Keysight WaveTest 6 Wi-Fi 6 Test Solution

Problem: Measuring Wi-Fi 6 Performance Gain Under Deployment Conditions

Benchmarking Wi-Fi 6 AP performance requires a strong handle on several factors that influence the outcome – client scale, client-mix, client capabilities, traffic, QoS, SNR/RSSI, etc. Modeling real-world deployments in the lab and pushing APs to its limits just got more complex with Wi-Fi 6 and OFDMA. Testbeds relying solely on real clients or commercial chipsets often fall short creating enough variations and driving Wi-Fi networks to its limits.

Simulation is just one part of the story, accurate real-time measurements are critical to understanding system issues. Wi-Fi 6 promises to improve user experience by lowering latency and improving throughput. With everdecreasing latency budgets, there is very little tolerance for error. Measuring KPIs in software often results in inaccuracies.

Solution: Purpose-Built, Scalable, Multi-User OFDMA Wi-Fi 6 Tester

WaveTest 6 is the industry’s first purpose-built solution capable of modeling realistic deployment scenarios and measuring multi-user OFDMA performance gain. Each WaveTest 6 can scale up to 2000 stateful clients (in multi-port mode) and is capable of handling concurrent RU allocations across all combinations. This purposebuilt hardware is designed for benchmarking APs across all client configurations.

The key is to validate the access point (AP) scheduler performance by modeling the real-world network with a diverse Wi-Fi 6 and legacy client mix at varying distances from the access point. WaveTest 6 provides complete control of Wi-Fi client attributes. Real-time statistics provide critical insights that help to correlate the Wi-Fi 6 network performance across layers. A single capture view helps you debug and diagnosis multi-user OFDMA issues. With full client and test control combined with advanced analysis, this enables quicker time to resolution of problems and faster verification of Wi-Fi 6 features.

WaveTest 6 integrates client simulation, traffic generation/analysis and multi-user OFDMA packet capture capabilities in a single platform, making it a very powerful, one-stop solution for validating 802.11-based products.

WaveTest 6             

The Keysight WaveTest 6 is a high-performance test solution that provides multi-client emulation for testing Access Points (APs). The WaveTest 6 delivers powerful independent Wi-Fi benchmarking, functional, soak, and stability testing for wireless local area network (WLAN) APs and home gateways.

Wi-Fi 6 is the next-generation wireless standard that’s faster than 802.11ac and introduces technology (such as Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access or OFDMA) to improve capacity, latency and efficiency in high challenge and congested areas. In dense client environments, the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers) goals for Wi-Fi 6 is to increase the per-user throughput by 4x while simultaneously lowering latency, thereby improving the overall user experience. With OFDMA Wi-Fi 6 can now divide a wireless channel into many subchannels. Each of these subchannels service multiple stations simultaneously.

The Keysight WaveTest 6 is a next-generation test tool that is capable of simulating multi-user OFDMA at scale to fully validate the functionality and performance gain promised by Wi-Fi 6 technology. With full client control testing, the WaveTest 6 provides repeatable results and all tests are automatable and easy to configure. To accelerate development, extensive visibility and debugging is also provided.

The WaveTest 6 is built from the ground up to simulate multiple fully stateful 802.11 clients with the capability of testing access points to theoretical limits and beyond. The high performance of the WaveTest 6 provides verification of the access point's scheduler performance and insight into OFDMA performance at the protocol level. Key features of the WaveTest 6 include full configurability and control of clients and full automation while giving consistent and reliable results.