Distributed wi-fi networks across APs for dummies

Installing and Using OpenWrt Network and Wireless Configuration
1

I'm trying to plan for a company move to a much bigger office, and while I have several years experience with OpenWrt via LuCI, I'm trying to learn how I can achieve something like this:

Proposed%20Network%20Diagram%202
Proposed Network Diagram 2.jpg2497Ă—2164 283 KB

The two things I'm most concerned about is:

  1. creating a guest wi-fi network
  2. distributing all 3 wi-fi networks across 3 access points

I know there's a wiki entry for guest wi-fi here. Not sure if it's up to date. From my reading, distributing the networks requires me to use relayd, as outlined here. Would this be correct, or anyone have other recommended links or pointers? I plan to spend all of Monday and Tuesday working on this. Thank you.

2

All of your distribution is wired, so you need only set up VLANs on the cables. The 48 port switch needs to be able to run VLANs.

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3

…and just to spell it out explicitly, as long as the APs are wired to the main gateway router, you don't need (and shouldn't even think about-) relayd. It's only for wireless uplinks where the situation gets more difficult.

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4

A couple “enhancements” to think about

A dedicated, management VLAN makes securing access to the APs a lot easier.

When using all-in-ones as APs, I use the “Internet” port for the VLAN trunk. It’s usually a different color so there’s no question which one it is.

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5

Thanks very much for your replies! I've heard of VLANs but managed to avoid having to learn about them. The switch I got was the NETGEAR GS748T-500NAS which appears to have VLAN capability. I will try to get this going tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

6

You probably want to use a more "suitable" distro for the main router as you more than likely want to do content filtering and/or IDS and to forget logging.