I install the USG, UAP AC Pro, UniFi Switch & Cloud Key in every bar/restaurant I do.
It works great. It cannot be beat for the price and ease of setup.
Any items such as servers, APs, wired computers, printers, DVRs, etc... are given static or reserved IPs.
I create a guest network on a separate VLAN & limit the download and upload speeds and can schedule when it turns on and off.

Glad you got it figured out. Some times it is the simple things....


Pretty much the same as this. I tend to VLAN out any IP cameras as well if there is an NVR involved because they tend to be very chatty on the network and no reason for them to be broadcasting packets to every single device.

If installing multiple AP's, DO NOT use zero handoff. It is garbage, and the Unifi developers will tell you the same. Use something like EkaHau HeatMapper to get an idea of signal strengths and then set up MinRSSI to force handoffs between AP's.

If trying to get great 5ghz coverage, you probably will want to turn off 2.4ghz on every other AP since it has longer range and will overlap too much. Alternate channels between 1, 6, and 11 on 2.4, and avoid overlapping channels on 5.

Unifi AP's aren't set up to have the largest coverage area, or the fastest speed to one single device. They are more designed to be very stable and balance speeds with many devices connected to them, so don't freak out when you do a speed test and it seems slower than another AP. (Don't take this the wrong way, they are still plenty fast for streaming or large file transfers.)

Wider channel widths will increase speeds, but can occasionally cause issues with some older devices, and you want to avoid overlapping channels if at all possible.

Transmit power on auto is the same as on high. You will be better off installing more AP's and setting them lower. Just because the AP can talk to your phone/laptop/whatever doesn't mean your device can talk back. Once again, try to avoid overlapping really strong signals. Even if on different channels, it can still cause issues.

If at all possible, don't use wireless uplink. It cuts throughput in half since wifi is a half duplex connection.

Just a few things to start with. I really recommend a scan of wifi in the area before and after configuring them to see what other networks you are competing with.

Competing access points can come and go over time. Scan as often as you can -- at multiple points in the area that you are attempting to cover. Some access points will do this on request. It's not a real fast scan (and this is an advantage), but it will log congestion that a given access point had to deal with during the scan.

I install for lots of customers in high rise buildings. A quick scan will turn up a blizzard of competing access points, some pumping out a signal level similar to my access point. 10-20% of these access points will be on "auto" channel and off the 1-6-11 grid.


This is an important point, especially for iDevices. They might receive a strong signal blasted by a high output access point, but actually be out of range as far as practical two-way communication is concerned. The iDevice will not give up this pointless connection. You might also overload the receiver in a nearby client or create very strong multi-path.

Early on with these access points I was setting them for the highest power, I was drunk with the power, but I noticed that as I pumped out more and more power, the situation became worse and worse.

There is a new group of Ubiquiti access points that fit in a j-box. One would use one access point per room. In terms of speed and range, these are not as potent as the others, but one would essentially have a private access point in every room. You'll likely realize more speed and less interference dealing with this local access point than attempting to deal with a more potent access point a room or two distant. And, you may be able to better work around other rogue access points that are off the 1-6-11 grid.

Unfortunately, this does happen. And is one of the reasons I hate routers defaulting to auto on the channel selection. The worst ones will follow the strongest signal instead of moving away from it too. I feel like the developers should know better than to configure them to select something other that 1 6 or 11 when on auto, especially when using a 40mhz width on 2.4 or 80mhz width on 5.



Yep, iDevices suck horribly at handoff. Android does a slightly better job of it, but not much. Most of the issues with this will be phones and tablets, but occasionally laptops have issues with it as well.



Yeah, I have looked at these a few times, just haven't had a chance to play with them yet. You also get 2 gigabit ports to plug local devices in to, one of which can do poe. They look pretty cool and useful.

All I do is small residential set ups. I was hoping to find a go to combination of products that I can install in place of people's shitty Rogers and Bell modem/routers (well in addition to I guess as they bet bridged), so that my HEOS setups work well.

This usually winds up as a new router for inside (now a router and AP), a switch, and an AP for outside in the back yard if I'm doing outdoor audio. I have all of this going on in my own home so I chose to test the equipment and learn it there first.

So far I'm very happy with the performance and the coverage of the single AP inside the house. I'm in a 2500sqft back split. The AP is in my master bedroom about 5ft from the highest peak of the roof. All of the other network equipment is in my basement. The AP replaced a D-Link router which was set up as an AP and the difference was remarkable. Way better coverage, HEOS speakers had sporadic connections before and speeds all over the house are very uniform.

I'm very interested to test the outdoor AP after I put it in. Then I'll get to perfect the handoffs. Thanks for posting about the Zero Handoff and limiting the power. That will prove useful I'm sure.

I'll have to look up a lot of the other things you guys mentioned. Like I said, networking is not my strong suit. But I'm eager to learn and thankful for your advice.

Craig

Not a problem at all. One other recommendation I have is when possible, replace any cable modem/router combos with an Arris Surfboard (SB6190 is nice) and DSL modems with something like the Netgear DM200. I have seen too many combos get kicked out of bridge mode with a forced firmware update. I am not sure which models are supported by Rogers and Bell, so you may want to look in to that. Normally an easy sale because it saves the customer money off their monthly bill since they all bill a rental fee for their hardware.

The USG is a nice little router, and when you combine the unifi products to create your whole network, configuration is all done in the same interface.

One minor thing to keep in mind is the poe voltage differences of the ap's. The UAP-AC Pro, UAP-AC HD, and UAP-AD Edu are all standard 48 volt, and the UAP-AC Lite and UAP-AC LR are 24 volt passive, so be careful about interchanging POE inserters or planning on using a poe switch to power them. There are a few UAP-AC LR's out floating around that can be powered either way, but not all of them. Not sure if this is going to become a normal thing, so I wouldn't count on it. It will say on the box if it does.

My personal biggest benefit for the UNIFI ecosystem is setting up your controller softeware on a cloud server and then just adding each customer as a new "site" so you have the ability to remotely monitor/troubleshoot your customer's networks.

If you have any other questions, feel free to ask. Also, Ubiquity's forum is very useful.

Awesome. Honestly I'm intimidated at the thought of remotely managing a network. I just want to set it up and have it work, haha.

I don't want to waste anyone's time with newb questions about networking.

Can anyone recommend a cheap online course i could take, or a good primer book on networking? I don't want to be a network admin for a big company. I just want to better understand the basic residential stuff.

Or am I just better off buying some gear and trying stuff?

Craig

I have my own server to manage all our Unifi jobs. I can manage them from the Unifi app on my phone. It's pretty awesome actually. Any questions or issues, I can quickly check on my phone.

This just happened to one of my clients. Argh! What pain. Took his heos system down and he lost his mind.

Craig.

I believe it. That can be a very fun thing to try to troubleshoot too because you're not expecting that to be the problem.

This is often referred to as AP isolation or Client isolation. Its typically a check box or setting in the wireless set-up menu. On or Off. As CMA said if its on you will not be ale to use FING to see any other devices on the network.

No kidding. And the only reason I thought to try it was because you suggested it. You saved me! Made me look awesome and Rogers look like dicks. Always a good thing.

Thanks very much.

Craig