[SOLVED] Question about roaming between different AP's ?

[paulo_andre]

Is there any way to improve roaming between 2 AP's?
I need 2 to cover my house (there is some overlap), and I can't have a stable wifi call while walking from one to another.
I have a samsung S9+ and the AP's are a TP-Link TL-WDR4300 and a Xiaomi AIoT AC2350, with a rasbpberry pi 4 acting as a wired router for all (all using openwrt).

 

[Ralston18]

Perhaps:

https://www.samsung.com/au/support/mobile-devices/enable-adaptive-wi-fi/

That said, what square footage area needs to be covered and how far apart are the APs?

Channels?

For more in-depth information:

https://docs.samsungknox.com/admin/knox-platform-for-enterprise/kbas/kba-115013403768.htm

Likely you will need to experiment a bit more.

Change only one thing at a time and allow some time between changes.

 

[bill001g]

Short answer is wifi was never designed for "mobile" use unlike cell tower software.

So many people seem to want mesh systems for roaming and have no idea what it is really used for. Using VoIP calling is the one application where this is really needed everything else is pretty much stupid......I mean watch netflix while you walk down your stairs

Many years ago when the cell companies still charged by the minute for usage the company I worked for tried to make wifi call roaming work. It sorta did BUT it required a special app on the phone and in those days only a small number of phones could run the app. This worked along with cisco fancy AP and controller that
could control where the phone connected to. Since cell companies change the policy the cisco solution is too costly and was such a pain to deal with.

The problem you have is end device not your network control the roaming. It is very stupid system designed to favor stability rather than performance. What is does is it will only check for another wifi source when the power level is below some number. It then disconnects and scans and hopefully finds a stronger signal.
Even in the very best case you will still take a small interrupt that you will be able to hear on a phone call. This would have to be completely redesigned so that the network could tell the phone when and where to switch.

Your best option for this to work is to place the 2 AP with as little overlap as possible but still enough that when the signal level on one is low the other signal is good enough. You make it too little overlap an the phone will just hop back and forth. This all is trial and error by setting ..ie reducing ..the wifi power level in the AP.

I have unlimited minutes on my cell phone and the one case where I need to use VoIP to make international calls I just run it over the cell data network. It all depends on if it is cost effective to use a cell system that was designed for this issue or to hack on wifi stuff.

 

[paulo_andre]

To answer both of the replies:
I can get cell coverage during the day just fine. But at night, with the aluminium blinds, the cell signal goes to 0. And no, I'm not replacing those, way too much work.
Also, one AP is enough to cover the whole house, as long as I don't close the doors.
So, my real problem is at night, I can't answer a call in the living room, go to the bedroom and close the door without the call dropping.
And apparently the solution is not on the router/AP but on the client... so I can only hope my next phone will have some trick to fix this.
Thanks anyway.

 

[bill001g]

You can put a AP in the bedroom and turn down the power. It should "mostly" work" It is not a restriction only on your phone it is a fundemental design change to the whole wifi standard and I have seen no discussion on this topic even.

The solution that is used in business is to put in a micro cells inside the building. This is a option for home users also. It is basically a private cell tower in your house only device you list can use. I did this because I got no cell coverage at all inside where I used to live.

Depending on your provider this might be free if you tell them you have no coverage....and of course imply that you can switch to another carrier that does have coverage. It is not a real expensive box even if you have to buy it.

It is kinda a scam though. They use your internet connection to create a VPN tunnel back to the cell company. So it uses your data you pay for from your ISP. Then if you say connect and use internet on the phone they still count that against any cap you have.

The box I had worked really well it even provided a pretty strong signal just outside the house which helped because the coverage even outside was spotty.

 

[vov4ik_il]

Seamless roaming like you are used to seeing on cellphones is not possible with wifi and alike. There is no base station controller (BSC) to collect signal levels from end devices and control handover between base station sectors (BTS). As previously mentioned, wifi connection criteria are controlled by the endpoint device.
There is no 802.11 enhancement present (that I know of) that will enable something like that.

• On dual wifi systems, you could create software fallback solutions between two APs based on keep-alive.
• There are radio repeaters present (that way you stay within one AP, no handover needed).

That's probably it...