Design Tradeoffs with Remote WLC vs HREAP

Question

Can anyone tell me what the rule of thumb is for deciding whether to place a controller in a remote office or going with HREAP there instead?
Thanks
Gene

Answer 1

As long as your connection between the remote site and the WLC is less than 100ms then you can do HREAP. Else centralized location
Here are some notes:
Hybrid REAP Guidelines
Keep these guidelines in mind when using hybrid REAP:
•A hybrid-REAP access point can be deployed with either a static IP address or a DHCP address. In the case of DHCP, a DHCP server must be available locally and must be able to provide the IP address for the access point at bootup.
•Hybrid REAP supports a 500-byte maximum transmission unit (MTU) WAN link at minimum.
•Roundtrip latency must not exceed 100 milliseconds (ms) between the access point and the controller, and LWAPP control packets must be prioritized over all other traffic.
•The controller can send multicast packets in the form of unicast or multicast packets to the access point. In hybrid-REAP mode, the access point receives multicast packets only in unicast form.
•Hybrid REAP supports CCKM full authentication but not CCKM fast roaming.
•Hybrid REAP supports a 1-1 network address translation (NAT) configuration. It also supports port address translation (PAT) for all features except true multicast. Multicast is supported across NAT boundaries when configured using the Unicast option.
•VPN, IPSec, L2TP, PPTP, Fortress authentication, and Cranite authentication are supported for locally switched traffic, provided that these security types are accessible locally at the access point.