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I have a small office building that has chosen to rent out several offices to tenants. They are providing the Internet to the tenants, which is where my headache begins. Currently everyone is on one simple LAN. They only have a consumer router, Layer 2-plus managed switch (TP-Link) and a couple of Ubiquity Unify Access points with a Cloud Key.

They want to have five separate VLANs for the various tenants, plus a common one for using Smart TVs in conference rooms. In addition, they want five matching SSIDs, one for each VLAN. They’ll also want a guest-WIFI. I know the Unify APs can support four SSIDs, but looking for ideas and equipment to exceed this and make this happen. They don’t want to throw a lot of money at this and I’ve already warned this is going to be much harder to manage.

Open to ideas of how to accomplish the above or find a simpler way to do it. Main goal is to separate the networks (both wired and wireless) with some way that people can still access the common devices (smart TVs and maybe a printer).

@spencer-ubiquiti

@ubnt-matt @marcomontelli5458

10 Spice ups
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Well, the consumer router is something that should get replaced with something, that knows how to handle VLANs.

In regards of the tenants and their SSID’s - I suppose the tenants are not mixed all over the floor, but stick each on their end.

So I would configure only accesspoints close to the tenants office space with their SSID. That should give you much more flexibility.

And possibly they should invest in a few more recent accesspoints, as the new ones support up to 8 SSID’s per radio. That should cover their needs for spots, where all the SSID’s would have to be available.

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So, the 4 SSID limit is per Access point in Unifi. I assume not all clients are in all areas, so you can probably manage it. Otherwise:

It can also be further tweaked in this way. You can have 4 unique SSIDs (by group) on 2.4Ghz, and 4 different ones (by group) on 5Ghz.

So 5 SSIDs is not an issue. Just have the smart-TV on 2.4 only along with a few of the others. Then the other 4 can all be on 5Ghz.

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You may want to look at other options for AP’s. D-Link cloud manage can do 16 SSID’s (8 per band) or TP Link Omada. I would hold off on TP Link until they turn on 2FA on the cloud management. Going to have to be creative if they don’t want to open the wallet,

@kelly-for-d-link

1 Spice up
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Here is an example of 5 different ones

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There is no need to change the vendor. Even the $99 UniFi 6 Lite Access Point supports 8 SSID’s per band. So it’s just about adding a couple of new ones to problematic areas, where 4 SSID’s wouldn’t be enough.

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Good to know that newer UniFi WAPs support 8 SSIDs. :slight_smile:

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I think OP needs to first understand what is a VLAN ?

Then is the firewall and wireless AP ready for guest networks or DMZ ?

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@bojanzajc6669 ​ - Agreed, the router is definitely not up to the task. I just wanted to see if there was a simpler way to do this that I was over looking. Unfortunately the square-footage of the office is not that large, so it may be problematic to separate them based on distance/area. That would be good if there was more isolation, but these offices are quite close together. I also did not know that the newer APs were supporting 8 SSIDs per band. Very good to know!

@jclambert1 ​ - I had not thought about separating these based on band. This could work if they won’t upgrade all the equipment. Great tip.

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No problem, if the office space is not that large - don’t forget, that you can run AP’s at lower transmission power. So you can have a higher density of AP’s, with less interference and high flexibility in what SSID you want to deliver at what ends of the floor.

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Completely missed your tag, @michael9595 ​! But, it’s much appreciated.

OP - Not sure if you’ve already decided on next steps, but just wanted to let you know I am here in case you have any questions. Happy to help if I can!