[herpderperator]

Don't bother with repeaters. Get normal access points, and install several of them if you need to disperse the range around a large area/building/complex. If the SSID and security passphrases match, clients will roam seamlessly between the different APs. I suspect the reason people buy repeaters is that they don't realise that this is possible, or they don't want additional cabling.

Repeaters add latency and I can't imagine any network engineer would ever recommend one.

[mseebach]

> I suspect [...] they don't want additional cabling.

You probably suspect correctly. Not having additional cabling is a pretty big selling point of wireless technology.

[tatersolid]

Especially as the majority of homes date back more than 25 years, and retrofitted cabling is very expensive.

And if you rent rather than own, you likely can’t add cabling at all under the terms of your lease.

[forgottenpass]

>And if you rent rather than own, you likely can’t add cabling at all under the terms of your lease.

A POTS phonejack can use pair(s) in CAT 5 (or 5e, 6), and newish buildings often already run it to the wall jacks rather than CAT 3. Depending on access to the other end of the lines, and appetite for DIY upgrading a landlord's building, it's quite possible to temporarily swap the RJ11 hardware for some RJ45 and have a wired LAN ;)

[tatersolid]

No building or home 25 years old has even Cat-3 in the walls. It’s all “uncategorized” cheap ass aluminum or maybe copper unshielded twisted pair.

[w0utert]

>> Don't bother with repeaters. Get normal access points, and install several of them if you need to disperse the range around a large area/building/complex.

Or better yet, buy a bunch of Ubiqity UniFi's, which were specifically made for this purpose and should provide the most seamless and efficient way to blanket your house in Wifi (provided you already have cabling to the access points). They are not cheap, but also not extremely expensive compared to a decent router either.

[technofiend]

>Or better yet, buy a bunch of Ubiqity UniFi's

Warning: do not follow this advice; Ubuiqiti products are like potato chips in that you can never eat just one.

Oh I'll get the AC PRO access point, you think. Five minutes later you've set it via quick QR code scan and the UniFi app. That was painless! No wonder people recommend these things.

Oh wait I need to make some more device tweaks but UniFi won't do it.. better get the cloud key thingy that manages the device. I'll have one of those.

A couple of months go by and you discover your Google Home device or NEST doesn't work with beam steering. Wait, you can manage the advanced AC PRO settings using their own software? Fine I'll build a small PC to run that since if you're going to do it may as well see the stats all the time.

Hmm... KRACK/sploit-du-jour is out, maybe I'll just get a new Edgerouter since it's already fixed there. Oh wait, there's a fringy area in my house I'll bet another AC PRO or maybe an AirMax repeater would be just the thing.

Oh dear, I seem to be running out of ports, better go ahead and get a nice POE switch since that'll declutter things a bit. Etc.

[lunchables]

So true. Started with a couple AC AP PRO (incredible by the way). Ended up with an edgerouter poe and a poe unifi switch. I'm running the control on a vm on qemu/kvm and the seamless integration is wonderful. Once I plugged in the switch it popped up in the devices section and I could perform a one-click software upgrade, just like the WAP.

I will say that the features in the controller software rivals serious commercial offerings that I've used (Cisco, Meraki, Aerohive).

[johnbellone]

I agree. I purchased some Ubiquity gear a few months back after a condo purchase, and ran into few problems:

- UniFi brand works well for setup, but the cloud controller is necessary for command/control management outside of iOS/Android app.

- EdgeRouter is not a UniFi product and does not act as a cloud controller.

- EdgeRouter X does not deliver 48V PoE; upgrade was needed to power the AC-PRO.

- EdgeRouter UI is horrid and it’s much easier to manage over SSH.

- Cloud Controller is easy to setup, but doesn’t work with all product lines.

tl;dr The hardware is really good, but software is lacking, especially because not all hardware is UniFi compatible.

[technofiend]

My response was tongue in cheek but seriously I recommend budgeting a VM or Raspberry PI to run their controller software which offers the most configuration options.

https://www.ubnt.com/download/unifi/

[slantyyz]

The Unifi cloud stick isn't that much more expensive than a PI, and is probably the least amount of work to set up a dedicated controller.

I use an Atom based PC stick that I had lying around to run the controller (on Windows) and it works great.

[technofiend]

I mistakenly thought the cloud key ran a lesser version of unifi than the distribution found on their website, however googling around implies it's the same version. So I suppose budget for a cloud key or a pi. A raspberry Pi 3 is 64 bit, runs Fedora natively and can serve up other functions beyond the key. So I lean towards the Pi but if they're functionally equivalent I suppose it's down to personal preference.

[rrauenza]

I tried putting it into a docker container, but in the end didn't want to deal with the complexity -- bought a key. Does the VM/Raspberry PI get you anything the key doesn't?

[silverwind]

A Raspberry Pi probably won't do. The controller requires MongoDB which itself is no longer supports the 32 bit architecture which most RPis are running on.

[technofiend]

Pi 3 is 64 bit and natively supported in Fedora.

https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Architectures/ARM/Raspberry_P...

[rogueresearch]

You mean these UniFi APs don't run a built-in web server to allow configuring them?

[w0utert]

Basically all your objections boil down to the fact that the UniFi's are not very easy to manage.

I'd say none of this matters if you just want to have a few access points around the house for a WiFi network that currently runs on a single standalone router. Nobody said configuring the UniFi's is easy or convenient, but the premise is that you only do it once, using whatever computer you have that you can install the cloud controller on. You don't absolutely need to buy anything besides the AP's, it's only for convenience if your network changes a lot.

[pjc50]

UniFi devices are a bit unusual as wireless APs: not only do they not act as a DHCP server, they require you to have one somewhere else on the network. Generally your uplink router will do this, but it surprised me when I wanted to use one as a standalone AP.

[paulie_a]

In my opinion that is correct behavior. An AP shouldn't have dhcp, it should provide access to a network.

Disclaimer: I have a unifi and edge router and it's a great combo

[tomfanning]

A wireless access point is a completely transparent bridge between wired and wireless networks.

If you want a DHCP server in your Wi-Fi "box", you likely want it to do NAT and DNS as well, and that is a "wireless router".

[vlan0]

That's because you're comparing consumer grade all-in-one routers to a more Enterprise worthy AP.

Consumer grade gear is made to be easy and "just work".

[rvanmil]

Or better yet, get the AmpliFi’s instead of the UniFi’s :)

[Jaruzel]

Some OSs (I'm looking at you Windows) can get 'sticky' and refuse to fail over to the stronger AP even if it does have the same SSID and passphrase. The only solution is to force disconnect and reconnect the wifi on your device, and even then it doesn't fix it all the time.

I've found the most 'reliable' arrangement is to not only have the same SSID and passphrase, but to have them all on the same frequency and if you can, make them all from the same vendor.

Also, if you are going to re-purpose an old router as an access point, make sure you turn everything off on it except the access point service. It mustn't hand out IP addresses or offer any DNS resolution. You want your devices IP to be provided by the main router regardless of which AP you connect to. It sounds obvious, but this the main stumbling block people encounter when trying to do this.

[lmns]

Some Windows wifi drivers offer an option for roaming aggressiveness. I think I've seen this with some Intel cards.

[zoe1337]

Powerline Ethernet might be a solution for the cable problem. I'm thinking of connecting the extra AP(s) through Powerline Ethernet to the router if there is no copper Ethernet available.

[discreditable]

This might be the wrong thread to recommend it, but I've had good luck with TP-Link's Powerline Ethernet adapters. I switched to them from WiFi for my living room TV/Gaming/Streaming setup. I'm in a high interference wireless environment due to neighbor density (even in 5Ghz) and the TP-Link devices reliably push over 500mbps.

A downside of powerline ethernet devices is they use your house wiring as a hub-style network. While I think some support a form of MIMO, the more devices you have the worse performance will be. The TP-Links I have sport QoS, but I've not messed with it.

[lunchables]

That's exactly what I did and it's worked out great. I'm getting upwards of 300Mb/s using powerline adapters. They were netgear brand, I apologize I don't remember the model, but I think it had "1200" in it. A lot will depend on what else you have on the breaker, from what I understand. But for my purposes the performance was more than adequate.

[JustSomeNobody]

Powerline Ethernet is not really a good solution either. If you don't use your phone jacks, take the cover off one and check if it's actually using Cat5 or greater. You can then use those for network if you replace the connectors.

[lunchables]

You really shouldn't make blanket statements like that. While I'd definitely recommend using existing category 5 wiring if it's available, I'm getting close to 300Mb/s via powerline adapters, so it really comes down to your individual situation. For me it's been more than adequate.

[cannam]

> Powerline Ethernet is not really a good solution either.

Why is that?

[JustSomeNobody]

It's very finicky about line quality, it likes to be on the same circuit (doesn't cross breakers), and it doesn't live up to the claimed speeds.

[rrauenza]

As a no longer suffering user of X10 now enjoying ZWave, the issue is usually crossing the out of phase 110 legs (every other full size breaker in the panel is on a different leg).

To cross the phases, the signal has to go to the power pole where the phases originate. X10 has a repeater you can install and sometimes people just install a passive one (a capacitor if I recall.)

In a smaller house, signalling to the panel and back out to circuits on the same leg is more likely to work than crossing the phases.

[JustSomeNobody]

Thank you for the clarification.

[slantyyz]

>> Repeaters add latency and I can't imagine any network engineer would ever recommend one.

Keep in mind that these TP-Links are consumer grade hardware, and that they make sense for some use cases. Not every consumer can or wants to run wire for another AP, regardless of what a network expert would say.

I use an RE450 at my dad's house (which happens to be next to mine) so when I'm there I can access the Internet. My parents don't have any computers, smartphones or tablets and don't use the Internet. The RE450 does the job -- very well I might add -- and was cheaper and easier than drilling holes in masonry to run a network wire between the houses.

The NTP and DNS requests are concerning, but they don't materially impact my bandwidth cap on the plan I'm on.

[UncleEntity]

> Don't bother with repeaters.

The restaurant I was 'stealing' wifi from (not to mention my landlord) probably would've had a problem with me running a hundred meters or so of ethernet cable so a $60 repeater + aluminium can parabolic dish and Bob's your uncle. Worked for around two years until the interference from my neighbors' wifi made to signal too dodgy and (I think) they got wise and changed the password.

[dnebdal]

In this specific case, the RE650 is sold as a repeater - but it also has an access point mode. If it wasn't for TP-Link's approach to software, it would be a nice enough AP: I get good speeds and coverage out of mine, and it's small enough that you can just plug it into a wall socket somewhere you can run a network cable to.

Oh well, I'll probably have to get an ubiqity or something.

[slazaro]

Sometimes their simplicity wins out. I have a TP-Link repeater that just plugs into a wall socket and that's it, very quick setup. I just want it for a specific room that doesn't get wifi coverage; this was cheap and convenient, I'm happy with it.

I knew I could do it the proper way, but there would have been a lot of work involved, with very little payoff.

[QasimK]

Well you’re normal WAP needs to be connected to the network itself somehow. A repeater does it wirelessly, while a normal WAP may not even have that option.

[d2wa]

Most TP-Link repeaters can act in Access Point mode. It uses the same firmware and has the same bugs no matter what mode it’s set to use.

[shak77]

Most normal access points I've used won't work as wifi repeaters because they can't be in master and managed mode at the same time.

[chatmasta]

Does a router need two radios to support this dual mode? Or a single radio that supports transeiving? Or a single radio and two antennas? Or is a modified hostapd sufficient?

Basically, is it a hardware or software problem?