of the 802.3af standard or with the Type B methodology may require a special adaptor (supplied by Mobile Access) to reconfigure the PoE to a Type A equivalent. The adaptor solution ensures that customers will be able to deploy the VE system in any current or legacy Ethernet network.