Internal SQL database slow over wifi (original) (raw)

February 7, 2025, 1:54pm 1

We are currently running Cisco meraki Go GR10 access points for our wifi.
Our ERP is hosted locally on our SQL database server with the application installed on the laptops.
when running the ERP over LAN, the speeds are acceptable (4-5 seconds waiting to load screens).
when we run this over our wifi, it can take up to 30seconds to a minute.

I have tried changing everything on the access points and managed to reduce the ping statistics to an average of 7ms.

I changed the channels and went to 40MHz to increase stability.

My final thought is just to move everything to something like Unify 6 access points and even change the switches to make it uniform.

I think we max out on 60 devices simultaneous.

Could it be something else? or de we just need new wifi infrastructure?

Rod-IT (Rod-IT) February 7, 2025, 2:36pm 2

Indices on the database.

4-5 seconds on the LAN seems slow if it’s only refreshing data, but lack of indexing could be a problem if SQL has to run queries to get this information.

Some products are also not designed to work smoothly over slower networks, which include WAN and Wi-Fi and expect 100Mbit or more wired LAN connections.

Have you spoken with the ERP company for their advice? Is it up to date? Fully patched etc.

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 7, 2025, 3:04pm 3

The ERP company is pushing to go over to Azure, they won’t make an effort to help with local setup. The SQL is run and managed by them.

They recently had to rewrite the whole ERP system to “.net8”

I don’t want to make the investment to buy a whole new wifi setup since every € counts here.
same as if we were to move the ERP to the cloud, it would cost us 3 times what we pay for it now.

Rod-IT (Rod-IT) February 7, 2025, 3:34pm 4

I don’t believe Wi-Fi is the issue, it’s application.

They could at least look at Indexes in SQL tables.

FYI, if it’s slow over Wi-Fi, it may be worse over the WAN, especially if it’s direct and not using something like RDweb.

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 7, 2025, 3:39pm 5

I’ll check if they can give me some info around the indexes.
I must also mention use VPN over wifi at home is faster than using wifi in the office for the application.

phildrew (phildrew) February 7, 2025, 5:31pm 6

😱

Pretty sure it’s not indices then. This very much seems like a networking issue.

How is the WiFi network setup and connected to the wired network? Separate VLAN? What does routing? Is there a firewall? Is it doing packet inspection?

Rod-IT (Rod-IT) February 7, 2025, 11:33pm 7

On Wi-Fi or per AP?

This AP is recommended around 50 devices per AP. It has a throughput of about 1Gbps plus/minus overheads.

Is everyone using the AP close by, is there interference?

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 10, 2025, 8:57am 8

Depending on how the access points share the devices, we have 2 in each “department” room → but according to signal strenght, I fear most keep connection with the first one. Then in General, up to 50 devices per AP.

the regular interference by the building, signal is around 28db and distance is no further then 3Meter.

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 10, 2025, 9:01am 9

No separate VLAN for the wifi, it’s connected like so: Access point → UTP → HP aruba switch → Server
routing is 1 hop around 5ms.
We have a PFsense firewall, that one is pretty tightly configured but no rules setup for wifi on the lan so everything goes.

no packet inspection, I did do a wireshark and noticed a have a massive amount of TLSv1.2 Ignored unknown record, around 20 lines before the TCP protocol happens.

adrian_ych (adrian_ych) February 10, 2025, 10:26am 10

I would think “fast” or “slow” sometimes is dependent on how you design the network and what hardware is used ?

If on LAN, literally each machine goes at 1Gbps…
But wifi…the 1Gbps is shared to the number of machines sharing the same AP ? Then each AP’s radio may have max bandwidth of 54Mbps or 450Mbps in Single user mode (imagine only 1 lappy on wifi) ?

Then you need to know how your ERP works ?
ERP is not SQL…it is actually one layer on the DB.
Some may have in-memory tools that uses user’s machines to run some of the processing, in addition, some may be smart to know if the clients are on local network as to offload these tasks while not offloading the tasks if on VPN or connected remotely (eg remote office) ?

So what if all 60 users were on LAN, does them running ERP becomes faster (reports etc) ?

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 10, 2025, 3:02pm 11

I"ve tested when I was alone or when the building is full. There is a difference but it is still extremely slow regardless.
On LAN, there is no performance issues, regardless of how many users are using the ERP.

I did a wireshark trace to see if there is a difference, but no difference in packages between wifi and LAN, a lot of TLSv1.2 “ignored unkown record” but that happens on both.

I’ll request the ERP company if they have some feedback on what could be going wrong.

regarding the firewall (PFSENSE) there is no configuration or VLAN setup for the wifi, only some port restrictions for external access, I disabled them briefly to check but no performance difference. the speedtest to the access point average 65Mbps.

matt7863 (m@ttshaw) February 10, 2025, 3:12pm 12

What is the ping time for a WIRED device? you go on to mention one routed hop - is the ERP/DB server on a diffferent IP subnet to the users? behind a router or firewall?

Things that effect wifi performance:
Total number of wireless clients per AP (per radio e.g. 2.4 or 5G)
distance from the AP
Slowest device on the network

Wifi is shared - so just because one device states it has a good connection e.g. 400Mbps it will not always be able to use that, it has to wait and share with other devices.
low ‘speeds’/connection rates should be disabled, make sure all devices have a good enough signal to work at a high rate. e.g. do not allow some distant device to be using 1 or 11Mbps etc - it will slow down the entire wifi radio channel.

I would expect 1-2ms ping to server on the LAN and max 4 on Wifi.

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 10, 2025, 3:22pm 13

ping over LAN = 1ms

Each access point pushes over 2 channels one for 2.4 and one for 5.
signal is average 23dB
max bitrate is 866 → the down gets split evenly and it ignores the devices not currently requesting anything to maximize down for each device.
upload is single stream so that can cause a lot of slow speeds.

I don’t believe the cisco meraki go GR10 have the option to disable low speed connections.

on average we have 15-20 devices connected per access point.
the ErP/DB is on the same ip Subnet. there is a PFsense firewall but I don’t see any configuration for the wifi.

Samael1 (Samael1) February 10, 2025, 3:36pm 14

On a wireless device , what happens if you change the value from dual to 5ghz?

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 10, 2025, 3:52pm 15

No difference :cry:

adrian_ych (adrian_ych) February 10, 2025, 4:19pm 16

But WIFI is a slow connection as compared to LAN…
So now I would think the issue is with the ERP ? Does the ERP uses a fat client ?

Can you see how much data is being transferred via the LAN vs WIFI to each ERP client ? Coz ERP or reports (like Qlikview etc) uses lots of in-memory process so the data is massaged at the client after it is extracted and presented to the user…
For example, if each user requires extraction of 1GB of data, the ERP just extracts 1GB of data and send to the user and the user’s ERP interface churns the data into user required information…this can be more efficient that the ERP extracting and churning 60x1GB data then sending 100MB of information to the users (the numbers are as an example).

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 11, 2025, 7:47am 17

The ERP uses a thin client, there are no spikes in memory or cpu when using the ERP. everything is run through the SQL database.

The devs of the ERP told me we are the first to have these remarks and no other users experience these issues.

We or the company are in no position to question how their database is being used as they have a big monopoly in our sector.

Knowing how much time it would take for them to admit their application needs work and to generate a solution. I truly fear new wifi devices that can throughput more is the only solution.

adrian_ych (adrian_ych) February 11, 2025, 7:52am 18

Bro…there is only “FAT Client” or ERP software to be installed on clients or Web Access ?

“THIN clients” are usually PC like appliances only for certain connection like to ERP, Main Frame, RDS (Terminal Server) or VDI ?

It is not how you question the relationship between ERP vs SQL vs clients but you need to know how it works ?

spiceuser-v06m (spiceuser-v06m) February 11, 2025, 8:00am 19

The ERP Software gets installed like a client, you need to be in the office or connected to the VPN to have access to the database, otherwise you can’t open the ERP. it’s the same client we use on local devices and on RDS, if you request some data, my cpu and memory don’t increase or have spikes, nothing is stored locally, everything gets stored in the database.

Maybe to you, that’s a thick client but without a fixed connection to the server, nothing works.

and nothing is browser based or web client.

adrian_ych (adrian_ych) February 11, 2025, 8:08am 20

Bro…just to be clear…users access the data etc via the ERP or you can say they access the ERP…not access SQL or database.

The client can be a connector (if you compare to RDP connector) or a full fat client (if you compare to MS Excel to open an xls file on a file server).’

Then to confirm…LAN vs Wifi