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Good afternoon all,

I’m in the process of putting together a proposal for a massive wireless infrastructure upgrade at one of our facilities. We’re going to be moving away from Cisco 1240AG access points without a controller to a newer, faster solution with a controller.

I’ve been strongly leaning towards Ubiquiti UAP-AC-Pro access points. I have a couple in-house that I’ve been using for testing, and I really like them. They seem pretty solid, I like the ease of setup, and the cloud controller seems to work really well. I gave this suggestion to my supervisor, but she wants more than just my word that they will work as well as Cisco equipment.

Other than reviews on Amazon and the Case Studies on Ubiquiti’s website, I’m having trouble finding testimonials from IT admins who have deployed these access points. I’m hoping that someone can either point me in the direction of a few testimonials, or can write something up briefly if you have used UniFi in your own environment. Have you had any issues since deploying them? Do you recommend them?

Thanks in advance!

11 Spice ups
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I would say for us they work great. We originally deployed the Unifi AP model (4 years ago I think). We had about 30 of them in our facilities. Today, we have upgraded most of them to the AC Pro models. We have over 40 AP’s spread out over 400,000 square feet of buildings in 4 locations. We have anywhere from 100 to 200 users online at any given time.

The system works well for us. Also, when you Factor in the great pricing, we are even more happy. We also moved to Ubiquiti from an old Cisco setup.

As I said, it works well for us. Will it work as well for you? Most likely, but not knowing the details of your setup, the environment, the issues you have, no one can say for sure. We tested with a few AP’s first, then when we saw that they would work, we rolled out the rest.

3 Spice ups
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Decent products, but Ubiquity support is crap, so take that in to consideration.

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I will leave the testimonials to non-employees :slight_smile: Thought I would include a link to UniFi stories that have been posted on our community forum from some of our users:

http://community.ubnt.com/t5/UniFi-Stories/con-p/UniFi_Stories

As for support, we offer 24/7/365 online chat support as well as email support. Our community forum (above) is an excellent resource as well and of course the spiceworks community!

Hope this helps.

Thanks,

Ben

4 Spice ups
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I would say the opposite. When we first deployed we had an issue with some wifi phones and Ubiquiti was extremely helpful even to the point of getting some beta firmware to test. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy they were to work with. I was working directly with an engineer via phone and email.

3 Spice ups
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I love their support and all their local sales people are pretty cool to work with. None of them actually come off as sales weasels… Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever had a cold call from Ubiquiiti so that makes them totally tops in my book.

3 Spice ups
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I use an AirRouter at home and have never had major issues. I love the interface and the granular control.

1 Spice up
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Just looking at the APs, I would absolutely recommend them. They have been doing wireless for a “relatively” long time compared to their other products. I have never had to contact support for my APs and the forums are usually full of info if you do encounter an issue.

Putting them side by side with Cisco, though, it really depends what your requirement are. Each company has different hardware for different scenarios. Feature for feature, they will work as well as Cisco stuff IMO.

1 Spice up
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Here we have currently 6 companies using UniFI APs(UAP and UAP-Pro).

Plus various customers using AirMAX for Point-to-Point links.

Ubiquiti Support is not crap as people said, they did had problem issuing RMAs in the past, but in the last 2 years I never once had a problem with their products.

The thing about UniFI is that anyone that cares to read the User Guide can prepare everything in a couple of hours. If you need a more complex setup, the folks at their forum plus here in Spiceworks can help you.

1 Spice up
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We have 1 AP-AC here, it’s rock-solid. We’re not doing anything too fancy, one AP with two SSIDs operating in different VLANS. Next time we remodel we’ll probably go up to 3 APs because coverage is a little weak in the corners of the building and people will be moving into those corners with weak reception.

I REALLY like the interactive coverage map where you upload a floor plan then scale it & place the AP(s) on your plan to get estimated coverage area. The coverage area changes based on your radio power settings.

The thing I don’t like is having to have a controller, but I’m sure it’s a necessary evil for larger deployments.

1 Spice up
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Let me put on my supervisor hat.

You want me to buy a product based on “They seem” and “I really like them” and “I like the ease of setup”?

Don’t get seduced by a pretty interface. Have you programmed them? Really programmed them? Have you set up a network with 10 SSIDs, 3 public with different vlans, 5 private with passwords, and 2 that provide only inter-device communication? Have you created a problem and then called Ubiquiti’s support or tried to find an answer on their “community” page?

Have you compared throughput and put the results in a table? What is your typical connection density? Have you tried to connect that many devices to a Ubiquiti node and see what the results are?

You shouldn’t be looking for people to give you glowing testimonials. You should be looking for people who hate Ubiquiti. Find out what their complaints are and determine whether or not they’ll impact you.

6 Spice ups
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There are like … 15 gazillion threads if you search Spiceworks for ‘Ubiquiti’. There are another 4 gazillion if you search for ‘Ubiquity’. Most people love them (for the price). A few hate them, although those are generally less about hate than about love of, and budget for, Meraki.

2 Spice ups
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take a look at peoples project pages. I have a couple of Ubiquiti Unifi wireless projects posted to my project pages as examples you could use.

1 Spice up
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Hahahahahahahaha…

Yes, they’re great. Cisco makes good stuff too, but to ask if it will work as well as Cisco? Haha. Plenty of stuff out there works 10x better than Cisco.

2 Spice ups
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I have a client that is a K-8 school and am running ~200 iPads and ~100 Chromebooks on 9 UAP-Pro access points and the stuff just runs. Have 3 SSIDs (1 for students, 1 for staff, and 1 for guests) all on their own VLANs. Had zero complaints of connectivity/signal strength last year, the 1st year after install.

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I deployed 12 UAC-PRO APs about 6 months ago to replace some old Cicso APs, and we haven’t had any issues with them. I haven’t needed to contact Ubiquiti’s support. The setup was easy and intuitive. The APs come with the mounting brackets. The wireless has worked very well and has had better performance than our old wifi. Meraki and Aruba probably are better, but they cost much more. Ubiquiti is a great value for the price.

1 Spice up
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Setup our first Ubiquiti AP’s in Dec 2013 and added more since. Have had ZERO issues with them. The controller software has been much improved.

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There are no issues with them, and there are tons of issues with them. It all depends upon where you look. Go to their forums and look for the current issues with Apple devices that stop communicating with the UAP-AC-PRO.

My deployments are tiny, just one UAP, UAP-AC-LR, or UAP-AC-PRO in any given location. I have a basic UAP in a church with 57 people on it without any issues, other than it being connected to a DSL 4Mbps connection.

I just installed a new WatchGuard T50 non-wireless firewall and a UAP-AC-PRO at a law office to replace their old WatchGuard XTM 26-W firewall with its built-in wireless. The UAP-AC-PRO blows away the performance and signal strength of the old firewall’s built-in wireless, as expected.

I have all of mine phone home to the Cloud Key controller in my office.

Gregg

2 Spice ups
19

I’m not running Ubiquiti currently, but deployed and supported it when I worked for an MSP. It was, in my view, unbeatable for the price, and was my go to recommendation for any customer that wasn’t an “edge case” where their needs were very specific or complex. If your environment only has a few SSIDs, no major spectrum issues, and you need to support <25 clients per AP, it’s probably a good choice for you. Cisco will have more features, particularly with controller based systems, but if you don’t need them, paying for them is pointless.

If there’s concern about a large deployment, can you put your 2 test APs into a different building or area and run a test deployment for a couple months? Heck, run it as “free guest wifi” for employees to use in the break room. Gather feedback and verify that the APs are running smoothly, or not.

1 Spice up
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I am currently the admin for small private school (~200 students K3-12th) and I have Ubiquiti throughout my building. The only part of my network that is not Ubiquiti is my firewall. I have NO complaints about my wireless. I have had to replace on AP in the last year (2.5 years old) but I was able to replace it with new UAP-AC-PRO (bought a 5 pack) for less than 6 months of license from Meraki. I love the visibility from the controller, the network set up is easy to use. The occasional time that I can’t find (too lazy to look) for an answer on the user forums and I use the chat support they are helpful. I would recommend that any small or medium business jump at the chance to use them.