In Eye P.A.'s Analyze Tab, you'll find alerts for potential issues your network is facing based on the information in your packet capture. These alerts include:
- Non-Standard Channel: Channels 1, 6, and 11 should be used to maximize the available bandwidth in the 2.4 GHz band. When a wireless network is on a non-standard channel, WiFi overhead is increased. This is because the non-standard channels overlap the standard frequencies.
- High Retransmits: Measuring retransmissions gauges how efficient a network is. In a noisy RF environment, 802.11 devices need to repeat themselves more often. This is because a percentage of transmitted packets are not comprehended by the receiving device. The airtime utilized can potentially double due to retransmissions, thus affecting the overall channel bandwidth.
- Legacy Data Rates: WiFi networks inherently have overhead to send data across the network. The data rate at which the overhead is transmitted can reduce the performance of the network. Legacy data rate support can increase WiFi overhead by 40%.
- Legacy Devices Detected: Legacy 802.11 devices in the environment require a significant amount of extra overhead. This reduces the available bandwidth significantly.
- Protection Mechanism: Protection mechanisms help legacy 802.11 devices coexist with modern wireless networks. To reduce interference, legacy devices must properly cooperate with modern networks by increasing their management overhead. Upgrading all legacy devices and discontinuing legacy data rates in the environment will improve the overall speed of your network.
- WEP Detection: Wired Equivalent Privacy (or WEP) is weak security encryption and can be compromised very easily.
- WPS Detection: WPS has a known flaw that makes it vulnerable to brute force attacks, and is considered to be less-than-ideal.