Top 3 Network Problems for Fixed Wireless ISPs
At Preseem, we often talk with customers and prospects about issues they may be having with their fixed wireless networks (and how we can help solve them, of course).
We recently examined transcripts from some of those conversations and analyzed them to identify the most common network problems faced by fixed wireless network operators.
The top three are presented below—if any of these sound familiar to you, schedule a demo with us and we’ll be happy to walk you through how Preseem can help address them. Or, if you’re already a Preseem user, contact our support team for assistance and insights.
1. Access Point (AP) Bottlenecks/Airtime Constraints
Topping the charts are AP bottlenecks and airtime constraints—we found this to be the most frequently mentioned issue across multiple conversations. This issue occurs when an AP has insufficient capacity to handle the traffic from all connected customers, particularly during peak usage hours.
When an AP runs out of airtime, it causes high latency and a poor experience for all customers connected to it. Or, as one of our prospects described it, “You have no airtime remaining on the AP, you’re screwed.”
How Preseem Can Help
- RF Airtime Scores: Fixed wireless providers sell airtime, not bandwidth. Our RF and airtime metrics mean you can see which customers in the network are having the highest negative impact on your APs, and whose RF conditions need to be improved to free up the most airtime (and sell more plans as a result).
- CPE Business Value Score: This score identifies the CPE Radios with the biggest negative impact on airtime. Many dimensions are simplified down to a single score that can be used to prioritize improvements that enable your ISP to sell larger plans and support more subscribers per AP.
- Auto AP Capacity Management: Our set-it-and-forget-it AP shaping automatically eases latency problems on overloaded access points, so that you can continue providing your subscribers with a great experience even when the network is at its busiest. Consider it the ‘easy button’ for access point capacity management.
2. Customer Premises Equipment (CPE)/Radio Frequency (RF) Issues
Second on the list are CPE and RF issues, which cover problems specific to an individual subscriber’s radio and its connection to the access point. These issues are often related to the physical installation or the RF environment.
These are identified in Preseem by a poor RF score, low or unstable link rates that cannot achieve the customer’s plan speed, poor signal strength, or high interference.
How Preseem Can Help
- AP Health Score: The AP Health Score summarizes the RF conditions for all attached CPE Radios and total congestion/stability. This metric enables the network operations team to identify APs that are delivering a poor experience across several dimensions with a single, sortable score that can be used to prioritize work.
- AP and CPE Radio RF Scores: These scores allow your team to easily identify APs and CPEs with poor RF conditions across many dimensions, again with a sortable score that can be used for proactive network improvement.
Note: RF scores are normalized across vendors/models and take into account configurations such as rate/modulation, noise, frequency, framing mode, and channel width. Preseem keeps this data for two years, allowing you to see seasonal trends over time 📈👀
Download Preseem's Guide to Capacity Planning and the RF Environment
3. Customer-Side/In-Home Issues
Of course, sometimes “network problems” have nothing to do with your network at all. Customer-side or in-home issues are problems that occur within the customer’s home network, separate from an ISP’s infrastructure.
Based on our analysis of our conversations with fixed wireless ISPs, the two main issues in this category are a) bufferbloat from the customer maxing out their internet plan, and b) in-home Wi-Fi interference.
Bufferbloat causes high latency when a connection is saturated. In-home issues can be caused by Wi-Fi extenders placed too close to the router or other devices causing channel interference.
How Preseem Can Help
- Limit Bufferbloat Issues with Active Queue Management: We use Active Queue Management (AQM) to dynamically size queues and optimize for superior latency and throughput, even under heavy usage. This means you’ll get far fewer slow-internet calls, even when subscribers are maxing out their plans.
- QoE Measurements Tied to Your Network Topology: When customers do call in with slow-internet issues, Preseem can help your support team get to the root cause with actionable metrics that help determine whether problems are network-wide or in-home, potentially saving time-consuming escalations or truck rolls.
