Group Policy or scripts that can set preferred band?

Joined
Sep 17, 2012
Messages
767
I'm trying to find some way I can push out something via group policy (or PDQ Deploy, since it actually works reliably and repeatedly, rather than requiring pagan rituals and sacrifices to Cthulhu and just hoping for the best after 12 reboots) that will set our wireless devices to prefer the 5GHz band.

Intel cards, I can do it with this powershell script I found online.
Code:
Get-ChildItem HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class -Recurse -ErrorAction silentlyContinue | Get-ItemProperty |
ForEach-Object {if  ($_.RoamingPreferredBandType -ge 0) {

$path = $_.pspath

Set-ItemProperty $path -name "RoamingPreferredBandType" -Value "2"

write-output $_.pspath
}
}


But, against my express wishes, we've got a lot of computers that don't have intel cards. Broadcom (although I've got that down to about 20 systems, as I swap out every Broadcom POS with a 7260 or 7265 when it comes across my desk), and a lot of Marvell from when they thought Surface Pro 4s were the best thing ever...until they realized they're not. Unfortunately, I can't just swap out the wireless on those.

It does seem, however, that the Broadcom and Marvell WiFi drivers do give us the option to manually set the preference for 5GHz band. But, I want to just make that happen automagically.

Does anyone know of any scripts or group policies or anything else that might point me in the right direction?
 
What wireless system are you using? If it's enterprise grade there are options to prefer 5ghz bands by delaying advertisements on 2.4, reducing the response db threshold, etc
 
As Eickst stated, the feature you would be looking for in a business wireless system is called Band Steering. This will set 5Ghz compatible clients to prefer 5G on dual band radios.
 
We're on Aerohive for our switching and access points. I'll look through there and see if I can find anything on Band Steering.



*EDIT* Spoke with my manager, and they already tried the Band Steering, and it caused a bunch of problem, so that's out. We'll have to manage it at the client level, it'd seem.
 
Last edited:
We're on Aerohive for our switching and access points. I'll look through there and see if I can find anything on Band Steering.



*EDIT* Spoke with my manager, and they already tried the Band Steering, and it caused a bunch of problem, so that's out. We'll have to manage it at the client level, it'd seem.

Did they contact support? Or just say f it
 
Did they contact support? Or just say f it
I would imagine they spoke with support, seeing as how I know we're putting in TAC cases for things that affect single switches, let alone something network-wide. They dealt with it before I joined the company 4 years ago.
 
I would imagine they spoke with support, seeing as how I know we're putting in TAC cases for things that affect single switches, let alone something network-wide. They dealt with it before I joined the company 4 years ago.

Just that it was 4 years ago warrants another go at it, firmware has come a LONGGGG way in 4 years for most vendors.
 
Are you using 802.11k or r in your environment?

If they don't want to mess with the infrastructure and want to only mess with the clients, you could probably do it with a powershell script that modifies the registry. You'll have to recursively search through the control classes (HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class) and find the value for each specific wireless driver. Intel and broadcomm probably use different keys and values, just search through for the key name you need to change for band preference and set it to whatever value is to favor 5ghz.

Intel actually has a toolkit for deploying profiles, you could set it there and at least handle the intel adapters easily, I don't know if broadcomm has a similar tool.

You could then create a GPO with a WMI filter that targets devices with batteries so it doesn't run on all your desktops needlessly
 
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