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Posted Thursday, July 19, 2023
Empowering Nonprofits with Meraki Access Point: Enhance Connectivity and Collaboration
In today's digital age, reliable and secure connectivity is crucial for nonprofit organizations to achieve their mission. Wireless Access Points provide a powerful solution to enhance connectivity and collaboration, enabling nonprofits to better serve their communities. With cloud-managed and scalable features, Meraki Access Points simplify network management, freeing up resources for nonprofits to focus on their core objectives. Let's explore how Access Points can benefit your nonprofit organization.
MR Access Points are part of the Cisco Meraki wireless series, which offers a line of cloud-managed WLAN access points (APs) designed for enterprise-grade networks. These APs leverage the award-winning Cisco Meraki cloud-managed architecture to provide powerful and intuitive centralized management, eliminating the need for traditional on-site wireless controllers and reducing cost and complexity. Meraki wireless APs are specifically designed for challenging enterprise environments characterized by high-performance hardware, multiple radios, and advanced software features that have proven scale and reliability, supporting even the most demanding use cases with a 99.9% cloud SLA.
What are Meraki Access Point?
Access Points are wireless access points that provide high-speed, reliable, and secure wireless connectivity. They are designed to meet the needs of modern networks and are ideal for businesses, schools, hospitals, and other organizations that require a fast and stable network connection. Wireless Access Points are cloud-managed, which means that they can be managed and monitored remotely, making network management a breeze.
Benefits of Meraki Access Point
Advanced Security Features
Access Points offer advanced security features to protect your network from cyber threats. They use WPA2-Enterprise encryption and support 802.1X authentication, which ensures that only authorized users can access your network. Wireless Access Points also come with built-in security features such as rogue AP detection, malware protection, and intrusion detection, which provide an extra layer of security to your network.
Easy Management
MR Access Points are cloud-managed, which means that you can manage them from anywhere, at any time. You can use the Meraki dashboard to configure and monitor your network, troubleshoot issues, and even push updates to your access points remotely. This makes network management easy and efficient, freeing up resources that can be used for other important tasks.
Scalability
Meraki Access Points are designed to meet the needs of growing networks. They are scalable, which means that you can easily add more access points as your network grows without having to worry about complex configurations. Wireless Access Points also support mesh networking, which means that they can form a self-healing and self-optimizing network, ensuring that your network is always up and running.
Scalability
MR Access Points are designed to meet the needs of growing networks. They are scalable, which means that you can easily add more access points as your network grows without having to worry about complex configurations. Wireless Access Points also support mesh networking, which means that they can form a self-healing and self-optimizing network, ensuring that your network is always up and running.
Nonprofit Benefits
MR Meraki Access Points can be particularly beneficial for nonprofit organizations that rely on connectivity to carry out their mission. For example, nonprofit organizations that provide healthcare, education, or social services can use Access Points to enhance their operations. By providing reliable and secure connectivity, Access Points can enable nonprofit organizations to reach out to more people and provide better services. Additionally, cloud-managed Wireless Access Points can help reduce IT costs, allowing nonprofit organizations to allocate resources to other important areas.
Meraki Access Point Centralized cloud management
MR Access Points utilize a cloud-managed architecture that enables seamless management of campus-wide Wi-Fi deployments and distributed multi-site networks. With zero-touch access point provisioning, network-wide visibility and control, self-learning RF optimization, and seamless firmware updates, MR Access Points offer a hassle-free network management experience. The intuitive browser-based user interface allows for easy configuration in minutes without the need for training or dedicated staff. Adding new sites to a network takes only minutes, and remote network monitoring and management can be done without additional staff. Access Points are self-provisioning, making large campus and multi-site deployments possible without the need for on-site IT. With billions of touchpoints, AI and data-powered Meraki Health provides customers with the data and context they need to make informed decisions and ensure network reliability.
Meraki Access Point Enterprise features
Meraki cloud-managed wireless access points are equipped with exceptional features that make them highly suitable for enterprise deployments that require top-notch performance and reliability:
- Self-configuring plug-and-play deployment
- 802.11ax MU-MIMO with up to eight spatial streams built for voice and video
- Dedicated radio for security and RF optimization with integrated spectrum analysis
(indoor models) - Advanced security to protect against malware, ransomware, and C2 callbacks
with Umbrella integration - Integrated intrusion detection and prevention system (WIDS/WIPS)
- Intelligent firmware upgrades that minimize downtime
- AI/ML-powered analytics for root cause analysis and Wi-Fi troubleshooting
- Advanced application visibility with Cisco Network-Based Application
Recognition (NBAR) - Flexible group policy engine for creating and applying application-aware policies by
network, device type, and end user - Wi-Fi personal network (WPN) on any shared network (dorms, senior living, hotel
rooms, etc.) - Integrated Bluetooth® IoT radio
- IoT ready (ESL integration)
- Self-healing, zero-configuration mesh
- Role-based administration and automatic, scheduled firmware upgrades delivered
over the web - Email and text message alerts upon power loss, downtime, or configuration changes
- FIPS-140-2 compliant, IPv6 compatible, WFA-certified APs
Network Assurance through Cloud Management
Meraki Health
Meraki Health offers a comprehensive suite of tools and analysis, providing wireless administrators with invaluable perspectives on client connectivity and access point performance within the WLAN. This robust solution enables IT organizations to achieve faster issue resolution, maximize uptime, and optimize overall network performance.
Leveraging data from a complete network infrastructure platform, the advanced heuristics engine of Meraki Health swiftly detects anomalies that impact the wireless end-users' experiences throughout the entire client connectivity process—from association and authentication to IP addressing and DNS availability. This capability allows for rapid root-cause analysis and prompt response, ensuring a seamless wireless environment for all users.
Global Scalability
With Meraki Health, administrators gain instant visibility into identifying troublesome access points (APs) and clients. This powerful tool provides actionable insights, allowing pinpointing of failure stages and assessing user network accessibility. It empowers administrators to remotely identify problematic devices across campuses or numerous geographical sites, while also providing access to built-in live troubleshooting tools.
Through global application of network data collection, Meraki Health enables extraction of valuable insights. Administrators can leverage these insights to implement configuration changes at scale, ultimately optimizing Wi-Fi performance for enhanced user experiences.
Analytics
Meraki Health offers a wealth of analytics that guarantee optimal performance levels, presenting historical metrics in a visually intuitive manner. Color-coded indicators for signal quality, client count, wireless latency, channel utilization, and data rates enable easy time-based correlation with significant events.
Real-time analytics are provided for individual access points and wireless clients, offering precise insights into their performance. Client timelines feature automated root-cause identification, empowering administrators with actionable information and suggested remediation steps for resolving client connectivity failures.
Network visibility
By combining MR Access Points with Meraki switches and routers, administrators gain complete visibility and status updates of the entire network. This integration provides an end-to-end network infrastructure snapshot, highlighting client connectivity failures and key metrics that determine the health of connections and devices along the path to the network's layer 3 gateway.
The amalgamation of these components enables a shift from reactive troubleshooting to proactive and predictive network management. With enhanced insights, administrators can ensure optimal client, application, and service performance, fostering a robust and reliable network environment.
Fast Deployment and Scalability
The innovative cloud-managed architecture of Meraki facilitates hassle-free plug-and-play deployments at branch locations, delivering centralized visibility and control across multiple distributed sites. With Meraki MR series access points managed entirely through the intuitive web-based dashboard, configuration and diagnostics can be effortlessly performed remotely, eliminating the need for costly field visits.
By leveraging the power of the Meraki cloud, each device seamlessly downloads its configuration, automatically applying your network and security policies. This eliminates the need for on-site provisioning, streamlining the deployment process and ensuring consistent policy enforcement across your network.
Dedicated Radio
Meraki wireless access points incorporate a dedicated radio that continuously scans for potential threats, ensuring robust security measures. This radio is equipped for various functions, including rogue access point containment and automatic RF optimization.
With the Air Marshal feature, setting up a real-time wireless intrusion detection and prevention system (WIDS/WIPS) becomes effortless. Administrators can define customized threat remediation policies and intrusion alarms, effectively safeguarding wireless environments without the need for complex setup or system integration. Enjoy peace of mind knowing that your wireless network is protected by these comprehensive security features.
Automatic Cloud RF optimization
Meraki Wireless Access Points are equipped with advanced and automated RF optimization capabilities, eliminating the need for dedicated hardware and RF expertise typically required for fine-tuning wireless networks. The dedicated third radio collects RF data continuously, which is then fed back to the Meraki cloud.
Leveraging this data, the Meraki cloud automatically fine-tunes channel selection, transmit power, and client connection settings to deliver optimal performance, even in challenging RF environments. The Auto RF feature eliminates the manual RF configuration process by scanning the environment for utilization, interference, and other relevant metrics. It then computes and applies the optimal channel and power settings for every access point in the network.
Additionally, Meraki WLANs adhere to stringent compliance standards, including full compliance with HIPAA and PCI regulations, ensuring the highest level of security and data privacy for your network.
Guest Access with Analytics
Meraki cloud management offers the flexibility to personalize and seamlessly integrate splash pages across each Meraki wireless access point. You can choose between click-through or sign-on splash options, using your own RADIUS server or the Meraki cloud-based RADIUS user database.
The Meraki wireless series boasts a comprehensive suite of built-in captive portal tools, providing a rich guest experience. This includes a guest ambassador portal for easy new user sign-on, splash sign-in tracking to monitor user engagement, application blocking, and traffic shaping for optimized network performance.
Moreover, the access points support free and paid tiers of access, and you can enable integrated credit card processing and prepaid code generation for easy guest payment options. Additionally, the splash bypass feature ensures smooth connectivity for corporate-issued or recognized devices, enhancing productivity for your organization.
Integrated enterprise security
Meraki Wireless Access Points come equipped with integrated, user-friendly security technologies, ensuring a safe and secure environment for both employees and guests. Advanced security features, including AES hardware-based encryption and Enterprise authentication with 802.1X and Active Directory integration, provide robust protection comparable to wired networks, while remaining easy to configure.
For guest users, the one-click guest isolation feature offers secure, Internet-only access, safeguarding your internal network from potential risks. Furthermore, PCI compliance reports automatically assess network settings against PCI requirements, streamlining secure retail deployments and facilitating compliance with industry standards. With Meraki Wireless Access Points, you can enjoy peace of mind knowing that your network is fortified against threats while maintaining a seamless connectivity experience for all users.
Meraki Access Point High performance RF design
MR Access Points are equipped with continuous and automatic monitoring capabilities, ensuring Wi-Fi performance is maximized in any environment. These access points intelligently measure channel utilization, signal strength, throughput, signals from non-Access points, and non-Wi-Fi interference. Through this comprehensive monitoring, MR access points automatically optimize the Wi-Fi performance of individual access points while maximizing system-wide performance.
The proven track record of MR access points is evident in their successful deployments across demanding environments. With the ability to support over 100 users per access point and handle substantial user traffic, these access points demonstrate their reliability and scalability. By eliminating the need for traditional hardware controllers, Meraki eliminates the performance bottleneck commonly experienced in high-density wireless deployments.
To stay ahead of changing and challenging conditions, MR access points continuously measure utilization from neighboring access points, detect Wi-Fi signals from non-Meraki access points, and identify non-Wi-Fi interference. Advanced tools like real-time spectrum analysis and live channel utilization provide administrators with immediate insights into the RF environment across the network. Even in dynamic environments, Meraki networks autonomously detect and adapt to interference from non-Wi-Fi sources, ensuring uninterrupted performance.
Meraki Access Point Auto tunneling VPN Feature
With the Meraki cloud architecture, setting up site-to-site VPNs is made incredibly simple. You can establish secure connections between different locations with just a single click, without the need for technical configurations or complex setups.
You have three options to choose from:
- Teleworker VPN: Extend your company's network to remote sites using wireless access points (MR series) and either your own server or a Meraki MX device.
- Site-to-site VPN: Connect multiple branches together through a VPN with added features like WAN optimization and content filtering using a Meraki MX security appliance.
- Secure Roaming: This feature enables smooth and seamless movement across large campuses without any interruptions in connectivity.
By leveraging Meraki's user-friendly interface and cloud-based management, you can quickly and effortlessly deploy secure VPN connections, simplifying network management and ensuring smooth communication between different locations.
Meraki Access Point Wireless Personal Network (WPN)
Wireless Personal Network (WPN) is designed to provide a seamless and "home-like" Wi-Fi experience in shared networks, such as dormitories, residence halls, senior living facilities, shared office spaces, and hotels. By segmenting the wireless network on a per-user basis, WPN ensures each user enjoys a private and secure environment.
With WPN, users can discover only their own devices connected to the shared SSID, thanks to segmented discovery protocols like AirPlay. This containment eliminates the possibility of unauthorized access to other users' devices, ensuring data privacy and security.
A significant advantage of WPN is the ability to segment discovery protocols and unicast traffic on a single VLAN. This eliminates the need for complex VLAN configurations per floor, room, or location, streamlining network management and making it more efficient.
In shared environments, WPN revolutionizes the Wi-Fi experience, providing personalized, secure, and easy-to-manage connectivity for each user, while reducing administrative overhead and enhancing overall network performance.
WPN makes it easy for all user devices to connect and communicate within the SSID, creating a personal network experience for each user.
Meraki Access Point Portafolio
Read More:
Meraki Access Point: indoor Wi-Fi 6
MR28
Usage:
Entry Level, Basic Coverage
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
WIDS/WIPS: No
Interface: 1 x 1 Gbps
MR36
Usage:
Entry Level, High performance
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
WIDS/WIPS: Yes
Interface: 1 x 1 Gbps
MR36(H)
Usage:
High performance optimized for in
room deployments
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
Interface: Yes
Interface:
1x Gigabit Ethernet (RJ45) with 802.3af Power over Ethernet output 2x Gigabit Ethernet (RJ45) outputs 1x Passthrough port (non-managed).
MR44
Usage:
Medium density, high
performance
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
WIDS/WIPS:Yes
Interface: 1 x mGig 2.5 Gbps
MR46E
Usage:
High-density coverage and
performance
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
WIDS/WIPS: Yes
Interface: 1 x mGig 2.5 Gbps
MR56
Usage:
Ultra-high density and
performance
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
Interface: Yes
Interface: 1 x mGig 5 Gbps
Meraki Access Point: Outdoor Wi-Fi 6
MR76
Usage:
Ruggedized high performance
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
WIDS/WIPS: No
Interface: 1 x 1 Gbps
MR78
Usage:
Basic ruggedized coverage
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
WIDS/WIPS: No
Interface: 1 x 1 Gbps
MR86
Usage:
Ruggedized high-density, highperformance
Radio specification:
Dual band (2.4 GHz & 5GHz)
Interface: Yes
Interface:
1 x mGig 2.5 Gbps
Licensing
All Cisco Meraki MR Access Points Licenses
License
Description
Cisco Meraki MR Enterprise License and Support, 1 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Enterprise License and Support, 3 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Enterprise License and Support, 5 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Enterprise License and Support, 7 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Enterprise License and Support, 10 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Advanced License and Support, 1 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Advanced License and Support, 3 Year
Cisco Meraki MR Advanced License and Support, 5 Year
Cisco Meraki MR ENT to ADV Upgrade License, 1 Year
Cisco Meraki MR ENT to ADV Upgrade License, 3 Year
Cisco Meraki MR ENT to ADV Upgrade License, 5 Year
Meraki Access Point Use Cases
Enterprise Wi-Fi
Meraki Access Points are designed to provide reliable and high-performance Wi-Fi connectivity for businesses of all sizes. They can be deployed in offices, retail stores, warehouses, educational institutions, and other enterprise environments.
Guest Wi-Fi and Hotspots
With built-in captive portal and guest access features, Access Points are ideal for creating secure guest Wi-Fi networks. They enable businesses to provide seamless and controlled internet access to visitors, customers, and guests while maintaining network security.
Education and Classroom Wi-Fi
Access Points are well-suited for educational institutions, including schools and universities. They enable reliable and high-speed Wi-Fi connectivity in classrooms, lecture halls, libraries, and other campus areas, supporting the growing demand for online learning and digital resources.
Retail Analytics
MR Access Points can be leveraged to gather valuable data and insights about customer behavior within retail environments. They can track foot traffic, analyze shopper trends, and provide data-driven insights to optimize store layouts, improve customer experiences, and enhance marketing strategies.
Location Services
By leveraging built-in Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology, MR Access Points can enable location-based services and asset tracking. These capabilities are valuable for industries such as healthcare, hospitality, and logistics, where real-time location data can enhance operational efficiency and improve customer experiences.
Security and Surveillance
Access Points can be integrated with Meraki security cameras to create a comprehensive security and surveillance solution. They can provide a unified platform for monitoring, managing, and securing both the network and physical premises, enhancing overall safety and security.
Meraki Access Points Customer Reviews
Easy Deployment and Management
Many customers appreciate the simplicity and ease of deploying Meraki Access Points. The cloud-based management interface allows for centralized control and configuration, making it convenient to manage multiple access points across different locations.
Reliable Performance
Customers often highlight the reliable and robust performance of MR Access Points. They praise the stable Wi-Fi connectivity, seamless roaming capabilities, and consistent coverage provided by the access points.
Advanced Features and Analytics
Customers appreciate the extensive range of features offered by MR Access Points, including built-in analytics, location-based services, and security capabilities. The ability to gain insights into network usage, client behavior, and security events is highly valued.
Scalability and Flexibility
Customers find MR Access Points to be scalable and flexible, allowing for easy expansion of Wi-Fi networks as their needs grow. The access points are adaptable to different environments and can cater to various user requirements.
Strong Support and Community
Meraki customers often mention the excellent customer support provided by the Meraki team. They appreciate the responsive assistance and the helpfulness of the online community in resolving any issues or queries.
Meraki MR Conclusion
Meraki Access Points offer a powerful solution to meet the demands of modern networks. They offer advanced security features, easy management, scalability, and other benefits that make them an ideal choice for businesses, schools, hospitals, and other organizations. For nonprofit organizations, Meraki Access Points can be especially useful in improving their operations and reaching out to more people. If you're looking to enhance your network's performance, consider investing in MR Access Points.
Present a highly beneficial solution for nonprofit organizations seeking to enhance their Wi-Fi infrastructure. With their reliable performance and easy cloud-based management, nonprofits can streamline network deployment and maintenance, freeing up valuable resources and time to focus on their core mission and activities. The built-in security features ensure the protection of sensitive data, which is crucial for nonprofits handling donor information and confidential records. Additionally, the support for guest Wi-Fi empowers nonprofits to create personalized guest experiences, engage with supporters, and raise awareness about their cause.
Furthermore, Meraki Access Points' scalability allows nonprofits to expand their network seamlessly as they grow, accommodating increased usage and ensuring a consistent and reliable Wi-Fi experience for all stakeholders. The centralized management dashboard simplifies network configurations and monitoring, enabling nonprofit staff to efficiently manage the network from any location. By leveraging Access Points, nonprofits can improve connectivity, enhance security, and promote their mission effectively, ultimately making a positive impact on their communities and achieving their goals with greater efficiency and ease.
