Aruba Wi-Fi 6 access points provide high-performance
connectivity for any organization experiencing growing
numbers of IoT and mobility requirements. With a combined
peak datarate of up to 5.37Gbps, the 550 Series deliver the
speed and reliability needed for any enterprise
INCREDIBLE EFFICIENCY
The 550 Series APs are also designed to optimize user
experience by maximizing Wi-Fi efficiency and dramatically
reducing airtime contention between clients.
Features include Orthogonal frequency-division multiple
access (OFDMA), bi-directional multi-user MIMO and
cellular optimization. With optional tri-radios, up to 4 spatial
streams (4SS) and 160MHz channel bandwidth, the 550
Series provides groundbreaking wireless capabilities for
any enterprise.
Read the Multi-User 802.11ax white paper for further
information.
Advantages of OFDMA
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 by
handling each transaction via smaller sub-carriers or resource
units (RUs), which means that clients are sharing a channel and
not competing for airtime and bandwidth.
The following table highlights the number of available
resources units per Wi-Fi Channel used:
Aruba Air Slice™ for Extended Application Assurance
Initially, APs in controller-less mode (Instant) can provide
SLA-grade performance by allocating radio resources, such as
time, frequency, and spatial streams, to specific traffic types.
By combining Aruba’s Policy Enforcement Firewall (PEF) and
Layer 7 deep packet inspection (DPI) to identify user roles and
applications, the APs will dynamically allocate the bandwidth
needed. Non-Wi-Fi 6 clients can also benefit.
Air Slice for APs uses Aruba Central for management.
Bi-directional Multi-user MIMO (MU-MIMO)
Similar to downlink MU-MIMO in Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac Wave 2), the
550 Series can simultaneously connect clients use downlink
– and now – uplink spatial streams. The added benefit is the
ability to multiply the number of clients that can now send
traffic, thus optimizing client-to-AP spatial stream diversity.
Wi-Fi 6 and MU-MIMO aware client optimization
Aruba’s patented AI-powered ClientMatch technology
eliminates sticky client issues by placing Wi-Fi 6 capable devices
on the best available AP. Session metrics are used to steer
mobile devices to the best AP based on available bandwidth,
types of applications being used and traffic type – even as
users roam.
Aruba 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.
IOT PLATFORM CAPABILITIES
Like all Aruba Wi-Fi 6 APs, the 550 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. It also
enables NFC to easily display AP status information and
streamline deployment. This allows organizations to leverage
the 550 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.
FOUNDATION FOR ACCURATE INDOOR LOCATION
Aruba APs act as a foundation for accurate indoor location
so that location-aware services can be deployed at scale.
Using embedded GPS receivers, Aruba Wi-Fi 6E APs are able
to self-locate and work with Wi-Fi 6 APs to establish reference
points that can be used to accurately determine indoor client
location.
Because they use universal latitude and longitude
coordinates, there is no need for custom map development
or to create separate applications for indoor and outdoor
environments.
ARUBA SECURE INFRASTRUCTURE
The Aruba 550 Series includes components of Aruba’s 360
Secure Fabric 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. Requires ClearPass Policy Manager.
VPN Tunnels
In Remote AP (RAP) and IAP-VPN deployments, the Aruba 550
Series can be used to establish a secure SSL/IPSec VPN tunnel
to a 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 and keys, and boot code.
SIMPLE AND SECURE ACCESS
To simplify policy enforcement, the Aruba 550 Series uses
Aruba’s policy enforcement firewall (PEF) feature 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
Like the 530 Series AP, each 550 Series AP provides
connectivity for a maximum of 1024 associated clients per
radio (2048 in total). In real-world scenarios, the maximum
recommended client density is dependent on environmental
conditions.
FLEXIBLE OPERATION AND MANAGEMENT
A unique feature of Aruba APs is the ability to operate in either
controllerless (Instant) or controller-based mode.
Controller-less (Instant) mode
In controllerless mode, one AP serves as a virtual controller
for the entire network. Learn more about Instant mode in this
technology brief.
Mobility Controller mode
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 (cloudmanaged)
or Aruba AirWave – a multi-vendor on-premises
management solution.
For large installations across multiple sites, APs can be
factoryshipped
and can be activated with Zero Touch Provisioning
through Aruba Central or AirWave. This reduces deployment
time, centralizes configuration, and helps manage inventory.
ADDITIONAL WI-FI FEATURES
Each AP also includes the following standards-based
technologies:
Transmit beamforming (TxBF)
Increased signal reliability and range
Passpoint Wi-Fi (Release 2) (Hotspot 2.0)
Seamless cellular-to-Wi-Fi carryover for guests
Dynamic Frequency Selection (DFS)
Optimized use of available RF spectrum
Maximum Ratio Combining (MRC)
Improved receiver performance
Cyclic Delay/Shift Diversity (CDD/CSD)
Greater downlink RF performance
Space-Time Block Coding
Increased range and improved reception
Low-Density Parity Check (LDPC)
High-efficiency error correction for increased throughput
SPECIFICATIONS
Hardware variants
• AP-555: Internal antenna models
Wi-Fi radio specifications
• AP type: Indoor, dual/tri-radio, 5GHz and 2.4GHz 802.11ax
4x4 MIMO
• 5GHz radio (dual-radio operation): Eight spatial stream
HE80 (or 4SS HE160) MIMO for up to 4.8Gbps wireless
data rate
• 5GHz radio (tri-radio operation): Four spatial stream HE80
(or 2SS HE160) MIMO for up to 2.4Gbps wireless data rate
• 2.4GHz radio: Four spatial stream HE40 (HE20) MIMO for
up to 1,147Mbps (574Mbps)
• Both downlink and uplink MU-MIMO in 5GHz, downlink
only in 2.4GHz
• Support for up to 1,024 associated client devices per
radio, and up to 16 BSSIDs per radio
• Supported frequency bands (country-specific restrictions
apply):
- 2.400 to 2.4835GHz (radio 1) ISM
- 5.150 to 5.250GHz (radio 0 and 0L) U-NII-1
- 5.250 to 5.350GHz (radio 0 and 0L) U-NII-2A
- 5.470 to 5.725GHz (radio 0 and 0U) U-NII-2C
- 5.725 to 5.850GHz (radio 0 and 0U) U-NII-3
- 5.850 to 5.895GHz (radio 0 and 0U) U-NII-4
• Available channels: Dependent on configured regulatory
domain
• Dynamic frequency selection (DFS) optimizes the use of
available RF spectrum
- Including Zero-Wait DFS (ZWDFS) to accelerate channel
changes
• Supported radio technologies:
- 802.11b: Direct-sequence spread-spectrum (DSSS)
- 802.11a/g/n/ac: Orthogonal frequency-division
multiplexing (OFDM)
- 802.11ax: Orthogonal frequency-division multiple access
(OFDMA) with up to 37 resource units (for an 80MHz
channel)
• Supported modulation types:
- 802.11b: BPSK, QPSK, CCK
- 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 (HT) support: HT20/40
• 802.11ac very high throughput (VHT) support:
VHT20/40/80/160
• 802.11ax high efficiency (HE) support: HE20/40/80/160
• Supported data rates (Mbps):
- 802.11b: 1, 2, 5.5, 11
- 802.11a/g: 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54
- 802.11n: 6.5 to 600 (MCS0 to MCS31, HT20 to HT40),
800 with 256-QAM
- 802.11ac: 6.5 to 1,733 (MCS0 to MCS9, NSS = 1 to 4,
VHT20 to VHT160), 2,166 with 1024-QAM
- 802.11ax (2.4GHz): 3.6 to 1,147 (MCS0 to MCS11, NSS =
1 to 4, HE20 to HE40)
- 802.11ax (5GHz): 3.6 to 4,804 (MCS0 to MCS11, NSS = 1
to 8, HE20 to HE160)
• 802.11n/ac/ax packet aggregation: A-MPDU, A-MSDU
• Transmit power: Configurable in increments of 0.5dBm
• Maximum (aggregate, conducted total) transmit power
(limited by local regulatory requirements):
- 2.4GHz band: +24dBm (18dBm per chain)
- 5GHz band: +27dBm in dual-radio mode, +24dBm in triradio
mode (18dBm per chain)
- Note: conducted transmit power levels exclude antenna
gain. For total (EIRP) transmit power, add antenna gain.
• Advanced Cellular Coexistence (ACC) minimizes the impact
of interference from cellular networks
• Maximum ratio combining (MRC) for improved receiver
performance
• Cyclic delay/shift diversity (CDD/CSD) for improved
downlink RF performance
• Space-time block coding (STBC) for increased range and
improved reception
• Low-density parity check (LDPC) for high-efficiency error
correction and increased throughput
• Transmit beam-forming (TxBF) for increased signal
reliability and range
• 802.11ax Target Wait Time (TWT) to support low-power
client devices
Wi-Fi antennas
• Integrated downtilt omni-directional antennas for 4x4
MIMO in 2.4GHz with peak antenna gain of 4.3dBi, and
8x8 MIMO in 5GHz with peak antenna gain of 5.8dBi in
5GHz. In tri-radio mode, the peak gain of the antennas
for each of the 4x4 5GHz radios is 5.5dBi (radio 0L, lower
half of 5GHz) and 5.6dBi (radio 0U, upper half of 5GHz).
Built‑in antennas are optimized for horizontal ceiling
mounted orientation of the AP. The downtilt angle for
maximum gain is roughly 30 degrees.
- A mix of horizontally and vertically polarized antenna
elements is used
- Combining the patterns of each of the antennas of
the MIMO radios, the peak gain of the combined,
average pattern is 2.4dBi in 2.4GHz and 2.0dBi in 5GHz
(dual-radio mode).
- In tri-radio mode, the peak gain of the combined,
average pattern is 2.7dBi (radio 0L, lower half of 5GHz)
and 1.8dBi (radio 0U, upper half of 5GHz)
Other interfaces
• E0, E1: HPE SmartRate port (RJ-45, maximum negotiated
speed 5Gbps)
- Auto-sensing link speed (100/1000/2500/5000BASE-T)
and MDI/MDX
- 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps speeds comply with NBase-T and
802.3bz specifications
- POE-PD: 48Vdc (nominal) 802.3at/bt POE (class 4 or
higher)
- 802.3az Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)
• Link aggregation (LACP) support between both network
ports for redundancy and increased capacity
• POE power can be drawn from either port (single source,
or set to prioritize) or both ports simultaneously (set to
combine). When set to prioritize, the AP draws power
from E0 and may failover to E1.
• DC power interface: 48Vdc (nominal, +/- 5%), accepts
1.35mm/3.5mm center-positive circular plug with 9.5mm
length
• USB 2.0 host interface (Type A connector)
- Capable of sourcing up to 1A / 5W to an attached device
• Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE5.0) and Zigbee (802.15.4)
radio (2.4GHz)
- BLE: up to 8dBm transmit power (class 1) and -99dBm
receive sensitivity (125kbps)
- Zigbee: up to 8dBm transmit power and -97dBm receive
sensitivity
- A pair of integrated omnidirectional antennas
(polarization diversity) with roughly 30 degrees downtilt
and peak gain of 4.5dBi
• Visual indictors (two multi-color LEDs): for System and
Radio status
• Reset button: factory reset, LED mode control (normal/off)
• Serial console interface (proprietary, micro-B USB physical
jack)
• Kensington security slot
Power sources and power consumption
• The AP supports direct DC power and Power over
Ethernet (POE; on port E0 and/or E1)
• When POE power is supplied to both Ethernet ports,
the AP can be configured to combine or prioritize power
sources
• When both DC and POE power sources are available, DC
power takes priority over POE
• Power sources are sold separately; see the ordering
Information section below for details
• When powered by DC, 802.3bt (class 5) POE or 2x 802.3at
(class 4) POE, the AP will operate without restrictions.
• When powered by 1x 802.3at (class 4) POE and with the
IPM feature disabled, the AP will disable the USB port,
disable the other Ethernet port, operate the 5GHz radio in
4x4 mode, and disable tri-radio operation
• In the same configuration but with IPM enabled, the AP
will start up in unrestricted mode, but may dynamically
apply restrictions depending on the POE budget and
actual power. The feature restrictions and order can be
programmed.
• Operating the AP with an 802.3af (class 3 or lower) POE
source is not supported.
• Maximum (worst-case) power consumption (dual-radio
operation):
- DC powered: 32.6W
- POE powered (802.3bt or dual 802.3at): 38.2W
- POE powered (802.3at, IPM disabled): 25.1W
- All numbers above are without an external USB device
connected. When sourcing the full 5W power budget
to such a device, the incremental (worst-case) power
consumption for the AP is up to 6.0W (POE powered) or
5.4W (DC powered).
• Maximum (worst-case) power consumption in idle mode
(dual-radio operation): 15.0W (POE) or 15.1W (DC).
• Maximum (worst-case) power consumption in deep-sleep
mode: 3.8W(POE) or 3.6W (DC)
Mounting details
• A mounting bracket has been pre-installed on the back
of the AP. This bracket is used to secure the AP to any of
the Aruba mount kits (sold separately); see the ordering
Information section below for details.
Mechanical specifications
• Dimensions/weight (AP-555; unit, excluding mount
bracket):
- 260mm (W) x 260mm (D) x 61mm (H) / 10.2” (W) x 10.2”
(D) x 2.3” (H)
- 1,570g / 55.4oz
• Dimensions/weight (AP-555; shipping):
- 320mm (W) x 303mm (D) x 108mm (H) / 12.6” (W) x 11.9”
(D) x 4.3” (H)
- 2,230g / 78.7oz
Environmental specifications
• Operating conditions
- Temperature: 0C to +50C / +32F to +122F
- Humidity: 5% to 93% non-condensing
- AP is plenum rated for use in air-handling spaces
- ETS 300 019 class 3.2 environments
• Storage and transportation conditions
- Temperature: -40C to +70C / -40F to +158F
- Humidity: 5% to 93% non-condensing
- ETS 300 019 classes 1.2 and 2.3 environments
Reliability
• Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF): 855,000hrs (98yrs) at
+25C operating temperature.
Regulatory compliance
• FCC/ISED
• CE Marked
• RED Directive 2014/53/EU
• EMC Directive 2014/30/EU
• Low Voltage Directive 2014/35/EU
• UL/IEC/EN 60950
• EN 60601-1-1, EN60601-1-2
For more country-specific regulatory information and
approvals, please see your Aruba representative.
Regulatory model numbers
• AP-555: APIN0555
Certifications
• UL2043 plenum rating
• Wi-Fi Alliance:
- Wi-Fi CERTIFIED a, b, g, n, ac, ax
- WPA, WPA2 and WPA3 – Enterprise with CNSA option,
Personal (SAE), Enhanced Open (OWE)
- WMM, WMM-PS, W-Fi Agile Multiband
- Passpoint (release 2)
• Bluetooth SIG
WARRANTY
Aruba’s hardware limited lifetime warranty.
MINIMUM OPERATING SYSTEM SOFTWARE
VERSIONS
• ArubaOS and Aruba InstantOS 8.5.0.0 (with some
restrictions). For unrestricted operation, use 8.6.0.0 or
later.
• ArubaOS 10.0.0.
Q1.What can you buy from us?
A:Mellanox, Aruba, Rukus, Extreme brand products, including
switches, network cards, cables, Access Point, etc.
Q2.How about the delivery date?
A:It usually takes 3-5 working days. For specific models, please
contact us to check the stock. In the end, the actual consultation
shall prevail. We will do our best to deliver as soon as possible.
Q3.What's your warranty terms?
A: We supply 12 months warranty time.
Q4.How about the Shipping Method?
A: We use Fedex/DHL/UPS/TNT and other air shipments,sea shipments
are also workable. In one words, we could do any shipments that you
wanted.
Q5.Can I get some samples?
A:Yes, sample order is available for quality check and market test.
You only need to pay the sample cost and express cost.
Q6.What are your core strengths?
A:First-hand supply, Original and new products with the favorable
price and perfect after-sales service.
