Starting up WS-6 and activating NSM5 station

[janderson]

My question is how to access a Netonix WS-6 to power-up an NSM5 station if the PoE port is not to be powered BEFORE plugging in a cable. Once I gain access to the switch activing PoE cameras is doable but the issue is how to gain access to the switch to turn on the PoE port for the NSM5 is the question.

i.e. to turn the PoE port on I need access to the switch, if the device does not have the NSM5 station PoE port powered yet . . . . what am I missing?

Is it as simple as: 1) energize the PoE port with NSM5 plugged into it (before mounting) 2) Turn off switch 3) Mount switch on tower and NSM5 with previously activated port plugged in and turn on switch

I understand one solution would be to manually plug a laptop into one of switches non-powered ports and configure PoE port from there, but this is an already installed enclosure and radio.

Question is what is best practice in a situation like this? What do others do in this situation?

Thanks in advance.

[sirhc]

Where is the WS-6-MINI mounted?

How are you powering the WS-6-MINI?

Maybe make a drawing showing what you have.

[Julian]

typically best practice requires local access to the switch you're trying to configure:

Power on switch, plug laptop in and any devices you're aiming to power, open GUI and apply power to ports.

the reason we ask that people not power a port prior to plugging in devices is that the switch will do a basic sanity check on the connected device prior to actually powering the port: If there are any cross-pair shorts, the switch will politely decline to apply power until they are resolved, this prevents frying ports..

I understand your dilemma, though: If your only means of accessing the switch is through a radio link, then what do you do, if powering ports and then plugging devices in voids the warranty? read the following, VERY CAREFULLY.

1. Preconfigure the switch's power scheme, then power off. There is no proscription against powering ports with nothing plugged in, as long as you don't stick anything in there while power's on, you'll be fine.

2. Plug ALL powered devices in with the switch powered off.

3. Apply power to the switch (either through barrel or POE in). It will then boot, run its sanity checks, and then apply power to the ports.

This keeps the order of operations necessary to maintain your warranty, at the cost of a small amount of added complexity.

[janderson]

It's a a very simple setup.

MINI mounted inside enclosure on tower with UBNT GP-C500-120G power supply.


Looks like this :


Port 1 to PoE Injector 50-60

Port 3 - 4 - 5 Cameras

Port 6 Radio (Station) to NSM5 Radio AP


No other connections to any other radios


Had issues attaching drawing, I'll have to spend some time on this later.

Hope this helps.

Thanks

[sirhc]

Read my post signature on how to post / upload attachment / drawings.

In this case you would plug your laptop into the UBNT 60W injector and access the switch UI

Plug in all you cables / cameras / radio

Then power up the cameras / radio from the laptop.

Look you can power the POE port ON then plug in a device but this bypasses the POE Smart cable check which is there to prevent you from damaging your devices and switch with a bad crimp end or device.

Or you can preconfigure it all the way you want and then power down and plug in all cables then power up switch and unless you disable POE Smart it will check the ports for shorts before it turns POE ON.

Read this post for details on why we tell you this: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1178

Question: Why do you say "DO NOT PLUG CABLES INTO LIVE POE PORTS".

Answer: Our switches are "passive" POE which means if POE is enabled on a port the power is live so if you plug in a cable that is shorted or the piece of equipment is bad you will damage the port in the switch and this damage is not covered under warranty.

You own the switch, you can power it up under water if you want to but do not expect that to be covered under warranty same as shorted ports are NOT covered under warranty.

Look, to be able to deliver .75A and 1.5A @ 55C we have to size the Polyfuse to not trip while delivering those watts at that temperature which means if the switch is in an environment that is less than 55C the Polyfuse will not trip until way beyond that level. The Polyfuses are used more for fire protection from the result of a dead short and since you can not find Ethernet Transformers to handle more than 1A per pair this means that the chances are extremely high that plugging in a shorted cable or bad device to a live port will result in the damaging of the port and it will cost you money.

You can not compare our switches to "active" POE switches which means that power is applied once the switch negotiates with the device and at that point the switch knows the cabling is not shorted and applies power. The problem with "active" POE switches is 802.3af limits you to 15W and 802.3at limits you to 25W which will not power things like airFIBER radios or deliver 1.5A to a MINI switch.

I have been a WISP for over 20 years now and I KNOW that we all make mistakes and crimp ends wrong from time to time and we are sometimes in a rush and plug the connectors in without being careful they are straight.

If you turn POE on after you plug in the cable the switch will attempt to determine if there is a cross-short and prevent you from making a mistake if you leave POE SMART enabled. POE SMART is not perfect but it catches 99% of the problems and saves a lot of switch ports.

If you turn the POE on after you plug the cable in the connector is firmly seated and straight with no chance of crossing pins and shorting out your port and possibly damaging your device.

Also there is a possibility that when you plug in a shorted cable or one with a bad device that too much power is drawn and can cause your switch to not only damage a port but reboot the switch causing your tower to go down while the reboot is in progress.

Plug a shorted cable into our switch and MOST times you fry that port and the rest of the switch is fine and will continue to operate. Do that to a ToughSWITCH and most times the whole switch is dead, at least that has been my experience at my WISP over the years. Feel free to try it yourself.

If you want to plug cables into live ports it is your switch do as you want as this damage is easy to spot when you RMA it and we will not fix it for free.

[janderson]

Julian and sirhc,

Thanks for the rapid responses this morning.

By following your suggestions to:

1. Preconfigure the switch's power scheme, then power off.

2. Plug ALL powered devices in with the switch powered off.

3. Apply power to the switch. Run its sanity checks, and then apply power to the ports.

I now have the described configuration installed and working.

Keep up the great work and excellent response time to questions.

I'll be installing another location using similar equipment in two weeks.

Your equipment is great.

Thanks

[sirhc]

Make sure to always run the latest code which is v1.4.7rc22

v1.4.7rc22 has all the bugs reported and fixed since v1.4.6 wa released