Ubiquiti and Zyxel Experiences - Switching, Security, Customer Service

[Avery]

Can anyone with experience with Ubiquity and/or Zyxel speak to how well they perform for switching, security, and customer service? Comparisons are even better.

I am need of a quiet gigabit switch with PoE, and it seems that my choices for a single device come down to either Ubiquity (USW-48-POE or USW‐Pro‐48‐PoE) or Zyxel (GS1920-48HPv2). I don't have experience with either of these mfg's, though am slightly inclined towards ubiquity for reasons of US company ownership and given Zyxel has had a couple significant back door vulnerabilities identified in recent years.

I would probably prefer a cisco SMB solution, but there isn't a good combination for low noise that works for me.

 

[tgl]

I don't have experience with the particular gear you mention, but I own some other gear from these two manufacturers, so here's an at-least-slightly-informed opinion.

I have two Ubiquiti EdgeRouter-X units that I've had for a couple of years, and I quite like them. They are well made for consumer-level gear and have not given me any trouble. I found them very confusing to set up at the beginning, but that might be just my own initial unfamiliarity with the software and Ubiquiti's terminology.

I've also got a pair of Zyxel NWA210AX wireless access points, and a pair of their powerline adapters, all acquired in the last couple of months. I like these too. Their management GUIs are very old-school looking but they get the job done in a straightforward, effective manner. It's too soon to give them a wholehearted recommendation for reliability, though.

Performance-wise, I'm not pushing the ERX units hard at all so I don't have much to say there. The Zyxel APs are very competitive with other AX WiFi gear; in terms of iperf3 and other benchmarks, they seem to beat out the ASUS and Netgear Orbi units I had before them. No complaints there. (As for the PLAs, see my mini-review from a few weeks ago over in the powerline forum.)

Both companies would like you to buy into their cloud management infrastructure, but you don't have to and I haven't. For this amount of gear I don't think it's worth the incremental security risk. If I were managing dozens of access points it'd be a different story.

As for customer service --- I've not had to deal with returns or warranty issues with either company, so I can't speak to that. Ubiquiti has a far more built-out web presence, better online documentation, and bigger user community. Zyxel's website is relatively sparse on support documentation, and while they do have some tech support people answering questions in their user forums, it's hard to tell how well-qualified those people are. (Don't take my word for it, poke around their websites for yourself.)


On the whole, I don't think you'll be unhappy if you buy Ubiquiti. Jury's still out for me on Zyxel; but so far I'm happier with their products than I was with either ASUS or Netgear.

 

[Tech Junky]

I use the NWA210AX and am probably the reason @tgl got them.

The Zyxel os is similar to Cisco from the CLI perspective. It's a bit quirky though on some things.

I can't speak to the other stuff they have though. I haven't ventured into ubiquity though and can't comment there either

 

[tgl]

I use the NWA210AX and am probably the reason @tgl got them.

Well, you and @shoman94 ...

 

[Tech Junky]

@tgl It always comes back to me if it's not Asus around here it seems!

As to the OP.. it seems like Zyxel is more EU oriented which may be why there's not as many people using them? I heard of them first back in the days of ISDN back when dial up was a thing.

Ubiquity though is more prosumer / nerd gear because you don't see it in stores.

Not to mention there's not a ton of people using 48 port switches around here. That's more enterprise density and they pay up for Cisco / Juniper support contracts / replacements w/ SLA's.

If I didn't collapse most of my network "nodes" into a single box I was still able to getaway with 5-port switches to aggregate things back to the router. I did pick up a 24 port TPL? to play around with some LACP before going DIY to collapse the devices.

 

[follower]

Can anyone with experience with Ubiquity and/or Zyxel speak to how well they perform for switching, security, and customer service? Comparisons are even better.

I am need of a quiet gigabit switch with PoE, and it seems that my choices for a single device come down to either Ubiquity (USW-48-POE or USW‐Pro‐48‐PoE) or Zyxel (GS1920-48HPv2). I don't have experience with either of these mfg's, though am slightly inclined towards ubiquity for reasons of US company ownership and given Zyxel has had a couple significant back door vulnerabilities identified in recent years.

I would probably prefer a cisco SMB solution, but there isn't a good combination for low noise that works for me.

CISCO or Netgear.
DIY Heat Sinks.
Replacing the fan to Low noise fans.

 

[ddaenen1]

No experience with Zyxel. I did have an Ubiquiti Edgerouter Light (ERL). Worked well, stable, but difficult to set up. The part using the wizard via the GUI were quite ok but all the other stuff via CLI was not my cup of tea. I never really got it running the way i wanted. Exchanged it with Microtik. Easier to config, all via GUI. Eventually that one went too and went to pfsense. Never looked back.

 

[coxhaus]

Can anyone with experience with Ubiquity and/or Zyxel speak to how well they perform for switching, security, and customer service? Comparisons are even better.

I am need of a quiet gigabit switch with PoE, and it seems that my choices for a single device come down to either Ubiquity (USW-48-POE or USW‐Pro‐48‐PoE) or Zyxel (GS1920-48HPv2). I don't have experience with either of these mfg's, though am slightly inclined towards ubiquity for reasons of US company ownership and given Zyxel has had a couple significant back door vulnerabilities identified in recent years.

I would probably prefer a cisco SMB solution, but there isn't a good combination for low noise that works for me.

If you think Cisco SMB is loud you should hear the enterprise Cisco switches as they are much louder and made for wiring closets. I would think most of the 1 gig switch ports are starting to be slow as most people now want 2.5 gig ports for SMB businesses nowadays. Any way if I was planning a new business layout and I wanted the best it is what I would do. Cisco SMB has you covered for nbase-t.

 

[Avery]

If you think Cisco SMB is loud you should hear the enterprise Cisco switches as they are much louder and made for wiring closets. I would think most of the 1 gig switch ports are starting to be slow as most people now want 2.5 gig ports for SMB businesses nowadays. Any way if I was planning a new business layout and I wanted the best it is what I would do. Cisco SMB has you covered for nbase-t.

No doubt, data centers are super loud an give me a headache. In this case, it's just for home network and next to a theater, so needs to be super quiet... unfortunately, that may drive me to a solution that is less than ideal technically, but being real about it.... for a home network, probably about any 1 Gig switch will be OK.

Is it just me, or was going to a 1U design for data center hardware not a good idea for cooling and noise reasons.

Follower - I've done fan swaps before, and don't want to deal with that or the reduced warranty that comes with it.

 

[follower]

No doubt, data centers are super loud an give me a headache. In this case, it's just for home network and next to a theater, so needs to be super quiet... unfortunately, that may drive me to a solution that is less than ideal technically, but being real about it.... for a home network, probably about any 1 Gig switch will be OK.

Is it just me, or was going to a 1U design for data center hardware not a good idea for cooling and noise reasons.

Follower - I've done fan swaps before, and don't want to deal with that or the reduced warranty that comes with it.

Then there is no way to reduce the fan noise without the fan replacement or DIY heat sinks. 1gb fan version switches also make noise. Otherwise you should put the switches into the closet, Rack, or somewhere.

 

[Avery]

Then there is no way to reduce the fan noise without the fan replacement or DIY heat sinks. 1gb fan version switches also make noise. Otherwise you should put the switches into the closet, Rack, or somewhere.

That is why I am selecting a switch that doesn't make much noise

 

[follower]

That is why I am selecting a switch that doesn't make much noise

Then find a Netgear Fanless 48 port swich. There are some of them. Or you can buy 2 of fanless 24 port switches.