Wireless Service Providers → [Tech Ops] DHCP Problems at Tranzeo

I have an odd problem. I had a Sonicwall firewall in place on a network of Bridged Tranzeo and UBNT radios, I replaced the aged sonicwall with a Barracuda, the clients on DHCP don't get an IP address, I put the Sonicwall back in place they do. Any explinations?

People still use Tranzeo?

Yeah I have one small pop left with it

There is a real easy solution.

Remove the tranzeo from it's mount.

Then throw it in the garbage and replace it with anything else. Ubiquiti, Mikrotik, Deliberant, Ligowave.

Even a linksys router from 2002 is more capable then anything tranzeo makes at least in 2009 and has a far better operating system.

edit: I am sorry to be mean but tranzeo's products are horrible the only redeeming quality about them is the case and operating temperature range and the case is really ulgy.

Can you try to put the Tranzeo in "bridge mode" or whatever they call it? We fixed a customer's network and the problem was similar to what you describe, but it was several years ago.

Chele, do you mean router mode? There's not a bridge mode.

Layer 2 bridge mode is the default configuration of tranzeo units. You don't want router mode if you want DHCP from your sonicwall.

edit: I had to administrate a network of those horriable things for over a year. They don't even have Atheros WDS support they have their own proprietary PTP mode checkbox that was called something stupid.

edit: Make sure the PTP mode is turned on unless its a PTMP setup.

It's PTMP unfortunately.

No, it's not "router mode". I just can't remember what it was called but I do remember it was not named something obvious:( It was something similar to WDS(transparent bridge mode) in UBNT(that's where I got the idea). We couldn't get the DHCP to go through for the customer's VOIP system and after making that change it worked OK. Sorry I can't be more specific but we played with the Tranzeo very little because it ended up getting replaced.

PS.

Those radios were in PtP and PtMP. The change was in the CPE --- I think:(

In the wireless page there is a check box for its equivalent for WDS mode it had a stupid name with a P in it.

The help section said it was for point to point links.

is it pxp? And I assume that's enabled on both the client and the ap or just the ap?

PXP sounds like it, you would need it on everything that's connected. But I can't say for sure that will help you.

You have a problem on your network. You can solve it by putting the old firewall back into the network. Why this makes anyone think the problem is a Tranzeo radio confuses me.

You have a problem on your network caused by your new firewall. The problem is that the new firewall is not allowing DHCP to propagate across it. You need to configure the firewall to allow DHCP to propagate across it.

I had to work with tranzeo''s for some time they are far from transparent like most other products for what can traverse over them.

Something the Barracuda is doing is probably not quiet normal for its DHCP operations and the tranzeo doesn't like it and it won't pass over its bridge.

Not quite, in our case the customer's network had been deployed (by someone else) in a "daisy-chain" topology, 100% Tranzeo. We changed it to a mix of PtMP and PtP using another manufacturer for the PtMP portion and Tranzeo for a single PtP link. The firewall and the Tranzeo PtP were never touched. The VOIP started working as soon as that parameter was changed in Tranzeo. The Tranzeo was the last link.

I know this is a long shot, But I just remembered tranzeo doesn't support auto mdi-x you may need a cross over between your baracuda and your Tranzeo.

edit: Does the lan light come on ?

No doubt. The reason that you have to set Tranzeo's to PxP is so that the mac address of the client radio(s) are passed across the link. PxP is Tranzeo's WDS equivalent.

So the reason that DHCP doesn't work across a Tranzeo PtP link which is not in PxP is the same reason that it won't work across some other vendor's hardware which is not in WDS bridge mode. What happens is that a client's mac is masked behind the PtP radio's address on the side closest to the DHCP server. The DHCP request passes across but it has the mac address of the Tranzeo. The DHCP server gives the client (using the PtP radio's mac) an address. Subsequently another client requests a DHCP address across the PtP link and the server thinks it is the same DHCP client that last asked for an address because it has the same mac as the first client across that PtP link. The server does what it is supposed to do and ignores the request because it is bad for the DHCP server to give the same mac address a bunch of different IP addresses.

We had about 30 backhauls which were on Tranzeo gear for a few years. We only moved away from them when we started switching to 802.11n backhauls to get capacity.

By the way, the same problem happens with PPPoE clients if the Tranzeo is not in PxP mode.