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Ubiquiti Unifi AP AC-PRO + Router

ionbasa
By ionbasa
in Networking
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Posted

Wanted to ask around and see what people think of these APs. I'm looking on buying one or two for my house. Its an open floor plan ~2600 sq ft and ceiling mounting it. (I have an architectural ceiling so it's easy to run the ethernet cable).

 

I'm also looking at picking up one of their routers. How well do they play together. Are their any concerns before I go out and starting buying?

 

I have a decent amount of wifi clients, ~25. Some IoT/Home automation, plus 4 smart TVs, set tops boxes, 4 laptops and smartphones.

 

Thought or any other solutions I should look into?

▶ Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Einstein◀

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They're quite good for home wifi. For a house like that, you should get 2. Also, you should get a raspberry pi to run the unifi controller. Having it running allows you to do zero-handoff

My native language is C++

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Which routers were you looking at? UniFi gateways or the Edgerouters? I wouldn't even consider the UniFi gateways or the Edgerouter X series. Get the ER-Lite or ER-PoE5 if you require PoE or otherwise the Pro version if you want a higher performing version though probably not needed for your evironment.

 

Alternatively to using a Raspberry Pi as the controller, Ubiquiti make the CloudKey which runs the UniFi controller and is powered over 48V PoE.

 

 

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6 minutes ago, Windspeed36 said:

Which routers were you looking at? UniFi gateways or the Edgerouters? I wouldn't even consider the UniFi gateways or the Edgerouter X series. Get the ER-Lite or ER-PoE5 if you require PoE or otherwise the Pro version if you want a higher performing version though probably not needed for your evironment.

 

Alternatively to using a Raspberry Pi as the controller, Ubiquiti make the CloudKey which runs the UniFi controller and is powered over 48V PoE.

 

 

I was thinking of just running the UniFi controller on VM. 

 

As to the router, I was originally considering the ER-LITE, but If I get two APs I may get the POE version to simplify my life a bit. 

Is the Cloudkey worth the price? I don't mind having the software run under a ESXI guest.

▶ Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Einstein◀

Please remember to mark a thread as solved if your issue has been fixed, it helps other who may stumble across the thread at a later point in time.

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3 hours ago, ionbasa said:

I was thinking of just running the UniFi controller on VM. 

 

As to the router, I was originally considering the ER-LITE, but If I get two APs I may get the POE version to simplify my life a bit. 

Is the Cloudkey worth the price? I don't mind having the software run under a ESXI guest.

I run the Cloudkey purely for simplicity as I don't have a regular ESXi host running at the moment.

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8 hours ago, Windspeed36 said:

I run the Cloudkey purely for simplicity as I don't have a regular ESXi host running at the moment.

So, do I need the Cloudkey or UniFi controller constantly running if I only have 1 AP? 

I'm thinking of just picking 1 up and then using my old E2000 as a repeater near my garage area (It runs DDWRT). 

 

▶ Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Einstein◀

Please remember to mark a thread as solved if your issue has been fixed, it helps other who may stumble across the thread at a later point in time.

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12 minutes ago, ionbasa said:

So, do I need the Cloudkey or UniFi controller constantly running if I only have 1 AP? 

I'm thinking of just picking 1 up and then using my old E2000 as a repeater near my garage area (It runs DDWRT). 

 

You can just run the software on any Windows, Mac or Linux PC.

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You planning to use a switch? Because I wouldn't hook up all the APs to the router directly, I would really only use 2 of the ports on the router, one for WAN and one to go to a switch. You should look into a switch, possibly a PoE one for the APs.

And the software stuff, if you have a server, you can run the controller on the server, and you can also run the cloudkey software on a server too. For that just look on the EdgeMax forums.

Comb it with a brick

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1 hour ago, .:MARK:. said:

You planning to use a switch? Because I wouldn't hook up all the APs to the router directly, I would really only use 2 of the ports on the router, one for WAN and one to go to a switch. You should look into a switch, possibly a PoE one for the APs.

And the software stuff, if you have a server, you can run the controller on the server, and you can also run the cloudkey software on a server too. For that just look on the EdgeMax forums.

Yes, I do plan on using a switch because I know that the Edge Router does switching/bridging in software. I have a 24 port Gigabit Cisco switch, but it doesn't have PoE. While I'm at it I could upgrade my switch too.

▶ Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Einstein◀

Please remember to mark a thread as solved if your issue has been fixed, it helps other who may stumble across the thread at a later point in time.

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14 minutes ago, ionbasa said:

Yes, I do plan on using a switch because I know that the Edge Router does switching/bridging in software. I have a 24 port Gigabit Cisco switch, but it doesn't have PoE. While I'm at it I could upgrade my switch too.

UAP's on their own will include injectors

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2 minutes ago, Windspeed36 said:

UAP's on their own will include injectors

True, but if I pick up a second UAP I'd rather not clutter my networking area with injectors. I have a small closet area in the hallway that has space and power outlets at a premium/

▶ Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Einstein◀

Please remember to mark a thread as solved if your issue has been fixed, it helps other who may stumble across the thread at a later point in time.

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11 hours ago, ionbasa said:

Yes, I do plan on using a switch because I know that the Edge Router does switching/bridging in software. I have a 24 port Gigabit Cisco switch, but it doesn't have PoE. While I'm at it I could upgrade my switch too.

Replacing the Cisco with an equivalent PoE one might be costly, also make sure the PoE standards are correct before buying anything.

Comb it with a brick

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