Are Ubiquiti APs better than converted ASUS routers?

[Ois]

As a matter of interest, are devices such as Ubuiquiti's APs (and similar APs designed for miltiple APs on one SSID) actually better than multiple Asus APs?
I have a two story apartment made from steel reinforced concrete with lots of interference from neighbours. My AC87u (router + AP) and AC68u (AP) only barely manage, yesterday I had to plug in on a Skype call due to bad call quality (cable worked better)
Is it worth upgrading? thanks!

 

[MichaelCG]

Possible.....but you need to establish what was causing your issues first. Was it signal strength? Was it signal quality issues? Where you using 2.4GHz or 5GHz? How far were you from the APs?

There are perks to using some of the "fancier" APs...but they aren't a miracle device. If you have lots of interference and lots of attenuation from walls, they won't fix that. The only real way to fix that is more APs running lower power and making sure you are using channels that have the least amount of interference.

 

[System Error Message]

it depends really. They're both good at wifi even though ubiquiti may have better range asus is able to handle more clients.

Its very likely your neighbours jacked up their signal quality and download a lot. Tell them to put it to low for 2.4Ghz as 5Ghz can be set to high since it has less range and more free space.

 

[Trip]

A good wifi survey and spectrum analysis should give you pretty good insight into how to circumvent the interference.

Or, if you want to give your neighbor a taste of his own medicine, drop some coin on some enterprise density-focused gear (Xirrus, etc.) and blow him out of the water just for giggles! Expensive giggles, though, so obviously I'm joking... or am I?

 

[System Error Message]

Thats not a bad idea, get yourself a mikrotik wireless RB, some directional antennas, run one of mikrotik's packet generator on the wifi AP itself and start blasting traffic on the wifi interface. it'd teach them a lesson . Make sure to use wireless b.

Very sure they jacked up the tx power and think they are getting good wifi. In truth their wifi upload speeds suck because of that but most people are downloaders and dont even know that it can get to a point where the client isnt powerful enough to talk back to the AP.

You should also find out local interferences. Microwaves if they leak is a health hazard and wifi interference. Many wifi based stuff run on 2.4Ghz that dont use the same wireless protocols as wifi routers as well. Bluetooth and wifi based remotes, wireless game controllers, etc.

 

[pege63]

Or tell the next door neighbours left, right, uppstairs, downstairs, to use 20MHz on 2,5GHz and 5GHz WIFI like this and give them non-overlapping CH:
I did that and now everybody is happy.

 

[Ois]

Thanks, good info.
I think the issues are mostly interference, I often do a site survay and see that neighbours have changed their frequencies (maybe router doing it automatically) or new SSIDs pop up.
Most people have no idea about 5GHz/2.4GHz and bandwidth etc.... they wouldn't know what I was talking about.

I had a LOT of Cat7 installed, so I'm usually able to plug in or I don't need much bandwidth (browsing/email).

I often see that handover is badly managed by clients, often signal strength is strong enough but interference means that the available bandwidth is small. I think that's probably most of the issue (reluctant handover). But I guess that is always the client's job, unless you have a mesh system. I have seen the mesh systems discussed here, I am not re-opening that discussion!

I'll think about adding another AC AP with reduced power. Thanks again.
Maybe someday when a new WiFi protocol cames out (or something new) I'll invest in a ceiling mount AP set.

 

[pege63]

Well yes thats why you shall informed the neighbours whats best for you all, and dont use auto for CH setting, set CH manualy non-overlapping CHs..
Also in the 2.4GHz can BT, Cordless phones and so on interfere the band.
Find the best spot (center most) for the Router and maybe you dont need the AP at all.
But as usual, it's just my own thoughts, I vent here

 

[System Error Message]

actually there are ceiling mount AP sets already. However you should look at some of the mesh that exist with the whole idea of the APs talking to each other via ethernet so that they can switch clients between them seamlessly. Google's seolution is promissing at the moment.

Informing other people is good if they will co operate and arent anti social. From my experience people dont know any better and i had to educate my student ISP on the finer points of wifi distribution when you have lots of wifi APs in a small area and what settings should be used and educating people about it rather than having people tell the ISP that others are running their own routers as they had planned to disable the ethernet ports on the wall of the room of any student who ran their routers and got discovered by someone.

I also noticed that my student ISP dont seem to be in sync. Their techs agree with me but their management dont as i complained about upload to download ratios and other things regarding their network.

 

[dunkin]

I have both Asus routers and Ubnt APs. The Asus routers happen to be the same as PM's, a RT-AC68U and a RT-87U. My Ubnt APs are an AC Lite, an AC Pro and an AC HD.

In my experience, the Asus routers have better signal strength and faster bandwidth than my Ubnt APs. The AC HD can barely match the Asus routers' speed. The others just can't match at all.

However I do find that Ubnt APs have many other good features that I like very much
1. central controller. With the controller (Unifi controller), you can manage all your APs together;
2. band steering. Seems newer and more expensive Asus routers have this feature too, but neither RT-AC68U nor RT-87U has.
3. multiple SIDs. Each Ubnt AP can support up to 4 SIDs. The SIDs can be associated to VLANs. Normally people don't need this, but somehow I have a special requirement. I need a dedicate SID for a VLAN.
4. 802.11r roaming support. Though Ubnt claims that their support is not 100% 802.11r compatible.

There are some other features such as airtime fairness and guest management but for me the above 4 features are more important.

Now all my APs are Ubnt's. The two Asus routers are concerted to client mode.

 

[Cake]

Yes, depending on the firmware. Use a Asus router, and track down hggomes version for it. If FCC rules don't apply to you or.... you will be amazed at how far the 2.4Ghz signal goes and goes. (When I was using it a long while back I got 2000+ feet.) I am using a Ubiquity Pico for a AP, and its range is typical - I would guess 500ft based on how far away my neighbors latch on to it

Edit: It was more like 1,500ft according to Google Earth (Asus) and 400ft for the PicoStation M2HP. Both are/were located in a second level floor surrounded by single pane windows on all sides.

 

[pege63]

Well with a ASUS Router you get, Router, Repeter, AP, Media Bridge so 4 in 1 device.