Aruba AP-503H data sheet

DATA SHEET

ARUBA 500H SERIES

HOSPITALITY ACCESS

POINTS

High performance and cost-effective

Wi Fi 6 (802.11ax) for hospitality, branch, and teleworker deployments

These economical Wi-Fi 6 access points provide high performance connectivity for any organization experiencing growing mobile, cloud and IoT requirements. With a wireless aggregate data rate of up to 1.5 Gbps and gigabit local wired ports, they deliver the range of connectivity options needed for venues such as hotels, residence halls, and remote offices alike.

	INCREDIBLE EFFICIENCY	KEY FEATURES
	The 500H Series APs are designed to optimize user
		• Combine wireless and wired access in a single
	experience by maximizing Wi-Fi efficiency and dramatically
		compact form factor
	reducing airtime contention between clients.
		• Ideal for organizations with work from home or
	Features include Orthogonal frequency-division multiple	teleworker initiatives
	access (OFDMA), multi-user MIMO and cellular optimization.	• Up to 1.5 Gbps of maximum wireless throughput
	With up to 2 spatial streams (2SS) and 80MHz channel	• 4 wired network ports and 1 Smart Rate uplink port
	bandwidth, the 500H Series provides groundbreaking	• WPA3 and Enhanced Open security
	wireless capabilities for budget-conscious deployments.	• Built-in technology that resolves sticky client issues
	Read the Multi-User 802.11ax white paper for further	for Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 5 devices
		• OFDMA and MU-MIMO for enhanced multi-user
	information.
		efficiency
	Advantages of OFDMA
		• IoT-ready Bluetooth 5 and Zigbee support
	This capability allows Aruba’s APs to handle multiple Wi-Fi 6
	capable clients on each channel simultaneously, regardless of
	device or traffic type. Channel utilization is optimized	Wi-Fi 6 and MU-MIMO aware client optimization

by handling each transaction via smaller sub-carriers or Aruba’s patented AI-powered ClientMatch technology resource units (RUs), which means that clients are sharing aeliminates sticky client issues by placing Wi-Fi 6 capable channel and not competing for airtimeand bandwidth. devices on the best available AP. Session metrics are used

to steer mobiledevices to the best AP based on available

bandwidth, types of applications being used and traffic type – even as users roam.

DATA SHEET

ARUBA 500H SERIES HOSPITALITY ACCESS POINTS

Advanced Cellular Coexistence (ACC)

This feature uses built-in filtering to automatically minimize the impact of interference from cellular networks, distributed antenna systems (DAS), and commercial small cell or femtocell equipment.

Intelligent Power Monitoring (IPM)

Aruba APs continuously monitor and report hardware energy consumption. They can also be configured to enable or disable capabilities based on available PoE power – ideal when wired switches have exhausted their power budget (AP-505H).

IoT PLATFORM CAPABILITIES

Like all Aruba Wi-Fi 6 APs, the 500H Series includes an integrated Bluetooth 5 and 802.15.4 radio (for Zigbee support) to simplify deploying and managing IoT-based location services, asset tracking services, security solutions and IoT sensors. This allows organizations to leverage the 500H Series as an IoT platform, which eliminates the need for an overlay infrastructure and additional IT resources.

Target Wake Time (TWT)

Ideal for IoTs that communicate infrequently, TWT establishes a schedule for when clients need to communicate with an AP. This helps improve client power savings and reduces airtime contention with other clients.

Advanced IoT Coexistence (AIC)

This feature uses built-in filtering to allow Wi-Fi and BLE/

Zigbee radios to operate at maximum performance, range and capacity without the impact of mutual interference

ARUBA SECURE INFRASTRUCTURE

The Aruba 500H Series includes security components to help protect user authentication and wireless traffic. Select capabilities include:

WPA3 and Enhanced Open

Support for stronger encryption and authentication is provided via the latest version of WPA for enterprise protected networks. Enhanced Open offers seamless new protection

for users connecting to open networks where each session is automatically encrypted to protect user passwords and data on guest networks.

WPA2-MPSK

MPSK enables simpler passkey management for WPA2 devices – should the Wi-Fi password on one device or device type change, no additional changes are needed for other devices. This requires ClearPass Policy Manager.

VPN Tunnels

In Remote AP (RAP) and IAP-VPN deployments, the Aruba

500H Series can be used to establish a secure SSL/IPSec VPN tunnel to a Gateway or Mobility Controller that is acting as a

VPN concentrator.

Trusted Platform Module (TPM)

For enhanced device assurance, all Aruba APs have an installed TPM for secure storage of credentials, keys and boot code.

SIMPLE AND SECURE ACCESS

To simplify policy enforcement, the Aruba 500H Series uses Aruba’s Policy Enforcement Firewall (PEF) to encapsulate all traffic from the AP to the Mobility Controller (or gateway) for end-to-end encryption and inspection. Policies are applied based on user role, device type, applications, and location.

This reduces the manual configuration of SSIDs, VLANs and ACLs. PEF also serves as the underlying technology for Aruba

Dynamic Segmentation.

HIGH-DENSITY CONNECTIVITY

Each 500H Series AP provides connectivity for a maximum of 256 associated clients per radio (512 in total). In real-world scenarios, the maximum recommended client density is dependent on environmental conditions.

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DATA SHEET

ARUBA 500H SERIES HOSPITALITY ACCESS POINTS

VERSATILE INSTALLATION OPTIONS

The APs can be deployed as a wall-mount or for remote teleworker environments, they can be converted to a deskmount by using an optional accessory stand.

FLEXIBLE OPERATION AND MANAGEMENT

A unique feature of Aruba APs is the ability to operate in either controller-less (Instant) or controller-based mode.

Controller-less (Instant) mode

In controller-less mode, one AP serves as a virtual controller for the entire network. Learn more about Instant mode in this technology brief.

Remote AP or IAP-VPN mode

For both cloud and on-premises deployments, each AP can establish secure overlay VPN tunnels to a VPN Concentrator (VPNC). Aruba Central-managed SD-WAN Gateways and on premises Mobility Controllers both support VPNC functionality.

Mobility Controller mode

For large installations across multiple sites, APs can be factory-shipped and can be activated with Zero Touch

Provisioning through Aruba Central or AirWave. This reduces deployment time, centralizes configuration, and helps manage inventory.

Access point with optional stand shown

For optimized network performance, roaming and security, APs tunnel all traffic to a mobility controller for centrally managed traffic forwarding and segmentation, data encryption, and policy enforcement. Learn more in the ArubaOS datasheet.

Management options

Available management solutions include Aruba Central (cloud-managed) or Aruba AirWave – a multi-vendor on premises management solution.

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DATA SHEET

ARUBA 500H SERIES HOSPITALITY ACCESS POINTS

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Hardware variants

	AP type	• AP-503H: Mid-range dual radio Wi-Fi 6 Hospitality AP with 1+2 Ethernet ports
		• AP-505H: High-end dual radio Wi-Fi 6 Hospitality AP with 1+4 Ethernet ports, PSE, USB
	Wi-Fi radio and platform specifications
	5GHz radio	Two spatial stream (SU/MU) MIMO for up to 1.2Gbps wireless data rate (HE80)
	2.4GHz radio	Two spatial stream (SU/MU) MIMO for up to 287Mbps wireless data rate (HE20)
		Note: HE40 operation is supported in 2.4GHz, but uncommon and not recommended for enterprise
		deployments
	Maximum number of	Up to 256 associated client devices per radio
	associated client devices
	Maximum number of BSSIDs	16 BSSIDs per radio
	Supported frequency bands	• 2.400 to 2.500GHz (ISM) channels 1-13
	(country-specific restrictions	• 5.150 to 5.250GHz (U-NII-1) channels 36, 40, 44, 48
	apply)	• 5.250 to 5.350GHz (U-NII-2A) channels 52, 56, 60, 64
		• 5.470 to 5.725GHz (U-NII-2C) channels 100, 104, 108, 112, 116, 120, 124, 128, 132, 136, 140, 144
		• 5.725 to 5.850GHz (U-NII-3) channels 149, 153, 157, 161, 165
	Dynamic frequency selection (DFS) optimizes the use of available RF spectrum
	Supported radio	• 802.11b: Direct-sequence spread-spectrum (DSSS)
		• 802.11a/g/n/ac: Orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM)
	technologies
		• 802.11ax: Orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA) with up to 8 resource units
		• 802.11b: BPSK, QPSK, CCK
	Supported modulation types:	• 802.11a/g/n: BPSK, QPSK, 16-QAM, 64-QAM, 256-QAM (proprietary extension)
		• 802.11ac: BPSK, QPSK, 16-QAM, 64-QAM, 256-QAM, 1024-QAM (proprietary extension)
		• 802.11ax: BPSK, QPSK, 16-QAM, 64-QAM, 256-QAM, 1024-QAM
	802.11n high-throughput	HT20/40
	(HT) support
	802.11ac very high	VHT20/40/80
	throughput (VHT) support:
	802.11ax high efficiency (HE)	HE20/40/80
	support:
		• 802.11b: 1, 2, 5.5, 11
		• 802.11a/g: 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54
	Supported data rates (Mbps):	• 802.11n: 6.5 to 300 (MCS0 to MCS15, HT20 to HT40), 400 with 256-QAM
		• 802.11ac: 6.5 to 867 (MCS0 to MCS9, NSS = 1 to 2, VHT20 to VHT80), 1,083 with 1024-QAM
		• 802.11ax (2.4GHz): 3.6 to 574 (MCS0 to MCS11, NSS = 1 to 2, HE20 to HE40)
		• 802.11ax (5GHz): 3.6 to 1,201 (MCS0 to MCS11, NSS = 1 to 2, HE20 to HE80)
	802.11n/ac/ax packet	A-MPDU, A-MSDU
	aggregation:
	Transmit power	Configurable in increments of 0.5 dBm
	Maximum (aggregate,	• 2.4 GHz band: +20 dBm (17 dBm per chain)
	conducted total) transmit	• 5 GHz band: +21 dBm (18 dBm per chain)
	power (limited by local	• Note: conducted transmit power levels exclude antenna gain. For total (EIRP) transmit power, add
	regulatory requirements):	antenna gain
	Minimum configurable	0dBm (conducted, per chain)
	transmit power level
	VPN IPsec throughput	100 Mbps (AP-503H) and 500 Mbps or better (AP-505H)
	performance

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