Wifi access point advice

[DrStein99]

I am beginning to use these WIFI switches, relays, and other devices in home. I use a Sophos UTM for the firewall / router. Currently using a Netgear WNDR4500 for WIFI.

I believe I should probably have WIFI access points through the house, instead of just one unit. The lady decides to dust and not put the power cord back in, or any other stupid reason makes this shut off.

I am a bit of an intermediate when it comes to WIFI access points. I would like to get signal all over the house, inside and out without buying (1) $1,000 device that can just be unplugged (accidentally or otherwise) and shut down. Ideally, I like a few of cheap devices - with all the same SSID and password that I can grant or bypass access to my lan at my firewall/router level.

Is this done through access points ? Because now if I change anything, then my WIFI switch and relay devices go bezerk and I have to open the ceiling up and manually reset and initialize all this - which is a huge drag.

 

[LodeRunner]

With multiple APs and same SSID, you'll want coordination. Ruckus Unleashed, Ubiquiti UniFi, etc. is what you should be looking at. Or for simple mesh: Plume, Eero, Netgear Orbi. There's also TP-Link Omada, but I have no experience with them. Centrally managed settings and they (usually) do proper channel coordination to keep interference down.

If stuff is in your ceiling and you can run ethernet, go with PoE powered APs. Much harder to accidentally unplug Ethernet cables without doing serious damage to them or the device, and if you need to reboot it, you just unplug the injector or toggle the switch port (if you have a PoE switch).

Trying to manage the configuration of multiple devices doing the same thing is a great way to annoy yourself greatly.

 

[pod]

If you're a Costco member the tp-link deco M9 3 pack is $160, should cover a wide area for a very reasonable price. I do not have experience with these but reviews there are mostly positive.

 

[DrStein99]

Centrally managed settings and they (usually) do proper channel coordination to keep interference down.

Yes. I plan to do that through my firewall router. I believe the firewall needs dedicated ethernet ports for each access point. I keep getting stuck when I change wifi router to "AP MODE", then being able to console into it to do a management interface so I can test between that and my firewall router. I am shopping for a test POE wifi AP to test with, looks like plenty of cheap slow used 2.4g stuff.

If stuff is in your ceiling and you can run ethernet, go with PoE powered APs.

Yes. I have the POE switch and a highway of wires all over. I have to play fun games with wattages and cable lengths when I suspect in my future the limit to the # of devices and / length my switch will handle and the cost of upgrades of course. Home networking can be evil to the bank at times.

Trying to manage the configuration of multiple devices doing the same thing is a great way to annoy yourself greatly.

I am easily annoyed by a lot of things. Computer work is one of the areas which actually provide some type of reward from time to time.

 

[coxhaus]

The Cisco small business wireless APs are nice and stable. I have run these for years at home. They have free software firmware updates and do not require a controller as the controller in built-in. You configure 1 unit and just join the other APs. They are easy to setup.

They support VLANs if you want to go that route. I use a VLAN for my wireless guest LAN.