Open Mesh??? Is it as good as they claim

[five.five-six]

I have never even heard of Open Mesh before so i am looking to see if anyone here has ever used it. I have a specific application (retail building that needs a secured internal SSID for employees and an open "internet only" guest SSID with multiple Aps to cover ~ 8Ksqft. I am just looking for some feedback before I roll this solution out.

[five.five-six]

link:

http://www.open-mesh.com/index.php/om2p-us.html

[zenmastar]

No experience, but reading the product description, I would favor Aruba's Instant APs over this for you needs. Such as the 105.

AP-105s give you 2x2 and two spatial streams. Plus Aruba's roaming support is very good.

Open mesh spec makes no mention of this that I can find. Looks like a cheap chinese AP that you can pick up from dealextreme.com or ahappydeal.com to me.

[five.five-six]

UM, yea, but at $500 each, I am a luxel dealer and with Vlan router, I can do the same thing for a lot less. I am trying to do this entire portion of the project for about the price of a single 105.

[ExtremeX]

I have played with open-mesh APs in the past but never really got too into it.

I have used and installed this product in a small office / warehouse before. I like Ubiquity products, affordable and good quality.

http://www.ubnt.com/unifi

Hardware is pretty cheap, software is included, easy to use and setup plus it scales and can do what you need it to.

[ExtremeX]

3 pack for $200, or 69 each

http://www.streakwave.com/Itemdesc.asp?ic=UAP%2D3%2DUS

I buy a lot of crap from Streakwave too, good company.

[five.five-six]

3 pack for $200, or 69 each

http://www.streakwave.com/Itemdesc.asp?ic=UAP%2D3%2DUS

I buy a lot of crap from Streakwave too, good company.

Can they do multiple SSIDs? One for guest internet and another for employee internet/LAN?

[ExtremeX]

Can they do multiple SSIDs? One for guest internet and another for employee internet/LAN?

Absolutely… up to 4 SSID and support for VLAN IDs.

Read for more details.

http://dl.ubnt.com/datasheets/unifi/UniFi_AP_Datasheet.pdf

http://dl.ubnt.com/guides/UniFi/UniFi_AP-Pro_UG.pdf

http://wiki.ubnt.com/UniFi_FAQ

There is also detailed information on guest access portal type setups in the links above.

[five.five-six]

So, I will need a vlan router to do what I want to tag the SSIDs?

[ExtremeX]

VLANs are optional… it just supports VLAN tagging on each SSID.

The way you implement this and set it up is going to also depend on what type of security you need. I haven’t done it the way you are trying to do it. I ALWAYS have a firewall/router used to control access policy and to provide network services per subnet.

I segregate the private and guest network using a firewall capable of creating multiple subnets. This is now protected and separated at the firewall level with two sets of users on two completely different networks. … Guest network would then have its own separate DHCP server for example; nothing is shared with the private network. Not even the gateway address of the private network even though they use the same internet connection.

For more simple installations like a coffee shop for example… the guest portal should segregate traffic by default, the access point is now responsible for the security. It’s an option on the device, “guest isolation mode”, “Restricted Subnets”… options should be under admin settings / access control… But I haven’t setup this product in that manner; I have used it for larger installations for coverage / repeater use.

There are a lot of setup options for this kinda stuff; you should really go through the user guide to get an idea of how its setup and what it’s capable of.

Here is something that you should read.

http://forum.ubnt.com/showthread.php?t=51328

[five.five-six]

I could not get them to buy a firewall

[zenmastar]

UM, yea, but at $500 each, I am a luxel dealer and with Vlan router, I can do the same thing for a lot less. I am trying to do this entire portion of the project for about the price of a single 105.

You really cannot as the open-mesh AP cannot compare to the features of Aruba's AP-105. Check out their datasheet and notice they never use "WiFi"? This is because their AP does not meet 802.11n minimal WiFI qualifications although their datasheet claims it does. There are more red flags on their data sheet but I am sure you will not read the details of what I explain more than this paragraph.

The Unifi products look good and are a decent subset of Aruba's. Prices are comparable to Aruba's though. You may not think so when comparing a lesser Unifi AP to an Aruba AP.

If you do not have serous requirements of roaming or managing interference from WiFi RF and other RF sources, Unifi should do you well.

Hire a pro is the best advice I can give you.

[Bryansix]

If they want the separate guest SSID to be "Internet Only" then they will need either VLANS some other convoluted solution that VLANS would be much better then.

[five.five-six]

Well, I rolled it out today, I bought 3 nodes but only implemented 2 of them, the range is amazing. That part of the contract was to cover ~8k sq ft of office space with 2 SSIDs, I am covering the entire 20,000 sq ft warehouse too. I am using it to focus IP 4 megapixel cameras over 150 feet from the closest node.... that's something.

[five.five-six]

I have implemented several of these nodes and I am really happy with them. The range is good, remote management, mesh network. And it is all white box.