My review of the Ubiquiti UAP-AC-LR

pbx2 · December 29, 2016

So i have had my new Ubiquiti UAP-AC-LR for a few days now, so here is my review of it.

The unboxing was nice, The outside of the box looks good and contains all the information you would ever want.

I liked the small protector on top of the AP, shows quality

I don't like how tightly it is packaged at the bottom, but i can understand why as it saves on postage and the bottom bits are not really what you are paying for.

So i got onto doing some tests, with two different internet connections.

Range:

First of all, at the first place i tested it, i had it at the back of the house in an extension, i managed to get top speeds of 6Mbit DL (the fastest the connection could provide) outside the front of the house on the other side of the street, about 60 meters away, keep in mind that it went through two brick walls, so i think that was quite good, and i probably could have gone further.

Where i currently am i have a 200Mbit connection, so there is less bottleneck, however, i can't be bothered to test the range.

The estimated range from the controller was OK, and i don't think it was too far off.

POE:

There is an inconvenience of having to need two ethernet cables because you need one for the POE out and LAN in, this is annoying, so keep it in mind that you will need to buy another cable or steal one from another device (Like i did).

However it is nice to be able to run just one cable, and i will be taking advantage of this at the place i will deploy it.

Throughput:

I decided not to test with a 6Mbit connection for obvious reasons.

I will do some file transfer tests when i return to school because all the things i need to do so are there.

Tests were done on an iPad air (one)

The max speed of the connection is ~220Mbps DL / ~12Mbps UP

Here are some tests: (I am not quoting each link)

2G: (No vs original tests on this)

Directly ontop of the AP: 70.74Mbps DL | 12.47Mbps UP.

~2M away with no obstructions: 59.58Mbps DL | 12.11Mbps UP.

~5M away with no obstructions: 49.30Mbps DL | 11.99Mbps UP.

Through ceiling: 71.11Mbps DL | 12.30Mbps UP.

5G: (Vs the virgin super hub 2.0)

Directly ontop of the AP:

Virgin: (Test 1: 106.49Mbps DL | 12.40Mbps UP) (Test 2: 157.50Mbps DL | 12.42Mbps UP) (Test 3: 126.53Mbps DL | 12.66Mbps UP)

AC-LR: (Test 1: 114.40Mbps DL | 12.48Mbps UP) (Test 2: 108.42Mbps DL | 12.58Mbps UP) (Test 3: 71.81Mbps DL | 12.40Mbps UP)

~2M away with no obstructions:

Virgin: (Test 1: 122.51Mbps DL | 12.40Mbps UP) (Test 2: 139.80Mbps DL | 12.80Mbps UP) (Test 3: 107.29Mbps DL | 12.51Mbps UP)

AC-LR: (Test 1: 133.34Mbps DL | 12.70Mbps UP) (Test 2: 110.16Mbps DL | 12.49Mbps UP) (Test 3: 83.37Mbps DL | 12.51Mbps UP)

~5M away with no obstructions:

Virgin: (Test 1: 130.41Mbps DL | 12.49Mbps UP) (Test 2: 137.40Mbps DL | 12.46Mbps UP) (Test 3: 143.54Mbps DL | 12.65Mbps UP)

AC-LR: (Test 1: 116.80Mbps DL | 12.53Mbps UP) (Test 2: 111.13Mbps DL | 12.53Mbps UP) (Test 3: 117.13Mbps DL | 12.39Mbps UP)

Through ceiling:

Virgin: (Test 1: 87.85Mbps DL | 12.49Mbps UP) (Test 2: 41.69Mbps DL | 12.45Mbps UP) (Test 3: 81.93Mbps DL | 12.37Mbps UP)

AC-LR: (Test 1: 78.11Mbps DL | 12.58Mbps UP) (Test 2: 92.31Mbps DL | 12.44Mbps UP) (Test 3: 99.86Mbps DL | 12.62Mbps UP)

Overall, they are close, however, this is the fun bit, multiple devices.

(All start test buttons were pressed at the same time)

The virgin held up better than i expected:

5G:

Virgin:

Laptop: 86.34Mbps DL | 4.88Mbps UP

Phone: 45.03Mbps DL | 11.50Mbps UP

iPad: 24.86Mbps DL | 6.45Mbps UP

AC-LR

Laptop: 55.94Mbps DL | 5.04Mbps UP

Phone: 57.29Mbps DL | 11.60Mbps UP

iPad: 57.77Mbps DL | 10.43Mbps UP

Airtime fairness:

See above, The virgin obviously has none enabled.

The AC-LR is quite good at it, however, although it isn't enabled by default.

Software:

The software is amazing, and has a stupid amount of settings, including guest networks with a built-in landing page, although i will not go into it at all, you can get a demo of it at https://demo.ubnt.com/manage/site/qzmicadd

So far, I love it, The place i am going to deploy it will not get full 5G coverage, so i will probably get another for the 5G coverage.

However, it gets enough 2G coverage to be good enough, Will come back with tests for this new location, not speed tests though, just file transfer tests.

estimated 2G coverage