AirMagnet unveils new wireless LAN management products

AirMagnet introduced the third generation of its laptop and handheld-based wireless LAN (WLAN) security and performance management products. The AirMagnet Mobile 3.0 suite – AirMagnet Laptop “Trio” and AirMagnet Handheld 3.0 – adds 22 new features, including the industry’s most comprehensive support for 802.11g, service level monitoring and assurance for Wi-Fi and voice-over-IP (VoIP), new denial-of-service protection and expanded signal quality and Quality of Service (QoS) assessment. The company also introduced “AirMagnet Reporter,” a product that aggregates data captured by the mobile products in any format the user chooses.

The AirMagnet Laptop Trio includes 22 new alarms that address the latest threats to wireless security and performance, including:

• Six alarms that pertain to 802.11g, including the ability to identify pre-standard 802.11g devices and competition between 802.11b and 802.11g clients that negatively affects connectivity and lowers available throughput.
• A new coverage feature that allows network managers to monitor service levels and ensure that they are in compliance with service level agreement components, including voice-over-IP (VoIP) requirements, minimum and maximum user support, throughput rates and other parameters.
• A new signal quality tool that detects signal fluctuations and correctly identifies their sources as malfunctioning access points (APs), multi-path interference or a range of other possible problems.
• The ability to identify multiple SSIDs within a single AP. This allows WLANs to recognize different classes of users, or set up multiple functions on a single AP by designating one SSID for VoIP and one for WLAN data.
• The ability to identify the latest developments from hardware vendors, including multiple radios within a single device.

AirMagnet Reporter is an optional product for AirMagnet Handheld and AirMagnet Laptop customers. Reporter aggregates information from the AirMagnet mobile products to create 50+ different types of WLAN management reports, including overall network health, security threat summaries, rogue access point logs, critical network outage and performance degradation, bandwidth utilization trends, packet error and re-transmission rate trends, channel RF signal strength and signal-to-noise ratios across multiple frequency bands. Network managers can export reports from their handheld or laptop in all common file formats, including Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Adobe Acrobat and HTML.

AirMagnet Handheld 3.0 is the latest release of AirMagnet’s 802.11b-based solution for PocketPC devices. Handheld 3.0 includes 16 new alarms, coverage and signal measurement tools. The product’s small form factor and locator functionality make it the ideal tool for network managers who need to identify the source of network problems, track down rogue APs, and locate interference sources even in hard-to-reach places.