UniFi Dream Machine

[thiggins]

Great site Willie.

Willie is not a member of SNBForums. Please post your comments on his/her YouTube channel.

 

[bigfatron]

A bit of a cautionary tale now i've had a bit of time with this device, specifically regarding the firmware and automatic updating. Mine shipped with something like 1.5.3 on it. After a few days i'd enabled the automatic updates schedule and then discovered I couldn't remote into the device any longer, although it was clearly still working as a router. Once i'd regained local access I discovered the firmware was now 1.5.0, the controller part of it had also downgraded (I assume the configuration wasn't backwards compatible and hence that part of it had failed to restart) and the only way to get the device fully working again properly was to factory-reset. I did have a backup of my settings done to date but couldn't apply this as that too was taken under a higher version of the firmware.

In fairness to the folks on their support forum then they were quite quick to respond to questions about this and also provided a link to another newer version of the firmware that was also compatible with my backup and the whole episode cost me about an hour of my day to sort out. It would've been a major hassle though if the device was remotely deployed as you needed local access to get it going again. They did also say to leave the auto-update feature disabled, although it is actually enabled by default in setup (i'd initially switched it off). It seems the downgrade occurred because the shipped firmware was actually beta (although no way to easily see this) and the updater opted to write over the beta with the newest available stable release even though it was older and also not backward compatible with the existing configuration.

Another lesser issue I stumbled across was speed tests always came up about 33% down on expectation. I did initially suspect the security features but it turned out to be a feature called 'Smart Queues' that was enabled by default and throttling me. Once this was switched off then everything worked at full speed.

These blips aside, i'm still quite happy with the device and its been otherwise completely stable but its obviously also a work in progress.

 

[Trip]

Thanks for the notes on your experience, @bigfatron.

BTW, the UDM Pro has been out for about a week now. Interested to see feedback at SNB and /r/Ubiquiti.

 

[bigfatron]

Thanks for the notes on your experience, @bigfatron.

BTW, the UDM Pro has been out for about a week now. Interested to see feedback at SNB and /r/Ubiquiti.

Looks like that's had some fun too with a recent firmware upgrade https://community.ui.com/releases/U...4/71e1191b-36b7-4ac4-81a4-f4e859e4e0f3?page=7

 

[jcy]

These blips aside, i'm still quite happy with the device and its been otherwise completely stable but its obviously also a work in progress.

Can you tell me if it's possible to create individual user account/passwords on the device for ease of usage tracking? I'm looking into getting this for a roommate situation and ISP bandwidth caps, the details of which I will not bore you with

 

[L&LD]

@jcy how much do you trust this roommate? Share your ISP connection only with those you have complete trust with. What they do online will and does affect you. Even if they stay within any assigned bandwidth caps you can impose.

 

[jcy]

don't worry it's much more mundane than that

 

[Just Mark]

@jcy - You can track usage by device using the Unify Controller software. you could also set up a separate SSID for your roommate and track total usage for that SSID. You could even bandwidth limit that SSID if you wanted.

 

[bigfatron]

Can you tell me if it's possible to create individual user account/passwords on the device for ease of usage tracking? I'm looking into getting this for a roommate situation and ISP bandwidth caps, the details of which I will not bore you with

As someone else said, seperate SSIDs with individual VLANs sounds like the best fit. Don't think you can cap on absolute data usage though (would have to check) but, as they said, you can throttle the amount of bandwidth available if they're hogging throughput.

You'll be able to see per device what's been used up and down, although I should warn that I have seen some suspected anomalies in the data collated on the firmware that's been avaliable to date.

 

[jcy]

I read a review that said that "You can set up a dedicated L2TP VPN server on the router, and configure DHCP, DNS servers, UPnP, QoS, and a RADIUS server."

Does that mean it has a RADIUS server that could authenticate wireless devices against local UDM accounts? Something like a PEAP setup?

 

[bigfatron]

I read a review that said that "You can set up a dedicated L2TP VPN server on the router, and configure DHCP, DNS servers, UPnP, QoS, and a RADIUS server."

Does that mean it has a RADIUS server that could authenticate wireless devices against local UDM accounts? Something like a PEAP setup?

I don't think the RADIUS stuff works right this minute. Its marked as 'coming soon' on the menu.

 

[Robertus]

Is this possible:

I want a dream machine (other option is Asus zenwifi XT8) downstairs, wirelessly uplinked to an AP upstairs, the AP feeding a switch which will allow me to hardwire the NAS and PC upstairs?

 

[Trip]

@Robertus - Yes, possible, with the second AP wirelessly uplinked to the UDM, then wired into the switch, whose ports you plug in the patch cables from the NAS, PC, etc.

 

[Robertus]

So I would have:

UDM > wireless uplink > AP > Switch > devices

which AP? I know you recommended the Orbi Pros, but I’ll either go with this or the Asus mesh.

 

[FarmerBob]

So I would have:
UDM > wireless uplink > AP > Switch > devices
which AP? I know you recommended the Orbi Pros, but I’ll either go with this or the Asus mesh.

Ubiq has tons. I like the UAP-AC-LRs and all the rest . . .

 

[Robertus]

I think I’m going to stick with a mesh. Doesn’t seem like there’s an elegant solution other than having a disk on my desk. The Ubiquiti stuff seems slick, just not for my specific case.

 

[bigfatron]

So I would have:

UDM > wireless uplink > AP > Switch > devices

which AP? I know you recommended the Orbi Pros, but I’ll either go with this or the Asus mesh.

Bear in mind the UDM is WiFi 5

I think I’m going to stick with a mesh. Doesn’t seem like there’s an elegant solution other than having a disk on my desk. The Ubiquiti stuff seems slick, just not for my specific case.

There's the more cylindrical FlexHD AP out now if you want something that doesn't look like a smoke detector.

 

[Robertus]

Yes, UDM is WiFi 5, but I guess as Trip said, it’s wave 2 - the ubiquiti software looks slick too.

 

[Robertus]

Bear in mind the UDM is WiFi 5


There's the more cylindrical FlexHD AP out now if you want something that doesn't look like a smoke detector.

Would the flex hd connect wirelessly to the UDM and then feed that to a switch?

 

[coxhaus]

WiFi 5 wave 2 is probably the safest right now.