Upgrading to Wi-Fi 6 is not just about replacing your oldest access points. The true value proposition is in locating areas where specific Wi-Fi 6 features will improve the network performance and user experience. The AI/ML capabilities in Cisco DNA Center can help you find these upgrade opportunities.

Wi-Fi 6 has some new features that are useful in resolving what used to be unsurmountable problem areas in a wireless network.
The first step is to understand these new Wi-Fi 6 features and the wireless challenges that they resolve.

As you are sitting at home reading this, you could be analyzing your campus wireless network for areas where Wi-Fi 6 can add the most bang for your buck. Wi-Fi 6 has some new features that are useful in resolving what used to be unsurmountable problem areas in a wireless network. Your Cisco DNA Center Assurance dashboard has AI/ML features that can allow you to find these areas!

The first step is to understand these new Wi-Fi 6 features and the wireless challenges that they resolve:

Poor performance in highly congested areas: OFDMA in Wi-Fi 6, allows multiple clients to transmit simultaneously in order to increase capacity in highly congested areas.

Poor uplink performance on mobile devices: Uplink sub-channelization in Wi-Fi 6 provides mobile devices greater radio transmit power without consuming more battery power. This provides mobile devices better Wi-Fi performance in challenging conditions.

High radio interference: The Wi-Fi 6 OFDMA uplink map creates a synchronization that leads to less interference in between clients and in between access points. Additionally, OFDMA allows clients to transmit on small channels at greater power making them much less susceptible to interference from other wireless devices.

The IoT small packet problem: IT teams with large concentration of IoT devices (manufacturing, process control, video surveillance, etc.) are very familiar with the packet processing bottleneck that access points can become. Modern Wi-Fi 6 chipsets solve this with powerful quad-core 2.2GHz processors that can process three times more packets than most 802.11ac access points and twelve times as much as most 802.11n access points. This processing power, combined with a well-designed access point data-forwarding mechanism, has the potential to eliminate most of the issues you used to have supporting IoT devices.

Now let