Bluesocket offers LANPlanner

Network equipment and management company Bluesocket is offering its customers Bluesocket Wireless LANPlanner, a personalized version of the software from creator Wireless Valley. The new software will come at a major discount over the full version, but will be limited to planning networks with Bluesocket equipment.

"We've worked with Wireless Valley to build in definitions for Bluesocket products," says Doug DiNunzio, senior product manger

at Bluesocket. "The tool understands the Bluesocket access points, sensors, and antennas. It knows the transmit powers, receive sensitivity, and more" of the company's BlueSecure products.

While customers and partners can model the exact Bluesocket products they think will be needed, without having to use generic representations, DiNunzio says he did insist that a generic access point definition be available for those deployments that might use, for example, third-party APs from Symbol or Cisco.

"There will be folks that want to carry forward from a legacy environment," says DiNunzio. "They want to move forward with Bluesocket access points... this [software] will allow that."

There will be a discount upgrade path to customers that find the need for the full Wireless LANPlanner product. Wireless Valley doesn't publicize the cost for the full product on their site, but DiNunzio says the Bluesocket version will sell for $7,000 MSRP. It's a price he calls "aggressive."

Wireless Valley offers similar deals for other vendors. Xirrus offers an integrated copy of the company's Wireless LANPlanner and RF Manager software with each of it's hardware array products. SMC Networks has a customized LANPlanner specific to its own EliteConnect line of products. In October, Wireless Valley unveiled MeshPlanner for mapping out metropolitan-sized networks with mesh nodes, a product it originally designed in partnership with Nortel Networks back in May.