All in Vendors
The first thing I was impressed with was that there is no additional cost for doing this! You can use the DNA licensing you already have. This is a great solution for companies that don’t have the scale, technical expertise or budget to set up a DNA-C (Catalyst Centre) appliance. Just take the kit you already have and add it to the Meraki Dashboard.
The money and effort that goes into creating these tools is no small thing, so why would ‘Wi-Fi’ tool vendors suddenly start creating tools for things that we’re not using or doing yet… do they know something we (royal ‘we’ here… I actually mean ‘I’) don’t?
There are many good GUI apps to do this, but I find it much easier to use the built-in terminal that comes with every mac out of the box. There is a CLI app called ‘screen’ that will allow you to use a USB-C console cable
So it turns out that the speed you’re told about for a cable is the minimum, not the limit… Now, I’ve always known that in some way but when you think about it it really makes sense.
Did you know that there is a bunch of stuff that can be enabled by Meraki Support in Dashboard? Neither did I until I had a bunch of requests and called support!
We got it down to the NetAlly G2 and the NetAlly nXG - They were the simplest, lightest devices we had that gave us consistent results. The nXG took top prize just because it gives you the average RSSI and you can reset that with one button.
I’ve been trying to broaden my experience with different wireless vendors since taking WiFi seriously. I’ve used Meraki since before they were purchased by Cisco.