What's new

Ubiquiti USG or GUI interface

  • SNBForums Code of Conduct

    SNBForums is a community for everyone, no matter what their level of experience.

    Please be tolerant and patient of others, especially newcomers. We are all here to share and learn!

    The rules are simple: Be patient, be nice, be helpful or be gone!

coxhaus

Part of the Furniture
How many of you are running the Ubiquiti USG GUI interface routers? I was reading and they seem interesting. You have GUI on the router which handles the switches and wireless with a GUI. You get more of a firewall than normal small routers. It seems real easy to setup. I can see this coming on real strong for home users and small businesses which do not have an IT person.

Is anybody using these? Does it work well?

How does the controller work for the backup of the router? Is it cloud based? It seems to make it easy to change hardware.
 
It seems to me for someone at home they could run an UniFi® Security Gateway and AC Pro wireless for about the same money or less for home and have a better setup than a consumer router. This system would be easy to expand. What am I missing? You don't really need networking skills for this. It does VLANs for you.
 
Why does not nobody run a Unifi Security gateway? I like Cisco but if I was a typical home owner this would be at the top of my list.

But nobody runs this. There must be something wrong with it?
 
Well...in all fairness...the majority of typical home owners don't run Ubiquiti equipment in the first place. Even those that do use their APs quite often still use their original routers.
 
But now that the price of home routers have gotten so high it seems you can now buy an Unifi Security gateway with a AP cheaper than a lot of the new home routers. Am I right?
 
If you are being logical about it...yes. But most home users know nothing about Ubiquiti as well as the learning curve is higher. Way simpler for them to buy a single device that has a traditional webUI and go. All depends on the requirements of the user including budget, technical complexity, performance, and features. They all must balance out somehow.
 
Most consumers don't know:

  1. what an Access Point (AP) is
  2. that Access Points can be designed very differently from standalone routers, including supporting very high density clients (like you'd have in an office), efficient roaming and very stable WiFi
  3. that multiple Access Points outperform standalone routers in multi-floor setups or in a large enough area since no client is ever too far from a radio
  4. that multiple Access Points can often be cheaper than multiple standalone routers and some expensive consumer wireless routers
  5. that APs are usually designed to work together with other APs and can be infinitely extended in this cooperative configuration, whereas standalone routers often cannot work together or are limited to a small number, e.g. Asus AiMesh only supports 3 devices
  6. that APs almost always support wired backhaul, unlike many "mesh" devices, e.g. Asus AiMesh states it supports both wireless and wired backhaul, but in practice it only supports wireless
  7. that APs tend to have many more configuration options for their wireless radios, especially and importantly the ability to change transmit power (almost unheard of in standalone routers)
  8. that the best APs can be centrally configured, individually and as part of a network. Some can also be configured without a central controller, e.g. TP-Link APs
  9. who Ubiquiti are because their core customers are Wireless ISPs (WISPs) and medium to small businesses. Their devices are often used in large businesses and organizations, even in military, competing against the Ruckus, Cisco Meraki, Aruba of the world for value
  10. that unlike many business products, Ubiquiti products are sold on Amazon and other consumer retailers
APs in multiple configurations also reduces the value of expensive standalone routers with high number of streams. Why would you have a single 4x4 router going through walls to a small number (compared to offices) of 2x2 and 1x1 clients with the occasional 3x3 clients, when you could get greater and stable performance with a few well placed budget APs across a property with minimal intervening walls and floors? Can't beat physics after all ...

So, I think APs and therefore Ubiquiti APs - who are a leader in budget APs - will continue to grow quickly in popularity with consumers, especially since WiFi clients cannot scale up as quickly as WiFi technology. This empowers the "horizontal" scaling of APs rather than ever more powerful wireless routers. This also explains why router manufacturers and new entrants started to introduce and market mesh technologies.
 
Last edited:

Similar threads

Latest threads

Sign Up For SNBForums Daily Digest

Get an update of what's new every day delivered to your mailbox. Sign up here!
Top