Help Me Pick New APs (Aruba vs Ruckus)

[LodeRunner]

I've become increasingly frustrated with the two UAP-AP-PRO units I have in my house. 2 stories, 3k sqft, geometry means a single central AP is going to have problems, so I have two at opposite ends of a 40' hallway. Most of the time, everything is fine.

However, my neighbors have your usual bog standard home AP/router combo units that hop to whatever channel has the lowest noise and then run at max transmit power. So in the evenings, when I am most needing my wireless downstairs for streaming (have as yet been unable to pull a cable due to the way the interstitial space is constructed) is when my neighbors also generate more traffic and every time I move to a quiet channel, it'll be within the day that those other APs are on the same channel or overlapping neighbor channels.

I'm looking at Aruba AP-535 or AP-555 (or even an AP-635; the 655 is far too expensive at the moment) vs Ruckus R650 or R750 as the replacement. I haven't been able to find a good comparison of performance between them. eBay-wise, they're all within the neighborhood of each other price-wise, so really it comes down to which one has the best ability to deal with obnoxious neighboring APs.

Clients are all 5Ghz capable and I now have a few ax devices as well, so no legacy garbage to worry about, though I will probably need to maintain a 2.4Ghz network for my Rachio due to its position and structure of the house.

 

[ms264556]

You can check the data sheets to see the tx/rx dBm for all of these models. My limited experience with Aruba and Ruckus was that these numbers pretty accurately reflected reality.

I have a couple of R650s and I also had an AP-535 for a few days while I set it up for a friend.

For 5Ghz the R650 was providing similar signal from behind a drywall as the AP-535 in the same room. So not a huge difference, but noticeable, and roughly in line with the datasheets.

And for 2.4Ghz there were a couple of dead spots with the AP-535, but this may be because the placement vs the R650 was worse.

In terms of fighting with your neighbours' signals, I definitely think Ruckus does a better job. However, if your clients and the Aruba model have 6e, and your neighbours don't, then you're golden with Aruba.

Be careful with the higher-end models within generations - quite often the "high density" models have a poorer range (because they have extra radios), which is the main thing I care about at home.

 

[sic0048]

You can always fight fire with fire. Get an outdoor AP and point it right at your neighbor's house. Claim the best frequencies for yourself.

 

[LodeRunner]

You can check the data sheets to see the tx/rx dBm for all of these models. My limited experience with Aruba and Ruckus was that these numbers pretty accurately reflected reality.

I have a couple of R650s and I also had an AP-535 for a few days while I set it up for a friend.

For 5Ghz the R650 was providing similar signal from behind a drywall as the AP-535 in the same room. So not a huge difference, but noticeable, and roughly in line with the datasheets.

And for 2.4Ghz there were a couple of dead spots with the AP-535, but this may be because the placement vs the R650 was worse.

In terms of fighting with your neighbours' signals, I definitely think Ruckus does a better job. However, if your clients and the Aruba model have 6e, and your neighbours don't, then you're golden with Aruba.

Be careful with the higher-end models within generations - quite often the "high density" models have a poorer range (because they have extra radios), which is the main thing I care about at home.

Thanks for sharing your experiences with the APs in question. Going to grab a pair of R650's given the geometry and noise issues at home unless the lower number of radios on an R550 would be a better choice? We use AP-515's and 535's at work, but our office is a very open single story and we have no neighbors within ~ 100 yards of our building.

Edit: though looking on eBay, I can get R650's cheaper than R550's in most cases but there are a handful of R550's at the same price (just under $400)

 

[ms264556]

Thanks for sharing your experiences with the APs in question. Going to grab a pair of R650's given the geometry and noise issues at home unless the lower number of radios on an R550 would be a better choice?

Sorry, I haven't tested the performance of R550s or R750s. If R750s prices were in the same ballpark as the others then this is the one I'd personally buy (assuming the huge size isn't an issue). It should perform best, and should hold its value best.

For sure if you buy R750 but decide they're too big then I'm happy to pay the price difference + my half of the postage to swap with R650s .

 

[LodeRunner]

Sorry, I haven't tested the performance of R550s or R750s. If R750s prices were in the same ballpark as the others then this is the one I'd personally buy (assuming the huge size isn't an issue). It should perform best, and should hold its value best.

For sure if you buy R750 but decide they're too big then I'm happy to pay the price difference + my half of the postage to swap with R650s .

Yeah right now looks like the cheapest I can get a R750 (used) is $150-180 more than a new-in-box R650 ~$390). Or NIB R750 for $595. Looks like the R750 is only a half inch bigger in each dimension than a R650 which won't make a difference for that choice; and the UAP-AC-PRO is 7.74" across, so the R750 would take less than 2" more space.

 

[ms264556]

Oh wow. That's a big difference in price.
I don't think I'd spend ~$200 more for the R750.

 

[NablaSquaredG]

Is Wifi6 a hard requirement?

If not, you could get yourself a bunch of R710s. They're available for very little money and are probably the best Wifi 5 APs you can buy.

Another option: TP-LINK Omada. That stuff seems to be really solid, especially given their price point.

 

[ms264556]

Is Wifi6 a hard requirement?

If not, you could get yourself a bunch of R710s. They're available for very little money and are probably the best Wifi 5 APs you can buy.

Definitely Ruckus WiFi 5 stuff has better range and reliability than any non-Ruckus WiFi 6 APs I've tried.

The R650 outperforms the R710 by enough to be noticeable, and will have a few more years of software updates, so if there's not too much of a price premium then I'd buy the R650.

Another option: TP-LINK Omada. That stuff seems to be really solid, especially given their price point.

I would have recommended the same, but I think you'd need more of them. Only one data point, but walking around a large bungalow and measuring throughput in the centre of each room, the HD660 had the same signal strength (and better throughput if the signal was strong) as the R600 it was replacing. But there are now little dead spots, including a bed and a corner of the garage. They're treating this as a feature - "I don't want my 11 year using the iPad in bed anyhow" - and it's still quite impressive to get almost a whole house covered with one AP. But the old R600 had objectively better coverage.

 

[NablaSquaredG]

so if there's not too much of a price premium then I'd buy the R650.

Sadly, there is. R650 is at least $300, whereas R710 are sub-$100

I would have recommended the same, but I think you'd need more of them.

I'm going to deploy a ton of EAP670 soon, so yeah, we'll see

 

[LodeRunner]

Is Wifi6 a hard requirement?

If not, you could get yourself a bunch of R710s. They're available for very little money and are probably the best Wifi 5 APs you can buy.

Another option: TP-LINK Omada. That stuff seems to be really solid, especially given their price point.

Not a hard requirement, no. I was surprised to discover that the R710 is officially supported through 2027.

My primary requirements are overall coverage, better auto-channel than my current UniFi, and best ability to handle my neighbors’ noisy APs (without going IT supervillain and intentionally blasting them off the air). 802.11ac is required, ax is desired along with good enough 5Ghz performance to completely abandon the 2.4 band for user devices.

Sadly the IoT functions are behind an expensive license on Ruckus; it’s included in Aruba and would be a nice addition to extend and stabilize my Zigbee network, which occasionally takes interference from my neighbors when their 2.4 channels get set to something other than 1/6/11 (a regular occurrence).

 

[4getIT]

If you didn't already pull the trigger on one or the other, I'd vote for Aruba. I like the Rukus antenna design, but I prefer the Aruba software. I don't know if they still advocate for single-channel environments, but that used to be a thing Rukus preferred and I'm opinionated and cranky about that .

Whatever AP you end up buying, The best advice I can give you is to go find the setting to turn off all the lights when you are done. A pretty big AP can blend into the background as long as it isn't constantly blinking (especially in the dark).

I'm running an Aruba 515 in my house, and other than one RF shadow from my furnace, I've got awesome coverage. I picked up an Aruba iap 303h (hospitality AC-wave2 AP with multiple local switch ports) to add as a second wired IAP in a cluster, but I just never bothered to install it. I had an Aruba IAP 225 before my 515 and just upgraded for the AX.

If you do go Aruba, here are the gotchya's that I know of: You'll need to pick up their annoying custom serial cable that looks like a micro-USB cable, but isn't. You'll also need to be careful about which mounting bracket you buy. If you get the flat ceiling mount (like I did) you'll want to be careful which hole pattern is on the one you end up with as there are two. I went with the one with more holes for more options. I also ended up Drimmeling a cut-out into my bracket to run the Eth cable through.

Good luck :-D

 

[ms264556]

I notice Ruckus have put a bunch of material online for their new Ruckus Blue line of APs.

It looks like they're intended to be cheaper than existing APs - the OS functionality is simplified somewhat vs Unleashed, and capacity limits are lower.

So it might be possible soon to get a new Ruckus RB200 (R510 equivalent?) or RB220 (R650 equivalent?) for a price which is competitive with other brands.

 

[LodeRunner]

I notice Ruckus have put a bunch of material online for their new Ruckus Blue line of APs.

It looks like they're intended to be cheaper than existing APs - the OS functionality is simplified somewhat vs Unleashed, and capacity limits are lower.

So it might be possible soon to get a new Ruckus RB200 (R510 equivalent?) or RB220 (R650 equivalent?) for a price which is competitive with other brands.

Definitely interesting looking. They mention a lack of IPv6, is that on the management side, but the PHY would still pass IPv6 traffic? Still haven't pulled the trigger, other things consuming my budget at the moment and the UniFi still works (I almost wish one of the APs would go on the fritz to justify reordering the budget).

 

[ghost792]

Another option: TP-LINK Omada. That stuff seems to be really solid, especially given their price point.

TP-Link Omadas are nice, but we’ve had some issues with them working properly in scenarios with multiple APs and iPhones and iPads. My understanding is there is some issue with MTU, but the Omadas don’t let you make changes to the setting.

 

[hmw]

If you do buy the Ruckus R750s from eBay - just be careful. I picked up three, two of which worked perfectly. The third one loses heartbeat intermittently on Unleashed and drops out - cannot diagnose why. It's definitely a hardware issue and the eBay seller refused a refund.

 

[unmesh]

Sadly, there is. R650 is at least $300, whereas R710 are sub-$100

Would R710s coexist with R600s, all running Unleashed?

 

[NablaSquaredG]

Would R710s coexist with R600s, all running Unleashed?

R600? Probably not, I think the unleashed for R600 is ancient.

R650s? Yes. As long as you have the APs on the same unleashed release train, they will work together (e.g. R710 and R650)

 

[ms264556]

Would R710s coexist with R600s, all running Unleashed?

Install Unleashed 200.7 (or whatever version your R600s run) on the R710 and it will work fine with your R600s.

 

[ms264556]

R600? Probably not, I think the unleashed for R600 is ancient.

R650s? Yes. As long as you have the APs on the same unleashed release train, they will work together (e.g. R710 and R650)

For my home, R600 + R710 (on Unleashed 200.7 or ZD 10.5.1) worked better than R710 + R650.

Our WiFi 6 capable phones would always choose a poor connection to the R650 even if their WiFi was enabled while we stood beside the R710. I know you can disable WiFi 6 in the AP settings now, which I assume would fix this, but I haven't tried.