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Unifi switches and APs are fine ( great even) but the need for a single pane of glass management UI is way overstated in a home network. You can build a pfsense box off using an old desktop from ebay/amazon/craigslist for under $150 if you really feel like you need advanced features beyond what a typical consumer router provides and opens you up to other switch/APs instead of artificially locking yourself into a specific vendor just so they all tie in together neatly.
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Feb 13, 2022 18:32
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Speaking of switches, are 6 port 1GBaseT NICs still a thing, like it used to be with 6-port 100BaseTX NICs? Because with netmap(4) in FreeBSD, I'm pretty sure it should be possible to do in-kernel switching for up to 36 ports (ie. 72Gbps bi-directionally, which I remember it topping out at on at-the-time old hardware some number of years ago) on a standard motherboard with five daugherboards, while using the NIC on the motherboard/CPU for WAN. EDIT: Apparently it is, and there's even a SFP model. EDIT2: Now I'm thinking about how this could be used to build an all-in-one router+switch+database+fileserver+mediacenter+workstation virtualization monster. BlankSystemDaemon fucked around with this message at 19:38 on Feb 13, 2022 |
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Feb 13, 2022 19:27
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I got burned hard by Unifi's "consumer level" Amplifi brand. Mesh nodes are impossible to get, and used ones are a bad idea because nodes that come in a kit are hard-coded to the router they shipped with so even resetting them won't allow them to be used. Their new Alien mesh system is wholly incompatible with the old one. Not going to recommend or buy any of their hardware unless something major changes with the company's support philosophy. Ended up picking a TP Link Deco X90 system and putting the less than a year old Amplifi router on a shelf as a backup. I must say it was the easiest setup I've ever done for a wireless system, and it is extremely fast.
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Feb 13, 2022 19:34
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Anyone buying into mesh has amde their own bed and can sleep in it for all I care. This is my professional opinion I also give at work. That being sad, UniFi APs are pretty good but far from perfect. But really they are miles ahead of anyone else close to that affordable.
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Feb 13, 2022 19:55
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BlankSystemDaemon posted:Speaking of switches, are 6 port 1GBaseT NICs still a thing, like it used to be with 6-port 100BaseTX NICs? I don't know what the cost on those are but I'm not sure what you are going for over just installing a hypervisor and running everything on it. Just get a 4 port nic off ebay for <$30. Except for the switch. Just a dedicated switch; they are cheap.
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Feb 13, 2022 20:05
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SEKCobra posted:Anyone buying into mesh has amde their own bed and can sleep in it for all I care. This is my professional opinion I also give at work.  Cyks posted:I don't know what the cost on those are but I'm not sure what you are going for over just installing a hypervisor and running everything on it. Just get a 4 port nic off ebay for <$30. I didn't say it was a good idea.
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Feb 13, 2022 20:10
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Martytoof posted:when you want to do anything out of the super predefined box of “just connect your devices, let it provide them internet, and never really look at this interface again”. This is me.  Honestly, maybe I'm misremembering how lovely consumer level wifi is, but the thing I do appreciate about the Unifi stuff is how I can set it up and then essentially forget about it to the point that I have to remind myself what the password to the admin interface is. Residency Evil fucked around with this message at 16:54 on Feb 14, 2022 |
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Feb 14, 2022 16:51
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You can do that with Google Wifi or Eero for sure. They also have better AP coordination than Unifi, not that that's saying much. I think it's a mistake to recommend UBNT for most use cases. If you want set it and forget it, the big mesh players are really, really good. If you want to run a dedicated IOT network, get used Cisco or Ruckus. They're <$150 and actually have a controller and working enterprise features.
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Feb 14, 2022 17:31
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KS posted:You can do that with Google Wifi or Eero for sure. They also have better AP coordination than Unifi, not that that's saying much. Which Cisco or Ruckus access points are under $150? I'd like to look at their product line for some new sites a client is working on but most of them seem to be like $500 or more each.
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Feb 14, 2022 17:43
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Cisco 3802i Ruckus 320, 510, others. I would not buy used equipment in a business environment because of the licensing implications.
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Feb 14, 2022 18:01
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KS posted:Cisco 3802i Ah okay, yeah I can see that for some home game setup.
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Feb 14, 2022 18:17
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Ideally there would be a midpoint between enterprise grade and consumer grade that isn’t poo poo, and I think that’s where Ubnt could shine, and probably WANT to shine, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired. I’ll make this pitch for the single-pane-of-glass: I’ve got a fairly complex network with a few VLANs spread across floors with a variety of switches etc. With the Network app it’s as easy as just tagging some ports with the right port profile and I literally don’t have to worry about any of the low level configuration, trunking, or anything like that. It’s PROBABLY not a huge pain in the rear end to do this with other vendors but I’m happy to give Ubiquiti props for the one thing they get right. They let you manage your whole network at a glance with one interface. And it’s great. Now the problem is that the same people who want to use some of these features to create a more complex system with tie-ins and start dabbling in enterprise functionality are essentially going off-script as far as Ubiquiti is concerned. I mean I’m not sure what my point is ultimately. I agree with a lot of what has been said, and I think my biggest disappointment is that Ubnt has the potential to be an amazing enterprise-lite product suite, and I fully still believe that’s where they want to position themselves, but they don’t actually know what that means. If I want any sort of core prosumer functionality I should have stuck with my edgerouter, and at that point I’m not sure why I would have expanded my UI AP collection if they don’t play in the same sandbox and there are better non-enterprise options available to me at that point. I’d just have to give up on my central mgmt dream but at this point I’m spending more time working around little things than I am saving by not having to configure trunks or whatever. Sorry, a little ranty. I think my feelings are actually stronger than I anticipated on this one 
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Feb 14, 2022 19:51
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Ubiquiti would have to kick my dog to get me to start working with the sales reps and licensing contracts and purchasing headaches of something like cisco. That being said, using ubiqiti equipment in a network of any real size would feel like having your dog kicked.
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Feb 14, 2022 20:19
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what's the best way to set up a wired guest network for some internet-of-poo poo devices? As I understand it that's basically the remit of VLANs but I have no idea of how to go about setting one up. My actual router is running OpenWRT. is it possible to define a virtually segmented network purely based on the MAC/IP addresses itself? In other words can I say "this MAC goes onto the guest VLAN" and no other device will acknowledge it? That doesn't seem centrally possible, but IDK for sure. Do I need to actually plug the IOT devices into a managed switch? Does the whole switch have to be dedicated to the VLAN, or can I say "just port 4"? Obviously an old router running some flavor of WRT or Tomato would seem ideal regardless, those could easily be treated as a "managed switch". From there, it could be "trunked" to the actual router, or to another managed switch on the VLAN, over the trusted network, right? Is it possible to define "exceptions" in the routing? For example could I say my Plex server can be accessed by anything, or the printer can be accessed by anything? I realize that if necessary I can have the printer or router have addresses on both VLANs of course (with multiple cables if necessary, or a cable+wifi for a printer f.ex). If it's more sensible for those devices to live on the guest VLAN and other things can talk into the VLAN (with a rule that reciprocal connections out are fine once opened) that seems feasible as well.
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Feb 14, 2022 22:46
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Yes, that's firmly into VLAN territory. One of the whole points/benefits of a VLAN is that it can be done completely seamlessly at layer 2, so devices that don't understand "VLAN" (i.e. almost all consumer-oriented networked products) can still take advantage of them. Whether you need managed switches is up to how your network is architected out. If you can completely physically separate your networks, then you can just assign one interface on your OpenWRT to be an untagged member of the IOT VLAN, and everything downstream of that interface will be on that VLAN, no managed switches needed. In this scenario the VLAN only actually exists at the OpenWRT itself and you're effectively just managing two LANs. If cabling needs dictate that your IOT and non-IOT VLANs have to share a single cable somewhere, that cable will need to be between two VLAN-aware devices (two managed switches, or a managed switch and your OpenWRT) so that they can add VLAN tags to traffic going over that shared physical link. MAC-based VLANs are possible as well but that's something I've never messed with myself, and it's a more complicated configuration. You probably need more than the most basic managed switch possible to support it. Yes, you can define firewall rules to allow certain types of traffic between VLANs. I have my Edgerouter set up with basically the same thing you're proposing - traffic from the IOT VLAN can only get to the trusted VLAN if it's established from the trusted VLAN first.
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Feb 14, 2022 23:45
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I'm not sure if this would fit better elsewhere but has anyone ever used a cell antenna booster with a wifi hotspot for rural internet? It looks like I could get a 100gb plan from AT&T for $55, and if the cell booster works that seems like it might be more reliable than Viasat or HughesNet. I'd probably get on the waiting list for Starlink, but that's a year+ out. I'm looking at buying a house way out in the middle of nowhere so the wired options do not exist. It's also a pretty wooded area so I would be worried about reception for satellite.
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Feb 15, 2022 16:52
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22 Eargesplitten posted:I'm not sure if this would fit better elsewhere but has anyone ever used a cell antenna booster with a wifi hotspot for rural internet? It looks like I could get a 100gb plan from AT&T for $55, and if the cell booster works that seems like it might be more reliable than Viasat or HughesNet. I'd probably get on the waiting list for Starlink, but that's a year+ out. I'm looking at buying a house way out in the middle of nowhere so the wired options do not exist. It's also a pretty wooded area so I would be worried about reception for satellite. So I did use cell service for internet (Verizon) when I lived out in the sticks, but this was like a decade ago, so things hopefully have improved. I had a USB modem/hotspot, and used an antenna very similar to the below one. I had great results with it after mounting the antenna, could play online games use voip etc, things that didn't really work with satellite. https://www.alternativewireless.com/surecall-exterior-truck-wide-band-antenna-sc130w.html
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Feb 15, 2022 17:15
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Thank you. I'm thinking once I get a chance to go out there I'll try a speedtest from my cell to see how it performs, is there a similar service that I could just leave running to test for signal loss?
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Feb 15, 2022 17:32
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bobua posted:Ubiquiti would have to kick my dog to get me to start working with the sales reps and licensing contracts and purchasing headaches of something like cisco. If you want to pay money for support, or have to deal with end user issues with this equipment, in a large scale or critical enterprise yes I would feel like I've been kicked or need to be fired for installing it in the first place. It has its place but past a point you need a throat to choke and not a web forum or zendesk ticket to nowhere. If you have the time to outsmart it as there's somehow nothing else to do, sure. It works for what it does in the majority of cases and probably won't break. Up to you if you want to take that bet.
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Feb 16, 2022 00:04
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22 Eargesplitten posted:Thank you. I'm thinking once I get a chance to go out there I'll try a speedtest from my cell to see how it performs, is there a similar service that I could just leave running to test for signal loss? Speed is going to be variable based on allocated channels and loading , so it’s not necessarily a good indicator of how it will always be. Leave some wiggle room if you can.
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Feb 16, 2022 02:06
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Is that still a thing when it's just testing the 4g connection? Mostly I just want to make sure I'm at least getting... IDK, 5mbps? Enough I can stream and play games at least a little bit If I move there I'll probably get a 5tb external drive or something like that and just fill it up over time when I'm visiting my friend in town. I'll definitely get on the waiting list for Starlink, so this is just temporary to make sure I can still do my WFH job while I wait.
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Feb 16, 2022 03:06
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https://twitter.com/holman/status/1493333452866797568
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Feb 16, 2022 08:18
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22 Eargesplitten posted:Is that still a thing when it's just testing the 4g connection? Mostly I just want to make sure I'm at least getting... IDK, 5mbps? Enough I can stream and play games at least a little bit If I move there I'll probably get a 5tb external drive or something like that and just fill it up over time when I'm visiting my friend in town. I'll definitely get on the waiting list for Starlink, so this is just temporary to make sure I can still do my WFH job while I wait. It's depending on how they've configured it, as far as LTE goes. For a given set of allocated channels, there's only so much throughput available for up and down stream, again depending on how they've set it up. How it should work is that the more loaded it gets, everyone gets a smaller slice. They can set it up for different users to get different guarantees or whatever. Nerd words aside, if you're just testing the RSSP or signal quality it shouldn't make much of a difference. If you're testing performance, you're subject to the current state of affairs. Speed test isn't a litmus test of overall network quality. The way I would take that is if you went over there and copped some 200Mbps down with a speed test, that may be an outlier, and could be less if there are other customers in the same area that are going to come home and hit up netflix. But it shouldn't suddenly become zero.
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Feb 16, 2022 15:04
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I just bricked my RT-N16 and was looking for a replacement. I live in an apartment and am fine with getting either a good multi-functional router or a router/access point set up. Budget is ~$200 and I live in a 3 bedroom apartment. I'm tempted to turn my brain off and get an EdgeRouter X with a Unifi AP. If there's a better option, I'd appreciate any suggestions.
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Feb 18, 2022 11:22
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Wow, that N router was a trooper. It depends on what you want to do with your setup but the edgerouter + unifi WAP combo is still better than almost any boxed router for the money. Despite some of the drawbacks of Ubiquiti I appreciate that they keep their product firmware updated. I believe only my original 2.4ghz Unifi access point got moved to EOL with no future updates last year. One access point should be more than enough for an apartment. It will probably be nice to have 5ghz available (as well as WiFi 6) so you don't have to overlap with so many neighbors. I'd probably go for the UniFi 6 lite + PoE injector which are $99 and $8 on the ubiquiti store at the moment. https://store.ui.com/products/unifi-ap-6-lite https://store.ui.com/collections/related/products/u-poe-af
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Feb 18, 2022 17:35
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Rexxed posted:Wow, that N router was a trooper. It depends on what you want to do with your setup but the edgerouter + unifi WAP combo is still better than almost any boxed router for the money. Despite some of the drawbacks of Ubiquiti I appreciate that they keep their product firmware updated. I believe only my original 2.4ghz Unifi access point got moved to EOL with no future updates last year. Agreed. For all the angst about Ubiquiti in this thread, for the use case you outlined I think it is perfect. You have to engage your brain to set it up (EdgeOS isn’t quite as friendly as most consumer routers, and you have to do the UniFi controller to get the AP running), but once it is rolling you will forget it exists. I’ve almost never touched mine in 3+ years, which I cannot say for my previous consumer routers.
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Feb 18, 2022 17:51
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thiazi posted:Agreed. For all the angst about Ubiquiti in this thread, for the use case you outlined I think it is perfect. You have to engage your brain to set it up (EdgeOS isn’t quite as friendly as most consumer routers, and you have to do the UniFi controller to get the AP running), but once it is rolling you will forget it exists. I’ve almost never touched mine in 3+ years, which I cannot say for my previous consumer routers. These days you can use the Unifi app on your phone to configure a single AP if you don't want to run the controller software. It has fewer knobs but is fine for the basic settings including radio channel, SSID, and WPA2 passphrase. I run an ER-X with a single AC Lite and flashed OpenWRT on the AP since I'll never run the controller for the single unit it takes to cover my home. I got WPA3 capability and the ability to web or CLI manage the AP for my effort. Throughput, range, and stability are about the same.
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Feb 18, 2022 18:00
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Yeah, there's actually two phone apps you can use to control your EdgeRouter/AP on iOS it's UniFi Network to manage your AP, and UISP to manage the router Both will let you change major settings, update firmware, and reboot... UISP even shows you current throughput and will let you access the browser telnet interface. About my only issue is that Unifi hasn't updated the ER-X firmware since last May, though I'm aware they're in the middle of trying to push some new projects out the door like the DreamRouter which seems to be the equivalent of an Apple Airport Base Station but with WiFi 6.. for only $80..
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Feb 18, 2022 18:25
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22 Eargesplitten posted:I'm not sure if this would fit better elsewhere but has anyone ever used a cell antenna booster with a wifi hotspot for rural internet? It looks like I could get a 100gb plan from AT&T for $55, and if the cell booster works that seems like it might be more reliable than Viasat or HughesNet. I'd probably get on the waiting list for Starlink, but that's a year+ out. I'm looking at buying a house way out in the middle of nowhere so the wired options do not exist. It's also a pretty wooded area so I would be worried about reception for satellite. Get a router that can take external antenna and a couple of these: https://smile.amazon.com/Proxicast-Broadband-Directional-1710-2700-4400-4900/dp/B073WQ8DXD Mount them pointing at your closest cell tower with the best line of sight. Use https://www.cellmapper.net/map to locate the tower. You can also use https://link.ui.com/ to get the direction from your exact location to point the antennas. Mount the antenna as high as you can, and have them rotated 90 degrees apart. Here's a picture of the setup on our family river house. I've got an unlimited T-Mobile SIM in a Huawei B315s router, with two of those antenna. We pretty consistently get 20 down 5 up. 
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Feb 18, 2022 18:25
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Binary Badger posted:About my only issue is that Unifi hasn't updated the ER-X firmware since last May, What features or bug fixes are you waiting for?
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Feb 18, 2022 20:49
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Thanks everyone! Now the issue is finding these items in Canada without getting ripped off by scalpers. Goddamitt
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Feb 18, 2022 20:53
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SamDabbers posted:What features or bug fixes are you waiting for? I'm not gonna pretend I'm familiar with Debian on MIPS, but suppport for Debian 9 for MIPS ended in 2020 and I imagine there are at least a few bugfixes that they should have backported that they haven't. I don't know if any of those would be a security concern on a router, but Ubiquiti's track record on security is kind of iffy.
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Feb 18, 2022 21:38
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Mad Lupine posted:Thanks everyone! Now the issue is finding these items in Canada without getting ripped off by scalpers. Goddamitt They are just as hard to find in the states as well. I don't know what the TP-link Omada market is like there, but the ER605 and EAP620 will run you around the same price and is available on Amazon (in the states at least). If you don't care about having the same vendor for each product (which... for a single router amd AP, it really isn't that big a deal) you open up a lot more possibilities. Cyks fucked around with this message at 03:09 on Feb 19, 2022 |
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Feb 19, 2022 03:04
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thanks for the direct hit on the questions, appreciate it!
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Feb 19, 2022 14:37
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My ISP came to my house and replaced my fiber modem, while he was at it he also threw away my own network router and replaced it with their own. It's faster and better he said (to my SO, I was at work). So when I come home I see the new router and sure enough have ludicrous fast internet by my standards now, something like 475mbps down and 100mbps up for 29.90 a month. But it sorta left me with a bad taste that they replaced my own router with their own and then locked me out of it. So I can't put in my own DNS to use a pi-hole server for the local network. I guess I could just install my own router after theirs and route the home network through my own router anyway. Just bugs me.
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Feb 19, 2022 20:47
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His Divine Shadow posted:My ISP came to my house and replaced my fiber modem, while he was at it he also threw away my own network router and replaced it with their own. It's faster and better he said (to my SO, I was at work). So when I come home I see the new router and sure enough have ludicrous fast internet by my standards now, something like 475mbps down and 100mbps up for 29.90 a month. But it sorta left me with a bad taste that they replaced my own router with their own and then locked me out of it. So I can't put in my own DNS to use a pi-hole server for the local network.
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Feb 19, 2022 20:50
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I had a an uncomfortable conversation with some slightly-too-cheery sales rep from my ISP, they want to give me gigabit for a not-princely raise in my bill, and they told me they had to replace my modem (which is not that old and fully capable of gigabit) and that they would test my router through some undisclosed means to see if it could handle gigabit. If it couldn't. they would replace it with one of their routers and I'd have to request a BYOR (Bring your own router) connection. I told the sales guy if the guy touches my current router that I know is fully capable of asymmetric gigabit (they had already said it would be guaranteed 940 Mb/sec down and 50 Mb/sec up) I'd tell him the deal is off. Sales guy just laughed and said dont worry hes not going to ruin your network Pretty sure if he somehow decides the ER-X can't handle gigabit I'll just tell him to leave and leave me at 400 if he's going to gently caress around with it.
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Feb 19, 2022 22:00
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His Divine Shadow posted:My ISP came to my house and replaced my fiber modem, while he was at it he also threw away my own network router and replaced it with their own. It's faster and better he said (to my SO, I was at work). So when I come home I see the new router and sure enough have ludicrous fast internet by my standards now, something like 475mbps down and 100mbps up for 29.90 a month. But it sorta left me with a bad taste that they replaced my own router with their own and then locked me out of it. So I can't put in my own DNS to use a pi-hole server for the local network. Maybe it's different in Finland, but here in the US they wouldn't take your property without someone getting upset. They tend to limit themselves to things with their own branding on it and they usually have the modem/router manufacturers give them their own branded units that say the ISP name on them (we're dealing with megacorps here so they'll say Verizon or Comcast). Also, most ISPs let you log into the router they provide so you can have some control on it for things like changing the wifi details, DNS, DHCP, even the LAN network addressing if you want. The main reason to own your own here is the monthly fee for renting the ISP's equipment ends up being higher than purchasing your own after a year or so.
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Feb 19, 2022 22:11
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His Divine Shadow posted:My ISP came to my house and replaced my fiber modem, while he was at it he also threw away my own network router and replaced it with their own. It's faster and better he said (to my SO, I was at work). So when I come home I see the new router and sure enough have ludicrous fast internet by my standards now, something like 475mbps down and 100mbps up for 29.90 a month. But it sorta left me with a bad taste that they replaced my own router with their own and then locked me out of it. So I can't put in my own DNS to use a pi-hole server for the local network. You might want to call them and ask if they have a BYOR option for their router, whatever it is. Optimum has two non-labeled Ethernet ports on their Altice wifi combo router, if you call them, they'll enable exactly ONE and only one of those for you to hook up your own router. Not sure exactly what they do but the Altice router will continue to work broadcasting its feeble network and your router will get an IP if you hook it up to the port they specify and be allowed to do its thing.
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Feb 19, 2022 22:15
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Binary Badger posted:I had a an uncomfortable conversation with some slightly-too-cheery sales rep from my ISP, they want to give me gigabit for a not-princely raise in my bill, and they told me they had to replace my modem (which is not that old and fully capable of gigabit) and that they would test my router through some undisclosed means to see if it could handle gigabit. ISPs generally want you to use their equipment. It's helpful to them to have less support issues because everyone's using their own stuff. They can push firmware updates over the wire and swap in known good equipment if there's a problem. It's also (of course) gotten a bit more sinister lately because since they're in charge of the equipment they can do whatever they want. Comcast for example, uses the comcast provided router in your house as a Wifi hotspot for any comcast customer to log into so they can use it as a selling point to have comcast service and also use it as another way to artificially boost the coverage map of their cellular network since they now do that, too. The issue of course is that they provide the xfinitywifi network without your permission. It's separate from your LAN but it's still using the same coax to get back to their servers. Also a lot of their routers are combo modem/router units that are garbage. I had a recent issue with one of my clients where their existing modem just stopped working one day and they had comcast replace it. The comcast rep installed the "xfinity wifi gateway" which looks like a weird pillar and has halved their upstream bandwidth from 10Mb to 5. Comcast claims that they need a different router from comcast to fix it but won't come and replace it after business hours, they'll only show up at the middle of the day and knock a small office full of people offline while they make the switch.
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Feb 19, 2022 22:19
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