Prestaging for Deployment – MX and MG Best Practices – Cisco Meraki

When deploying an MG cellular gateway, there are a few steps that you can take during prestaging of your gateway to help ensure a stable and smooth connection. Because of the nature of a cellular uplink, it’s important to make sure the device is properly configured and up to date before mounting it on the roof and putting away the ladder.

To ensure maximum compatibility and device performance, we recommend first bringing the device online in an accessible location and allowing it to complete the initial Dashboard check-in and any pending firmware upgrades before fully deploying. By properly planning your deployment and prestaging the device, you can potentially save multiple service callouts to troubleshoot an unreachable device in difficult or inconvenient locations such as on a roof or other remote location.

The initial bring-up for MG devices has been designed to be as effortless as possible, with hundreds of the most common cellular carrier details preloaded on every MG, with the goal of providing immediate connectivity once a SIM is inserted. For many customers, prestaging the MG is as simple as inserting the SIM, powering on the MG, and waiting for it to check in to the Dashboard and complete any pending firmware upgrades before disconnecting the MG and taking it to the final install location.

For those using less common static or custom APNs, or who are otherwise unable to bring up cellular automatically with the default configurations available, MG devices are designed with several potential approaches to help assist in troubleshooting cellular connectivity.