Ubquiti - which one

[wjwren]

Im looking for a home mesh solution. Which Unifi should I get. Would 1 disc mounted on the ceiling on the landing be ok? House is 4 bed detached - not massive, prob 1800sqft. Also which one, an AC long range or AC PRO which is around £250. Is the AC pro much better? I have 4 kids and they all have the usual tech. There are also plenty of wireless devices and light bulbs/speakers etc.

[OldGermanHeaps]

long range isnt really designed for domestic use, and the pro is decent, but a bit old and is £120 not £250
there are newer models out that are a bit faster.
In a 4 bedroom property you would probably want at least 2 for coverage.

[wjwren]

Maybe I have the wrong one but there is one thats about £250 - :Ubiquiti UniFi AP AC HD Wave 2 Access Point (UAP-AC-HD)

[Mattt]

It’s not a mesh if there’s just one, it’s a wireless access point.

U6-LR is the new model to get, direct from the UI Store when in stock.

[jimmyjimjim]

I've a lite and a Pro covering 3300 sq ft. In the US, so wood only, no brick, but on three floors. I also added a beacon HD, primarily to piss around with, no real need.

I'm likely to replace the lite with another Pro, or potentially the nano HD, (which is half the price of the AC-HD), largely to improve the uplink to the beacon HD. Or, putting it another way, to piss around. I think the AC-HD, described as 'for high-density and performance-critical applications.' is a little extreme for home use.

The lite was fine for 98% of our use until my wife wanted video calling on the edge of the coverage zone. I think 2 lites, or two pro APs would be fine for you. The LR is an odd thing for special cases, it seems.

By all means wait for the U6-Lite to be in stock (or U6-LR if you want to pay another $80 x 2), but if you can find a couple of regular lites or Pros for a decent price, I think you'll be happy with them. 2xAC-Pro are less than the cost of 1 AC-HD. So are 2x nano-HD...

[troc]

NanoHD works wel in a home, one per floor for example. You could also use the FlexHD which is the same hardware in a small tabletop format can depending on location.

[megaphone]

You don't need a Nano HD or AC HD in a house, HD is high density, designed for multiple devices in a high density area.

Better off with a few AC Lites, there are new WiFi 6 versions available, or spend a bit more and get the 6LR when they are available.

Also make sure you run a CAT5/6 cable to all APs, if you haven't got cable in then you'd probably be better off with a dedicated 'mesh' wifi system.

Edited by megaphone on Monday 22 March 07:49

[neilus]

I've found that a single UAP-AC-Lite covers the whole of my four bedroom house, which is around the same size as yours, as well as the garden and driveway.

So you may be able to get away with just one device, although you don't have any redundancy.

[Magnum 475]

wjwren said:

Maybe I have the wrong one but there is one thats about £250 - :Ubiquiti UniFi AP AC HD Wave 2 Access Point (UAP-AC-HD)

That's one of the HD range - designed for very large numbers of devices to connect.

It's also worth pointing out that Ubiquiti are starting to ship their Wifi 6 kit. It's not quite here yet, but I'm hopeful that it will be available in the next few weeks. This is worth waiting for and ordering as soon as it's available.

[Murph7355]

It really depends on house construction IME.

Our house is very old, and some placings of APs struggle to get to the next room.

In a modern build I'd put at least one per floor in.

Are you running cable specifically for them? If so, I'd consider the in wall jobs if doing things again.

Don't buy LR units - waste of time (ask me how I know).

If buying normal APs I'd wait for the WiFi6 versions (I'm also waiting for these as have 4x APs that are now end of life).

[Mattt]

I don’t think the LR units are a waste of time, mine works pretty well.

The key with WiFi is two way communication, it’s easy for a WAP to transmit at high power to a distant device, but that low powered device has to talk back - hence the LR having extra sensitivity on the antenna over and above the regular APs.

[rxe]

Very much depends on layout of the house. We have 3 AC-Pros in the attic pointing downward into the house, works well, if we didn’t have chimneys in daft places (several extensions) we’d probably have got away with one or two.

The big differences between these and mesh is that mesh has one AP plugged into the switch/router and daisy chains the rest of the APs off the first one. Easy set up, gamers will notice the latency and performance is generally poorer. These need each AP got be plugged into the switch. They can do mesh as well, if you need it.

WiFI 6 and stuff? My phone supports it, but i don’t know what it is meant to do for me. My phone also supports 5G and can download at a rate of 400 Mbit, but again, I’ve not found a use for it. 6 is mainly about high density WiFi, so unless you live in a busy office, you probably won’t notice it.

[jimmyjimjim]

There's certainly plenty or people arguing that Wifi 6 will solve x, y and z, but in the home environment is largely, as above, un-necessary.

[Magnum 475]

jimmyjimjim said:

There's certainly plenty or people arguing that Wifi 6 will solve x, y and z, but in the home environment is largely, as above, un-necessary.

Depends on the home!

If you have smart bulbs, smart radiator thermostats, smart watches, kids doing intensive gaming, parents working on conference calls, streaming media, etc., it may be advantageous to wait. If you have one laptop and two phones then Wifi 5 will be adequate.

Wifi 5 (802.11ac) is also approaching 8 years old - it's hardly the latest standard. As devices age the manufacturers stop releasing updates to firmware and supporting the devices, so waiting a few weeks for the new device is frequently a good move.

[megaphone]

No point in buying 'old tech' when the latest is available for a few £ more.

The unifi 'N' APs are now end of life after about 8-10 years. The AC APs have been around for 4/5 years now so I can see them going EOL at some point.

The new U6 Lite AP is only £10 more than the AC Lite, why wouldn't you have the latest standard?

[jimmyjimjim]

Magnum 475 said:

As devices age the manufacturers stop releasing updates to firmware and supporting the devices, so waiting a few weeks for the new device is frequently a good move.

Equally, I've been looking at the bug reports on the ubiquiti community, and you could also take the view that waiting a while for stable firmware might be a good idea....

That being said, I think for the regular home user, you're unlikely to experience issues, but it's a bit of a moot point; the ubiquiti store is sold out of the U6 and have been for some time.

It may only be a few weeks before they get through their stock issues, it may be longer. I've seen everything else come into and go out of stock in that time, though. You're probably right that it's worth to wait, but if you want it now, you take whatever you can get.

I'd quite like to see what the U6 Pro is like instead of a nano HD.

[xeny]

megaphone said:

The new U6 Lite AP is only £10 more than the AC Lite, why wouldn't you have the latest standard?

I've got a 6 Lite. The firmware doesn't feel quite there compared to the AC lite it replaced (now relocated elsewhere), and it is about £90 plus a PoE injector, (with challenging availability) while an AC lite is about £65 including an injector and is pretty reliable software wise.

If I was shopping based on my experiences of having both, I'd probably buy an AC lite at this point, it's about 2/3 the cost for less hassle.

[pmanson]

neilus said:

I've found that a single UAP-AC-Lite covers the whole of my four bedroom house, which is around the same size as yours, as well as the garden and driveway.

So you may be able to get away with just one device, although you don't have any redundancy.

Same here (its set on the hallway ceiling right in the middle of the house)

[Bikerjon]

xeny said:

I've got a 6 Lite. The firmware doesn't feel quite there compared to the AC lite...

In what way? I also reckon the AC products are probably the safer option for the moment, but I'm interested in what problems you've noticed with the 6 Lite. It's not as if you can easily get the Wi-Fi 6 products in the UK anyway - actually that seems to be the case with quite a bit of the Ubiquiti product range at the moment!

[xeny]

Bikerjon said:

In what way? I also reckon the AC products are probably the safer option for the moment, but I'm interested in what problems you've noticed with the 6 Lite. It's not as if you can easily get the Wi-Fi 6 products in the UK anyway - actually that seems to be the case with quite a bit of the Ubiquiti product range at the moment!

The 2.4GHz performance is measurably worse, I had a frustrating time with other bluetooth hardware behaving oddly until they fixed a bug that left the AP with a bluetooth transmitter turned on all the time, and while if everything aligns the WiFi 6 performance is good, 802.11ac devices seem to lose performance more readily as they move to less optimal positions relative to the AP more quickly than they did with the AC Lite.

It also runs noticeably hotter than the AC lite - the whole top fo the AP is a metal casting used as a heat sink, and it is warm to the touch, in a way the AC isn't.

I bought the 6 so I could give the AC to a friend to stop him continually suffering from poor wifi while working from home over it, which it did (it handily covers their 3 floor 4+ bedroom house), partly to give myself the excuse to treat myself to a new AP.

I'm not so sure the friend would have been as happy if I'd have given him the 6 lite, but my place is enough smaller it isn't a significant issue.