Best Router/ AP for a Unifi Setup?

[Richywilson]

Hey everyone.

I'm looking to get advice as to what products I should get with my setup, I've currently been recommended Unifi which has a great reputation but there are couple of limitations and questions I have about this before I fully invest. I only have roughly a day and a half to make up my mind on what to get so any assistance in this would be appreciated.

 

What I'm trying to resolve:

Over the last year and a half I've been into getting smart home IOT devices like the ring doorbell, smart plugs, smart lights, robot vacuums, Echos etc etc but what I failed to do was do what I now know all people getting into this stuff should do.... make sure your network can handle it and my doorbell and smart plugs drop offline from time to time. With up to 15-25 2.4ghz devices chatting my routers wifi simply is not up to scratch and my purchase of an ASUS 86U gaming edition didn't do the trick either although that model may have a 2.4 band issue judging by the reviews. Range isn't a concern as my place is only 1 story and only 3 rooms long although as I'm renting I have no ability to mount the AP's but I'm told by others that although they won't work as good as they can, they'll still work even when not connected to the roof.

 

Solution:

I've been recommended ubquiti's unifi products. I'm coming from consumer products so this is all a lot of information very quickly and am being told they're likely to resolve the issue due to simply being better hardware. Others have recommended multiple AP's just to lighten the load of the 2.4ghz devices as well which brings me to my questions:

 

1. With this situation, would you recommend the LR or PRO AP? I've read so far that the LR has better 2.4 connectivity but the pro is better at 5ghz (I've got roughly 5-10 of these at the moment) and the pro is 3x3 for both 2.4 and 5ghz which I assume will help the connectivity.
2. Would you recommend i go all in and get the USG or Edge Router & a switch? I was thinking of just placing a non POE gigabit switch to my existing ISP provided router and connecting the AP to that considering it's the wireless that's the problem. If not would going with the USG and any gigabit switch do? I'm planning on using the provided injector mostly because I read that if a non POE device gets power down the line, it can wreck it and id rather not risk that to my Pc/fire cube etc. I'm probably being dumb here but I'm new to this.
3. Would multiple AP's be better than a single one to reduce the connectivity issues with the 2.4ghz network even though there's no issue with range?
4. This is more of an optional extra, is there any way with this to get an external HD connected to the network so I can access it from any device?
    

Appreciate your help

[Richywilson]

My local stores "Cyber monday" sale is coming in just over a day so i really need to get this sorted, is anyone able to assist? 

[Richywilson]

Anyone?

[sphbecker]

It really depends on if you are looking for a solution you can plug in and work, or something you can tinker with. If you want to just buy a product that will work. Check out Netgear's Orbi or Google WiFi. I helped a friend setup an eero once, and it was dead easy, almost too easy for my taste, lol.

 

If you are more looking for a system you can peice together, then it would be hard for anyone else to tell you what to get. That is half the joy of setting something like that up is specing everything out. If that isn't your thing, then go with a boxed option. If it is, then your best setup would be a PFSense router (running on an old but stable PC) connected to a Netgear PoE switch running Ubiquiti access points. That gets a little pricey and there are a number of ways to cut costs, but that would be the goal. (in my opinion)