Timeline
2021
Why TR-398?
TR-398 is an industry-standard test plan defined by the Broadband Forum that helps benchmark and compare the capabilities of Access Points (AP’S) to ensure the best Quality of Experience (QOE). Over the last few years, operators have been facing growing demand for Wi-Fi services from their end-users due to the increased number of devices in each household, demand for bandwidth, lower latency requirements, and more applications. TR-398 test cases were introduced to bring in widely accepted, repeatable, and well-defined test cases to measure and compare real-world performance of AP’S by operators and their OEM/ODM vendors.
Timeline
Alethea started support for TR-398 Issue 1 in 2019 to enhance Home Wi-Fi performance with a strong focus on current and near term deployments and requirements. Now, in 2021, Broadband Forum has announced TR-398 Issue 2 test plan. Alethea’s SWAT WiCheck has incorporated those test cases as well as the necessary test accessories from the June 2021 release.
What’s New in ISSUE 2?
With Issue 2, TR-398 covers the latest in Wi-Fi technology also – Wi-Fi 6. 17 new test cases across seven major dimensions have been added: receiver sensitivity, throughput, coverage, multiuser support, anti-interference, stability and mesh networks. All the test cases are to be executed for 802.11ax / ac / n with appropriate pass/ fail criteria defined per technology.
Alethea’s Offerings
We at Alethea offer a fully automated TR-398 test system. Our scale & performance test platform SWAT WiCheck 6 has been enhanced with additional software and accessories to offer full test coverage for TR-398 Issue 2. The package addresses testing for new IEEE 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6) technology in the 2.4 and 5 GHz bands along with testing for 802.11ac and 802.11n. With an extensive feature set, support for 50+ real stateful applications, an option to stream pre-defined traffic, and support for almost every authentication option including captive portals SWAT WiCheck 6 test platform provides the flexibility to run scenarios beyond basic TR-398.
Features and Benefits of SWAT WiCheck 6 for TR-398 Issue 2
Features
- All-in-one solution addressing 802.11ax/11ac/11n in a single topology
- All-inclusive TR-398 license
- Customization possible on chamber design/test case criteria to accommodate unique use cases
- Comes with real scale testing capability with 50+ real applications. Options to scale up to 512 clients for real-world scenarios
- Low ramp up time with easy to use interface and 150+ built in test cases
Benefits
- Provides 100% test coverage for TR-398 Issue2 test plan
- Addresses application performance, scale (1000+ clients), functionality, stability and security aspects of Wi-Fi Access Points and network beyond TR-398
- Reduces support cost by testing real world scenarios thus pre-empting customer issues
- Provide reliable and repeatable results with real world test cases in the lab
- No need to choose between different options with WiCheck 6, users can keep using the same setup to cover all scenarios as they scale up