Laptops won't find and connect to the strongest AP

[Guest]

We have a mobile cart with 25 laptops on it. (IBM Thinkpads R51-decent
machines) The cart has 2 cisco access points on it connected to a switch.
we plug the switch in the wall in each room we move the carts to. The
problem we are finding is that; after moving the carts to a new room, the
laptops don't ocnnet to the cart AP's, but instead connect to one of the
several mounted AP's in the building. Unfortunately the mounted AP's can't
handle the bandwidth and generaly have a medium to poor signal in these
rooms. If you manualy open the view available network settings you can
disconnect and upon reconnecting it will find the cart AP's, but I can't have
a class of sixth graders doing that every period.. any ideas on where I need
o edit to get xp to look for and then connect to the strongest AP??? any
help much appreciated (p.s. xp sp2)

 

[Chuck]

We have a mobile cart with 25 laptops on it. (IBM Thinkpads R51-decent
machines) The cart has 2 cisco access points on it connected to a switch.
we plug the switch in the wall in each room we move the carts to. The
problem we are finding is that; after moving the carts to a new room, the
laptops don't ocnnet to the cart AP's, but instead connect to one of the
several mounted AP's in the building. Unfortunately the mounted AP's can't
handle the bandwidth and generaly have a medium to poor signal in these
rooms. If you manualy open the view available network settings you can
disconnect and upon reconnecting it will find the cart AP's, but I can't have
a class of sixth graders doing that every period.. any ideas on where I need
o edit to get xp to look for and then connect to the strongest AP??? any
help much appreciated (p.s. xp sp2)

Silvius,

Make sure that SSID broadcast is enabled for the CISCO WAPs. Identify the WAPs
as Preferred networks on each laptop, and disable "Automatically connect to
non-preferred networks".

--
Cheers,
Chuck
Paranoia comes from experience - and is not necessarily a bad thing.
My email is AT DOT
actual address pchuck sonic net.

 

[Guest]

Silvius,

Make sure that SSID broadcast is enabled for the CISCO WAPs. Identify the WAPs
as Preferred networks on each laptop, and disable "Automatically connect to
non-preferred networks".

--
Cheers,
Chuck
Paranoia comes from experience - and is not necessarily a bad thing.
My email is AT DOT
actual address pchuck sonic net.

Hey Chuck,
All of the above has already been done, except disabling "automatically
connect to non-preferred networks" unluckily we need that on so kids can go
home and connect... even more unfortunately is they are connecting to our
preferred network through an AP in another room instead of the one sitting
right next to it.

Basicaly it is connecting to an AP with a weak signal in our network
instead of the nice strong signal sitting in the same room....

Thanx fer the help

 

[Chuck]

Hey Chuck,
All of the above has already been done, except disabling "automatically
connect to non-preferred networks" unluckily we need that on so kids can go
home and connect... even more unfortunately is they are connecting to our
preferred network through an AP in another room instead of the one sitting
right next to it.

Basicaly it is connecting to an AP with a weak signal in our network
instead of the nice strong signal sitting in the same room....

Thanx fer the help

Silvius,

Did you look for help in microsoft.public.windows.networking.wireless? That's
where the wireless experts are.

--
Cheers,
Chuck
Paranoia comes from experience - and is not necessarily a bad thing.
My email is AT DOT
actual address pchuck sonic net.

 

[Guest]

u d man!

Silvius,

Did you look for help in microsoft.public.windows.networking.wireless? That's
where the wireless experts are.

--
Cheers,
Chuck
Paranoia comes from experience - and is not necessarily a bad thing.
My email is AT DOT
actual address pchuck sonic net.