Completely disabling RTS/CTS

[Ben Greear]

On 07/21/2016 07:54 PM, Raj Joshi wrote:
> I am operating VHT (802.11ac) in AP-client configuration and thus
> aggregation is inevitable (as per the standard) as well as desirable
> (I suppose). I am receiving all A-MSDUs and not A-MPDUs. Now since
> losses are expensive to recover in case of A-MSDUs than A-MPDUs, is
> that the reason that there are intermittent RTS/CTS frames by rate
> control?
>
> If the culprit is firmware rate-control, I can try setting the bitrate
> mask and check again. Also how can I force the use of A-MPDUs rather
> than A-MSDUs? If this is outside the purview of firmware rate control,
> then I can try this one as well.

AMPDU and AMSDU should work fine in STA and AP mode.  If you are using IBSS,
then firmware must disable AMSDU since there seems to be some hardware bug with
IBSS and AMSDU.

I don't think you can affect RTS/CTS from the host.  I think it would require
a firmware code change to disable RTS/CTS rate-code entries.

I think there is a way to set the AMSDU size, and you could make it small
enough to effectively disable AMSDU.

Thanks,
Ben

>
> Thanks,
> Raj Joshi
>
>
> On Fri, Jul 22, 2016 at 12:44 AM, Ben Greear <greearb at candelatech.com> wrote:
>> On 07/21/2016 07:29 AM, Krishna Chaitanya wrote:
>>>
>>> On Thu, Jul 21, 2016 at 7:45 PM, Raj Joshi <rajjoshi at comp.nus.edu.sg>
>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Hi all,
>>>>
>>>> I am trying to "completely" disable RTS/CTS.
>>>>
>>>> * Case 1: Using iw/iwconfig when I set the sender's RTS threshold to a
>>>> very high value (RTS thr=10000 B), I expect that no RTS should be
>>>> sent. However, it seems that this threshold is not being honored and I
>>>> can sniff large number of RTS/CTS frames. I verified that no A-MSDU is
>>>> exceeding 10000 B.
>>>> * Case 2: Interestingly, when I set the sender's RTS threshold to off
>>>> (RTS thr:off), compared to case #1 much less number of RTS/CTS frames
>>>> are seen and throughput is seen to improve. But I can still see
>>>> RTS/CTS frames being sent.
>>>> * Since the channel is clear and much isolated, and there is just one
>>>> AP and one STA, there is negligible chance of other factors playing
>>>> any role.
>>>> * There is one change though that I have disabled dynamic bandwidth
>>>> i.e. ar->wmi.pdev_param->dynamic_bw set zero in mac.c. I believe this
>>>> is likely not an issue as similar RTS/CTS behavior is seen even with
>>>> dynamic_bw set to 1 (there are no heterogeneous channel widths in the
>>>> network in any case).
>>>> * Another thing I noticed is that the RTS/CTS protection mode if set,
>>>> it is set to CTS-to-self, rather than "RTS/CTS" i.e.
>>>> ar->wmi.vdev_param->protection_mode in mac.c is either set to 1 or 0
>>>> (depending upon use_cts_prot), but not 2. This probably seems not
>>>> helpful in hidden node scenarios as the CTS frame is unicasted instead
>>>> broadcasting.
>>>>
>>>> I would appreciate any pointers on completely disabling RTS/CTS as
>>>> well as the ability to choose between complete RTS/CTS versus
>>>> CTS-to-self whenever RTS/CTS is enabled.
>>>
>>> Which mode is this? For aggregated frames (AMPDU) RTS Threshold is
>>> not checked, so it can still be enabled
>>
>>
>> Probably would require firmware changes to fully disable RTS/CTS
>> from what I recall when I was reading the rate-ctrl code...
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Ben
>>
>>>
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>>
>>
>> --
>> Ben Greear <greearb at candelatech.com>
>> Candela Technologies Inc  http://www.candelatech.com
>>
>

-- 
Ben Greear <greearb at candelatech.com>
Candela Technologies Inc  http://www.candelatech.com