Cabletron Systems 3Com manual Encryption, Considerations, Configuration, Requirements

78CHAPTER 6: CONFIGURING THE AP USING THE ASCII INTERFACE

Enabling or Disabling The AP can be set for encryption of links to associated wireless clients. Any

Encryptionwireless clients associated with the AP must also have encryption enabled and set to the same level of encryption. To enable encryption in the AP, do the following:

1Select RF Configuration from the Main menu.

2Select Enabled for WEP (Privacy) to turn on encryption or Disabled for no encryption.

3If you have enabled encryption, select 40 bit key or 128 bit key (USA) or 40 bit key (non-USA)for WEP Algorithm.

4Select Save to enter your selections, then answer Yes at the confirmation prompt.

5Reset the AP as described in “Resetting an AP” on page 79 for your settings to take effect.

Encryption ■	The encryption level (open, 40-bit, or 128-bit) must be the same on the
Configuration	wireless client and the access point.
Requirements	All Shared Keys on the wireless client must be the same as those on the access
■
	point with which the client will associate. They must match exactly (key order
	and hex-digit sequence).

■ The selected keys do not need to be the same among different clients and/or access points.

Encryption Upgrade If you are upgrading the access point from 40-bit encryption to 128-bit Access Codes encryption, you must enter an access code to perform the upgrade. Until the

access code is entered, you can only enable or disable 40-bit encryption.

1From the Hyperterminal main menu, select RF Configuration.

2Press the tab key to highlight Enable Strong Encryption.

3Press Enter.

4An access code entry screen appears. Enter the access code in the fields.

5Select Save to save the access code entry.

6If you have enabled encryption, select 128 bit shared key for WEP Algorithm.

7Select Save to enter your encryption algorithm, then answer Yes at the confirmation prompt.

8Reset the AP as described in “Resetting an AP” on page 79 for your settings to take effect.

Special Configuration The following configuration settings are recommended for optimal performance.

Considerations

Disable Short Preamble If you are installing the access point into a network that includes earlier versions of 3Com access points, you must disable the short RF preamble setting (default is enabled).

To disable short RF preamble:

1Start Hyperterminal and connect to the access point.

2From the Hyperterminal main menu, select RF Configuration.