Max number of wireless clients

Derelict

Routinely have 150+ on a Ruckus 7372. WPA2.

Guest

Thanks Mr.D

I see the Ruckus on fleabay @$350-400. Is there any additional fees/subscription required?

Do you know what the POE voltage and wattage required is for the POE input?

Why a gig-E port and 10/100 port. Is the slower just for admin features or both do uplink?

RP-TNC for antennas?

Derelict

No. The AP will run in standalone without any additional costs. Though you lose the benefit of the controller. (My example is representative of a single, controller-based AP so the controller benefit is minimal)

Not sure why they chose 10/100 for the second port. It's typically used to provide wired access where an AP is. Not for management/uplink.

I don't believe the APs require PoE+. www.ruckuswireless.com will know for sure.

All internal antennas. Just run with it. BeamFlex is pretty sweet. The main concern is usually keeping co-channel signal from other APs, not propagating further.

jahonix

@Phishfry:

Do you know what the POE voltage and wattage required is for the POE input?

It's all in the specs for everyone to read: http://www.ruckuswireless.com/products/zoneflex-indoor/zoneflex-7372-7352#specs

DC Input: 12 VDC 1.0A
Power over Ethernet 802.3 af

Have a look at their R500 AP which does AC for the same money. Both are two-stream MIMO 2x2:2 devices

Make sure to read Ruckus' TechTalk section to understand what they are doing and why (pretty interesting!):
http://www.ruckuswireless.com/technology/beamflex
http://www.ruckuswireless.com/whitepapers

Guest

Kind of blown away with serving 150 connections with an internal antenna. Then only 7.5 watts@48V as well. Very impressive. So Cisco merkaki is a direct competitor?

Guest

I see they are using Atheros AR9160 inside this model:
http://electronics360.globalspec.com/article/3622/ruckus-zoneflex-7762-wireless-access-point-teardown

Derelict

@Phishfry:

Kind of blown away with serving 150 connections with an internal antenna. Then only 7.5 watts@48V as well. Very impressive. So Cisco merkaki is a direct competitor?

Not really. ;)

Aruba maybe.

jahonix

Aruba was just bought by HP. Down they go…

Current ranking (at least within the US and as far as I heard) currently is
#1 Aruba
#2 Cisco
#3 Ruckus

FWIW

Guest

Back to the topic. I have been researching this max internal Atheros radio users issue and can't find anything solid. One of the Atheros modules i recommend is an Apple Airport Extreme AR5BXB112 radio. When i look at Apples AP numbers they say 100 users. Do you think pfSense would work with that large a number as an access point? No conjecture please.

How could i test without 100 friends with laptops?

Maybe do a large gathering and setup a hotspot? Serving bandwidth would be cellular and not ideal with this method…

Derelict

pfSense DOES NOT CARE how many users are on an AP. It's all layer 2.

You are simply crazy if you want to use wireless adapters in pfSense for all but the most pedestrian of Wi-Fi access. Get an AP.

Regarding testing, you're getting to the numbers where if people expect it to work, and it doesn't, you look like an ass.

Your best bet would be to find a place where wi-fi isn't expected, advertise its availability, and give them something for their feedback. Depends on how badly you really want to know how well it works.

I, personally, cannot see hanging a pfSense from the ceiling where a high-density AP belongs in all but the highest-density, open space scenarios.