A few months ago, American Time received an email from a Canadian school administrator looking to equip their facilities with Wi-Fi clocks. They wanted to find a way to synchronize time with a server and wanted to learn more about the Wi-Fi clock product line, so they asked us a couple of questions before getting started.
School Customer: Our Wi-Fi system uses a portal where users login using their own username and password. Is it possible to set this up with your clocks?
American Time: No, the American Time Wi-Fi clocks do not support portal login options.
If not, I assume that we will need to start a new wireless network without a portal?
Yes, a separate SSID will have to be used for the Wi-Fi clocks in this situation.
I see that the clocks can be pre-configured with a SSID and passphrase. How is this configured? Reading through the instructions, it appears that each clock has an internal web server where we can configure these options.
American Time offers pre-configuration from our factory. To do this the customer completes and submits a Web form. All of the settings entered into the web form will come configured on the clock(s). If the pre-configuration option is selected, the installation is as simple as plugging in the battery pack and hanging the clock. Using the internal web server is an alternate method of configuring the clocks. In that case, each clock is configured separately by the customer at the facility.
If we equip our entire school with these clocks, but then end up needing to change the time server or Wi-Fi passphrase or network, is there a way to do them all at once?
If changes are made to the network there is no way to change all of the clocks simultaneously. If changes are made to the network, each clock will have to be updated separately.
If our Internet, Wi-Fi server and/or our external time clock server goes down, will the clocks function as a normal analog clock?
If the primary configured time server goes down, the clock will try the secondary configured time server. If both time servers go down, the clock will continue to free run until it can successfully connect to the primary or secondary time server. Typically it take several weeks to notice drift on the clock or crossing Daylight Saving Time when the time servers are not available. Additionally, it’s important to know that American Time Wi-Fi clocks cannot be manually adjusted.
If the batteries run out and the clock goes dead, does it lose its network settings?
Loss of power by disconnecting the battery pack or batteries going dead will not affect the memory of configured settings.
