# Best beacon interval for hostapd



## ronaldlees (Aug 30, 2017)

I have multiple wireless access points here, and I'm trying to optimize the hostapd _beacon_int_ value.  The default of 100ms would seem to waste bandwidth, so I've increased the value to ~1 second.  I've noticed that with all access point  beacons set to a 1 second interval, sometimes one ap's beacon would clobber the other's beacon. The clobbered access point could not be seen by clients.  Staggering the intervals  seemed to fix the problem,_ i.e. 1.0 secs,  1.2 secs, etc.   _I imagine I have to power them up at the same time for this to happen? I wonder how hostapd calculates its intervals.

Yes, they're all on the same channel, but are separated by some distance.  I'm usually using just one or the other at any one time, so using the same channel doesn't seem to matter for thru-put.  I'll stagger the channels as well, if the problem persists.  Maybe part of the issue is that the client does not hang around long enough to get a second reading.

Anybody else noticed this problem? For best performance, what values are best for the beacon interval?


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