RouterBoard (MikroTik) or Ubiquiti EdgeRouter - any good?

[blakerwry]

My research concurs with Merc's experience. I anticipated using the included power injector because the wiring in my application was not up to the standards required of a PoE deployment. The included injector worked fine.

Regarding range, I left the UAP to auto channel/tx level and am seeing ~ 100ft range with an iPhone 802.11N client @ 2.4GHz while maintaining reasonable speeds. While less than spec'd, that's all my application required - otherwise I'm just feeding the neighbors.

One thing I would have appreciated was a link light on the ethernet port. I ended up having a bad cable/punch down. A link led with speed indicator would have been quite handy to make that more apparent. It also seemed like the UAP required a DHCP server in order to provision; It would have made pre-provisioning easier had the management application and AP been able to speak to each other without a DHCP server.

 

[Mercutio]

I've also had a hell of a time getting UAP devices to factory reset from the physical button, which is something that doesn't seem like it should actually be a problem.

 

[blakerwry]

I haven't found the UAP-LR's range claims to match up with anything resembling reality so far, but next time I'm at that client site I'm actually going to test it with a 2.4GHz LocoM2, just to see if a better client device will get better reception than my phone or laptop can.

I tested today with a macbook air and found the range to be roughly 50%-100% better than with an iPhone. Interestingly, the signal strength indicator stays very high, even when at the outer edge of the usable range. My interpretation of this is that the AP is transmitting plenty loud and it's the client device's Tx limitation which ultimately restricts the usable range. I'm guessing a client with more powerful Tx or a (semi-)directional antenna would work within the stated 400ft range of the UAP. Of course, when we see a stated range, we may make the assumption that these specs are with a typical client device (even if it is best case with a typical device). Based on my observations, I think a 100ft (mobile) - 200ft (laptop) range is probably typical given line of sight with minimal obstructions. YMMV.

 

[ddrueding]

In my experience an iPhone has the worst range of any wireless client. They are what I use when I'm placing APs to guarantee overlap as a worst-case scenario.