Adding Access Point (Seamless?)

sterlingr · May 31, 2016

I'm finishing up the project of wiring my house with CAT5e to all the major points. Still, I'd like to extend the coverage of my Wifi network beyond what by router from AT&T can do (Pace N4111).

Goal: Ideally, I'd like to use my existing Pace router as an access point, and be able to add one (or two) access points (Ubiquiti probably) on the same SSID, so my devices will switch to the nearest/ best AP as I walk across the house

How would I go about doing this? Is this even possible? For some reason I have it stuck in my head that I cannot just add another AP and have my devices seamlessly connect to either as if they were the same network, please tell me I am wrong.

Thanks!

skywake · June 1, 2016

@sterlingr

That's exactly how it works. Though I would recommend against using your router as one of the access points. If you intend on buying a couple of Ubiquiti APs then you'd be better off going "all in" and using Ubiquiti for all your wireless. For a couple of reasons.

The first one is that some routers aren't that great at handling devices roaming. You can get some pretty weird behaviour that's kinda hard to diagnose. Like devices that will roam from the AP to the router and then lose some connectivity. But only sometimes. Or they'll just refuse to roam at all and just park themselves on the first AP they connect to. Not that all of them do this but some do. Mostly because these all-in-one routers are designed and tested to be sold as a single device solution. Enterprise-grade APs are designed to be deployed in large spaces with lots of APs.

The second reason would be that if you go with 100% Ubiquiti for your AP it's much easier to manage. You can see on one page what devices are connected to what access points and on what band. You can see which access point is getting more traffic and what devices are the most active. If you want to change your WiFi password or add a new SSID you can apply it across all APs automatically. If a device is misbehaving you can boot it off the network or reduce it's bandwidth. Having it all in one place like that makes it much easier to find out what might be the cause of an issue if it does arise and it gives you a few neat tools to try and resolve it.

Mark77 · June 1, 2016

Basically you set up all your APs as pure Ethernet bridges. And you set the SSID and password identically on all of them. Voila, your clients should pick the strongest AP and select it accordingly.

dricha36 · June 1, 2016

7 hours ago, sterlingr said:

I'm finishing up the project of wiring my house with CAT5e to all the major points. Still, I'd like to extend the coverage of my Wifi network beyond what by router from AT&T can do (Pace N4111).

Goal: Ideally, I'd like to use my existing Pace router as an access point, and be able to add one (or two) access points (Ubiquiti probably) on the same SSID, so my devices will switch to the nearest/ best AP as I walk across the house

How would I go about doing this? Is this even possible? For some reason I have it stuck in my head that I cannot just add another AP and have my devices seamlessly connect to either as if they were the same network, please tell me I am wrong.

Thanks!

Seconding @skywake's advice here. I wouldn't use your router as an AP - you will have a much better experience going for a full Ubiquiti powered solution. I have personally tried this as an IT tech with a number of ISP provided all in one boxes, and they all have issues with device roaming

Donut417 · June 1, 2016

22 hours ago, sterlingr said:

I'm finishing up the project of wiring my house with CAT5e to all the major points. Still, I'd like to extend the coverage of my Wifi network beyond what by router from AT&T can do (Pace N4111).

Goal: Ideally, I'd like to use my existing Pace router as an access point, and be able to add one (or two) access points (Ubiquiti probably) on the same SSID, so my devices will switch to the nearest/ best AP as I walk across the house

How would I go about doing this? Is this even possible? For some reason I have it stuck in my head that I cannot just add another AP and have my devices seamlessly connect to either as if they were the same network, please tell me I am wrong.

Thanks!

As others have said you can do this. I will tell you however that roaming on WiFi is not part of the IEEE WiFi specifications. Which means every manufacture can do it differently. You need to use the exact same access points through out to get the best results. I remember Linus did a video on this. It was mostly seamless but some services might have a hiccup. I remember Linus stated Streaming to the Nvidia shield did not work well roaming between access points, but most services had no issues.