LPV calculator instructions
4 minute read
Designed to assist with the effort for generating a rough order of magnitude (ROM) design, the LPV ROM calculator utilizes the assumptions in the previous pages along with the LPV team’s years of experience and best practices to generate a bill of materials that can be used for ROM purposes.
Getting started
The first question is the country where the LPV resides. This helps the calculator by determining the primary radio to be used at the venue. This will also help compute the venue’s total system throughput.
The ROM calculator takes all of the previous design criteria mentioned and default assumptions into consideration. As there are a variety of large public venues with various density requirements, the tool allows for key assumptions to be modified.

Basic starting information required for the calculator.
The country determines which frequency band to use. When the United States is chosen, the calculator will provide a solution set based on 6 GHz. If Rest of World is selected, the calculator will default to the 5 GHz band.
Coverage strategy
The key determining factor in coverage strategy to be used is the expected take rate of visitors and their devices. Venues with less than 10,000 seats are recommended to use an overhead coverage strategy. The reasons and concerns were specified previously.
Venues with more than 10,000 seats may incorporate a variety of coverage strategies depending on the number and types of areas the venue may contain. The calculator will allow modeling of both overhead and underseat coverage of an LPV and also a mixed environment in the case of a more complicated venue layout. Implementing an underseat coverage strategy, the LPV ROM calculator will initially target 60 seats per radio. Overhead coverage strategies assume a default of 200 seats to be covered per radio.
These default values and other calculator defaults can be changed under the Advanced Deployment Options.

Advanced options can be chosen to tune the calculator.
Here the number of clients/seats can be modified to reflect the number of seats to that will be planned for either overhead or underseat coverage.
Other advanced options include the maximum number of clients per controller or gateway, the maximum number of access points per switch, and switch capacity preference. Due to maximum Ethernet cable lengths most LPV environments will typically connect no more than 20 access points to a single switch. Also, depending on the expected usage of the area, more or less wired ports may need to be provided possibly for kiosks or other types of device access. To allow for further flexibility in the deployment the calculator allows for the selection between 24 and 48 port access switches.
The calculator will suggest either a 24 port or 48 port HPE Aruba Networking 6300M switch.
Additional coverage requirements
Large public venues often have areas which require different amounts of Wi-Fi network capacity and may require different coverage strategies to serve them. Examples of areas requiring special handling include:
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Entrance gates, usually exhibit a predictable and very high flow of traffic as visitors enter and then traverse the venue.
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Suites, common to sporting arenas and some other venues, require special handling as the suites could be reserved for corporate or private customers.
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Press or broadcast booths, quite often require dedicated planning to handle the potential higher network usage from people in the area.
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Concession areas which are often dispersed throughout large public venues. Typically found outside of the main event or bowl area of the venue and may require additional consideration.
Depending on the venue type, areas designated for purposes like event registration or event support could be calculated as a suite or gate with the online calculator.
To simplify design considerations, these areas default to a single AP per area. The calculator allows planning for a set number of each type of area, adding the additional access points to the estimate. If density requirements dictate more than a single AP in any one of the areas, make sure to adjust the number entered accordingly.

Setting the number of special coverage areas in the calculator.
All additional gate, suite, or concession areas, regardless of region, will default to either the AP-635 or AP-677.
Example output
Here is the calculator output from a large public venue modeled on the following criteria:
- Country: United States
- Coverage strategy: underseat & overhead
- Underseat seating capacity: 50,000
- Overhead capacity: 2,500
- Number of gates: 8
- Number of suites: 24
- Number of concessions: 40

Example output from the LPV ROM Calculator.
The calculator provides a reasonable, rough order of magnitude of the size of this example LPV project and can provide sufficient information to answer some of the initial questions that may arise.
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