maxslug's Mikrotik Networking Configuration Files

This repo is to hold my configuration files for a complex home network based on Mikrotik networking gear. Thank you to all the mikrotik forum posters for all this knowledge and hard work, especially pcunite!

To discuss this please join us here : https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=166330

Design Goals

WAN

• Dual ISPs with auto-failover
• Complete removal of AT&T router ("residential gateway") from the picture

L1

• Disaggregation of routing and wifi into separate solutions
• Switched managed Ethernet
• Redundancy
• Power over Ethernet to allow centralized UPS

L2 / L3

• VLAN separation of Guest, Primary, IOT, Neighbor, and VOIP networks

Wireless

• Centrally managed access points
• Roaming / Hand-off imrovements
• Higher overlapping coverage at lower radio power rates

L4+

• Port Forwarding over VLAN
• Secure DNS

Nework Design

These are notes to go along with the config files

Inventory

• 1 x Mikrotik RB4011iGS+ Router using RouterOS 6.47.3
• 2 x Mikrotik CRS109-8G-1S-2HnD Router/Switch/APs running RouterOS 6.47.3
• 3 x Mikrotik cAP AC (RBcAPGi-5acD2nD) using RouterOS 6.47.3

VLANs

• For each subnet addresses .1 through .39 are reserved for static IP assignment. .1 is the router.
• The WAN ports are not on VLANs
• Once configured, you will need to make a port be on VLAN 100 to use WinBox.

Printing

• ZeroConf / mDNS / Apple Bonjour (AirPrint) cannot be forwarded across subnets / VLANs.
  • You will only get to auto-discover the printer from one VLAN, I chose guest where the school tablets will be
• The printer ports for a Lexmark Laser printer are forwarded from the main VLAN to the guest VLAN where the printer is

Router

• 192.168.100.1

• The EAP Authentication protocol requires a set system clock. DHCP requires EAP. NTP requies DHCP. This means you can't set the clock over the internet because of a chicken-n-egg problem. Make sure mikro1.rsc is modified with the current time before programming it. Or, if you have a local NTP server, use that.

• You will need to coax your authentication keys out of your AT&T gateway so you can run in supplicant mode.

• DNS is setup to use DNS over HTTP (DOH) which requires some certificates and hurdles.

Switches

I was really only interested in an 8-port managed GigE switch, but for the same price these units include a 2G WiFi radio.

• 192.168.100.2

• 192.168.100.3 (config not included)

• The radio in the switches are not part of CapsMAN

• I create a "backup" SSID out of these that should work if I need to hookup the old router, or if for some other reason CapsMAN fails.

• One of the APs is chained off of sw1 due to physical topology

Access Points

• 192.168.100.11
• 192.168.100.12 (config not included)
• 192.168.100.13 (config not included)

Despite what the Mikrotik documentation says, you cannot fully remotely provision these. You will need to create a config file and add it to the AP. After that, the wireless definitions will be automatic, but not the base config and security!

• /system reset-configuration run-after-reset=wap.rsc does not seem to work. I still had to manually load the file after reset
• Resetting into CAP mode (hold reset button till it gets to it's second mode after blinking) is a better starting point
• Certificates will be auto-provisioned by CapsMAN
• Whenever you do a /system reset-configuration on the router, it doesn't have the ability of saving the certificate keys, so unless you are managing your certificates outside of RouterOS, you'll need to clear the certs on EACH access point
  • /interface wireless cap set enabled=no
  • /certificate print
  • /certificate remove numbers=1,0
  • /interface wireless cap set enabled=yes
• Spectral Scan and other cool tools are not supported by the cAP AC (or other 802.11ac products)
• You need to assign all channels manually, up to and including inputting all the frequencies. It's really strange that this isn't done for you based on your country setting. See below.
• I scripted the mode button so that it will toggle the LEDs between "always on" and "turn off after 1h"

802.11ac Band Planning

Here is a diagram I put together to understand the 802.11ac channel assignment

• DFS is the middle part of the spectral sandwich which requires fancy driver support and regulatory signoff
• DFS is not supported w/ the cAP AC, at least not for the ones locked to united states3 region. As far as I can tell.
• 802.11ac requires 80MHz channels, made up of 4 x 20MHz channels
• For any given 80 MHz chunk, there are 4 possible assignments, depending on which one you make the control channel
  • This is what gives you the Ceee eCee eeCe eeeC "walking ones" pattern. I tried to depict this above
  • I only defined the channels that worked for my region
• I use WiFi analyzer (Windows, Android) to do a survey of least-busy bands at each AP physical location

cAP AP Wireless Features

They are lacking on the software-based features like MIMO, DFS, Beam Forming, Handoff Protocols, Spectral Scan etc.

Mikrotik runs their own driver, and it seems to be developed in the 802.11n era. The chipsets in these devices support these features, but they are not enabled. If I had to guess, I would say it's probably a mixture of licensing from the chipset vendor, mountains of software development, and regulatory issues that make it difficult for Mirkotik.

It's not a deal breaker, I'm still getting great performance.

One promising recent development is the porting of OpenWRT to these devices. I'll probably do this once the dust settles, even though it will mean losing CAPSMan, which I happen to enjoy.

References

These are not in any particular order, but all my knowledge came from these, so Thank You!!

config

• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:Configuration_Management
• https://help.mikrotik.com/docs/display/ROS/First+Time+Configuration

Security

• https://mum.mikrotik.com/presentations/UK18/presentation_6165_1539151116.pdf

CAPSman

• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:CAPsMAN_with_VLANs
• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:Simple_CAPsMAN_setup
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=152188
• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:CAPsMAN_tips
• https://mum.mikrotik.com/presentations/BR14/Uldis.pdf
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=158379
• https://www.reddit.com/r/mikrotik/comments/cltszm/trouble_getting_vlan_working_on_cap_man/
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=155429
• https://www.gonscak.sk/?p=575

Wifi Channel Planning / 802.11ac / CapsMAN

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=136476
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=125026
• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:Spectral_scan
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=150463
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=149815&p=737784#p737784
• http://www.revolutionwifi.net/revolutionwifi/2013/03/80211ac-channel-planning.html
• https://netbeez.net/blog/dfs-channels-wifi/
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11ac
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_WLAN_channels#5_GHz_or_5.9_GHz_(802.11a/h/j/n/ac/ax)
• http://www.revolutionwifi.net/revolutionwifi/2013/03/safely-using-80-mhz-channels-with.html
• https://systemzone.net/mikrotik-wifi-frequency-band-and-channel-width-explanation/

band steering

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=127742
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=132817
• https://forum.openwrt.org/t/mikrotik-cap-ac-support/57828/28
• https://github.com/openwrt/openwrt/pull/3037

vlans

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=143620
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=155266
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=163650
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=160224

The Dude

• https://mikrotik.com/thedude
• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:The_Dude

EAP auth

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=154954

Bridging

• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:Interface/Bridge

failover / balancing

• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Load_Balancing
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=93222
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=157048

secure DNS

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=164078
• https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:IP/DNS#DNS_over_HTTPS

Printer sharing

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=110540
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=145765

port forwarding

• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=112861&p=817432#p817432
• https://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?t=130022