Help me build my pfsense box please!
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I also second Ubiquity. I have UAP-PRO, UAP, and UAP-LR. Recommended to me here in the past, and they work marvelously. The LR is real-ly LR ;D
It does 150 meter with 100% connection quality according to Windows 7, on a Lenovo T420. Download speed wired for this VDSL is 50 Mb/s, @ 150 meter it drops to 32 Mb/s.
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I haven't had any LR units fail. I suspect that most people who are using them and reporting problems aren't using them properly though and assume they're defective. The most likely issue you'd experience is that many clients have no connectivity even though they're well within the rated range and report a mid-level signal. What they don't understand is that there are two sides to the conversation and that it doesn't matter if the AP has a LR transmitter which the client can hear if the client device doesn't have the power to send messages back over the same distance.
How would you determine if the problem is with the client, Jason?
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@Hollander:
I haven't had any LR units fail. I suspect that most people who are using them and reporting problems aren't using them properly though and assume they're defective. The most likely issue you'd experience is that many clients have no connectivity even though they're well within the rated range and report a mid-level signal. What they don't understand is that there are two sides to the conversation and that it doesn't matter if the AP has a LR transmitter which the client can hear if the client device doesn't have the power to send messages back over the same distance.
How would you determine if the problem is with the client, Jason?
Unless you've explicitly bought a client wireless card noted for its "Long Range" abilities (read: high-powered & large antennas) you're going to have issues at the middle-to-edges of the signal area. Basically, anything without an external antenna will be flaky. You can test for this case with a specific device by running speed tests as you walk away from the AP. If you get to a point where you have 1-2 bars of "signal", which would still work fine with a "normal" AP, you'll have essentially zero throughput with the LR.
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Hey Jason,
For the wireless i just need something for 1 floor that covers up to 800-1000sqf with a good and strong signal, with the linksys E4200 with dd-wrt Im using, I just go in the bathroom 25 feet away from the router and I get 1 bar of wireless signal and it can be unstable on my galaxy phone.
I'm trying to spend as little as possible for my needs, not sure some of those pro or extreme 200$+ units are needed I dont have a house or anything overkill to cover either.
I dont need any crazy features just something durable and power efficient wireless G/N and a very good & strong radio signal that is stable and consistent!
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It's been my experience (admittedly, I haven't used it in a year or so) that DD-WRT makes things worse unless you know exactly what settings to change. If you want something simple and reliable then get an Apple AirPort. I use two, one on the 1st floor of my home and another on the second.
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I grabbed an Apple airport express for 85 bucks, I'll see how that go, about the box for pfsense, what kind of minimum cpu is needed (lowest power usage) to perform well for 50mbps openvpn traffic and basic plugins? No intense firewalling or pps or anything else needed much. Also how many gigs of ram would be ideal for it?
Is it possible to configure pfsense to have a failover/alternate vpn that it would connect to if unable to connect to the main/first?
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Intel Celeron G1610 should be do the trick. An i3-2120T, 35W if you can find it used would fit into your budget and be cool (pun intended).
2GB of ram will be more than enough.
OpenVPN is rock solid once setup properly. Point to point, mobile connections have been problem free for me. However if you feel the absolute need to have a backup, you can setup ipsec as secondary.
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Intel Celeron G1610 should be do the trick. An i3-2120T, 35W if you can find it used would fit into your budget and be cool (pun intended).
2GB of ram will be more than enough.
OpenVPN is rock solid once setup properly. Point to point, mobile connections have been problem free for me. However if you feel the absolute need to have a backup, you can setup ipsec as secondary.
Thank you very much for this quality post :)
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Unless you've explicitly bought a client wireless card noted for its "Long Range" abilities (read: high-powered & large antennas) you're going to have issues at the middle-to-edges of the signal area. Basically, anything without an external antenna will be flaky. You can test for this case with a specific device by running speed tests as you walk away from the AP. If you get to a point where you have 1-2 bars of "signal", which would still work fine with a "normal" AP, you'll have essentially zero throughput with the LR.
Thanks Jason ;D
Shouldn't the bold part be the other way around? Or do you mean 'will work fine with a "normal" AP in it's particular relatively small range'?
(What I mean is: the "normal" AP will not work fine if it is at the range of the LR, since it won't work at all there).
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What I meant was that with a normal AP you'd expect your client to be fast at 5/5 and get progressively slower until the signal drops at 0/5. With the LR AP, the client still thinks it has a decent signal at 1-2/5 but most lack a transmitter powerful enough to get data back to the AP. My example wasn't talking about absolute distance from the AP, but apparent signal strength on the client.