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I have been using the Cisco SA520W security appliance as a firewall/WAP and have had issues with wireless connectivity. I am considering moving to a standalone WAP to host both a secure and guest SSID. When I worked for a larger enterprise, we used controller based Cisco Aironet APs - anyone have experience with the 1600 series or have other recommendations for a small business office (20 - 25 connections)

@Cisco

13 Spice ups
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I like the Meraki devices. I have used the MR12 and MR16.

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For small business, I recomend Ubiquiti Unifi.

Very good, easy to deploy, Enterprise manageability, without need of a hardware controller.

Mircea.

11 Spice ups
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small office try the Unifi range from Ubiquiti.

Just provides a basic AP with multiple SSIDS etc so you’ll need a separate firewall but nice and cheap

2 Spice ups
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Ubiquiti Unifi is a very popular option here but I’d also look at open-mesh.com.

Similar price to the unifi but has a free cloud controller. Setup from un-boxing to the first client connecting take all of 5 min. No software setup needed (but less features than the unifi)

3 Spice ups
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+1 for the Ubiquiti Unifi. Just replaced all of our Cisco APs with them and have been extremely happy with them.

Drew

4 Spice ups
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Open-Mesh - www.open-mesh.com

Price Range: $55 - $75 per AP

  • Centrally Managed (Free cloud based network controller for complete control and monitoring)
  • Multiple SSID’s (Dual SSID’s for public and private use)
  • Mesh Enabled (Self forming, self healing mesh)
  • Zero config, plug and play networking
  • Hardware Watchdog (auto-restarts router after power spikes/outages)
  • Scaleable
  • Indoor and outdoor APs
  • Guest Portal
  • Automated outage alerts
  • Full usage statistics and control
  • Set upload and download caps
  • Custom captive portal with pay options
  • 12-20v PASSIVE PoE
  • Zero cost licence
2 Spice ups
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Just got a meraki device - awesome.

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Plus one for Open-Mesh. Easy to install and works the same way Meraki does. Just without the high price. However Im not complaining about Meraki I just don’t think it is a good fit for small business. It is desinged for mid size and up enterprise.

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Thanks for all of the Input, looks like I will be researching Meraki, Open-Mesh and Ubiquiti devices.

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Another Meraki fan here

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Meraki, Ubiquiti Unifi, and Open-Mesh are all good options just depends on your budget. If you have PoE switches already Ubiquiti Unifi needs less power so you will need to adjust it or get the adapters.

Meraki, is the most polished product, and the most expensive.

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Meraki all the way.

Easy to install and setup and manage.

We have 17 in our school and they work great.

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Have you looked into Aruba Cloud Wi-Fi - http://cloud.arubanetworks.com/. It’s now 11ac.

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Hi Maynesworld, you could look into CIsco Meraki as some already suggested or you can go with the 1600 AP that you mentioned here is more information on the 1600AP (Cisco Aironet 1600 Series Access Point Data Sheet - Cisco) f you any further questions please feel free to ask. hope this helps!

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I installed 9 Aruba IAP’s in a small elementary school recently. Staff (secure domain access), Student (secure access - no domain rights), and guest (open, isolated and requires agreement to T&C) all running great.

During school events we occasionally had issues with running out of IP addresses. Using the built in NAT saved me the trouble of having to rework my DHCP scopes. Staff still get addresses from the server, but students and guest get addresses from the Aruba controller.

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I just don’t understand this love for cloud wap, makes not sense to pay a fee to access your wap from the internet when they are right there in the building. They are yours, you paid for them, control them for free. Makes no sense.

I just spent 4 months researching various devices and even demo around 3 units and finally decided on Engenius EAP600 units. I bought 3 from CDW. They are very affordable, you buy them, you own them, and they come with free software to program them. Made perfect sense, works great, offers 8 SSID’s with two antennas, and offers guess network features.

Very happy with them, and so is my boss. I set them up and haven’t had to do a thing. I don’t understand the whole cloud thing because really, you set them up once and won’t have to manage them. At least for me, I don’t have to go in and manage them once I have them setup. Easy cheesy.

4 Spice ups
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As crazy as this sounds we have actually swapped our old WAP2000’s out for the new Apple Airport Extremes and couldn’t be happier. Their is no compatibility issues with Windows machines and the range on these access points are ridiculous and not to mention they are 802.11 ac. You can basically just plug them in and their ready to go. Just let your main router/firewall like a sonic wall do all the heavy lifting and hand out the DHCP addresses.

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Haven’t looked at those, are they affordable? The range I am getting on the EAP600 are pretty darn good. I mounted them in the rafter of the warehouse and I have complete coverage in every square inch. I will have to check out the price on those, I shop mainly at CDW and didn’t see those. Where did you get them?

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We shop through CDW as well. The price tag is $213.99 before any company discounts so they are a bit expensive but a lot of the higher end WAP’s are around this price plus you are buying the name. We have a lot of vendors and such that come in with Mac books and it was just a terrible mess trying to get them connected to our Wi-Fi. We saw that Windows machines worked without issues with these and decided to get two of them.

It’s just nice we can still use the content filter from our sonic wall to manage access with these AP’s. Most AP’s this has to be done through the AP/Router interface in my experience.