Paxton Net2 Pro - any known annoyances/design issues from an IT POV?

[pete]

We may be using Paxton to control maglocks, rfid entry/exit on external gates around the school site and buzz in/out audio systems for visitors.

 

I've poked around the Paxton website and there's a few things that've triggered my spidey sense, so.....

 

Paxton appear to really prefer you to run it on Win7/8 - I'm assuming this is just their 1st/2nd line lacking experience with server installs?

 

What resources have you allocated to the VM running it? How much of their "optimal spec" (Quad, 8 GB RAM) does it actually use day-to-day?

 

Edit: Follow-up question while I remember - I'm thinking of Mifare tokens for the flexibility in form factor (card, fob, sticker) and easy availability - am I missing out on anything by not using Paxton tokens?

 

Any other strange caveats you can think of?

Edited April 25, 2017 by pete

[localzuk]

Its running on Server 2008 R2 here without issues.

 

Ours is on a physical box, as we have some of the RS485 loop stuff on our setup, and therefore have a serial connection into the server. The server in question is an old one that we had lying around. Dual E5440, 16GB RAM. We have about 35 doors on it and the CPU averages at 0% and RAM at 4GB used.

[free780]

I couldn't see anyway of using AD though I'm not using the pro version.

[localzuk]

I couldn't see anyway of using AD though I'm not using the pro version.

What do you mean using AD? It doesn't integrate with the network beyond being on a PC on the network. Users are manually created within the system.

[localzuk]

Edit: Follow-up question while I remember - I'm thinking of Mifare tokens for the flexibility in form factor (card, fob, sticker) and easy availability - am I missing out on anything by not using Paxton tokens?

Paxton's own (Hitag 2 based) tags come in multiple forms too - Plain white ISO, White ISO with magstripe, Self Adhesive Disc, Keyfobs, Clamshell cards, and wrist straps, plus long range fobs.

 

However, the big difference is price. Mifare are a lot cheaper IIRC.

[mavhc]

It's software written by hardware people, so it's pretty janky, and probably terrible insecure. I bet half the installations have the default obvious password

[TechieWils]

You can use Mifare cards you just need to use the correct readers, I believe my old place used HID readers. You can import the users via CSV. We used to run it on an old windows pc with two NIC's as we had the Paxton stuff on it's own VLAN.

 

I did have it on a server at another place though and it was happy enough.

 

The only issue was if you used the builtin card creator you could never bulk print the cards.

 

Personally loved Paxton and would recommend.

[Linfit]

We have it running fine on a Server 2008r2 VM, been running for 5+ years now no issues. Its got 4 cores, 8GB Ram allocated and its fine. We are running the pro version, with 45 controllers plus 2 additional readers for the car park gate and signing in. CPU usage rarely above 15%, usually much less. It isn't AD aware, at least not our version, but maintenance is straightforward enough. We use the paxton keyfobs, as thats what was given to us, (system was installed as part of a newbuild) but haven't seen much need to change them - if we were starting from scratch I'd probably us the cheaper Mifare as well.

[Boredguy]

We have the paxton software running on a Windows 2012r2 server happily, and the client runs on Windows 7 and Windows 10 fine for making changes since it's mainly via .Net framework.

 

The readers we have also work happily with our impro RFID tags that we use for our external gate as well as the normal paxton/mifare chips

[free780]

I just thought its to do with identity AD integration seemed obvious. Disable AD account=deny access to building.

[Edu-IT]

http://www.net2-solutions.com/en/products/

 

Good for linking to AD.

[Michael]

You can't install version 5 on a DC; sometimes problematic for smaller schools where they may have only one server.

 

You need to configure your controllers with static IPs, otherwise it doesn't always come back after a power cut.

 

I've installed on physical/virtual servers, no problems at all.

[pete]

Net2 Solutions - Net2-solutions paxton Net2 Product Overview

 

Good for linking to AD.

 

That looks interesting, I've given them a nudge for pricing. I'll still need to assign tokens, but being able to set an account expiry in AD and have Paxton use it would be useful.

[caffrey]

I had a slight issue with the software on a new Hyper-V VM the other day (I'd moved the VM from one server to another) I'd recommend not using dynamic memory and sticking to 2 cpu's - It was spiking at 99% cpu all the time, it's settled down now to using next to nothing

[deano3693]

How are people affording a paxton system. We got quoted for this and it was approx £5,000 per door!!!! Or are people buying the kit themselves and doing a self install?

[MartinRouterKing]

How are people affording a paxton system. We got quoted for this and it was approx £5,000 per door!!!! Or are people buying the kit themselves and doing a self install?

 

Wow! Who is quoting that much? The Paxton net 2 is £380 to buy. Mag lock is about £60 if not less exit button about £20 and break glass about the same and then probs about £50 for your fire engineer to put a normally closed link in!

[victory2015]

we use net2 pro here and have it integrated with our cunningham's cashless catering system which pulls users from sims, so we print the cards for member staff in idstore and it drops the cards mifare id into net2 pro automatically , in idstore i can assign staff and visitor passes net2 access rights. works well!

[victory2015]

How are people affording a paxton system. We got quoted for this and it was approx £5,000 per door!!!! Or are people buying the kit themselves and doing a self install?

 

ouch!!! quote for one door when we had an extra one done was around £1100

[deano3693]

Hi,

 

Yes i've just revisited our quote was £5,600 for 5 doors so approx £1,100 per door. Is this about the going rate then?

 

I'd love the system but have never been able to convince everyone of £5,600's worth of benefit!!!!!!

 

I love the idea of intergrating with cashless catering as well as we use ID Store.

 

Regards,

Dean.

[Edu-IT]

Hi,

 

Yes i've just revisited our quote was £5,600 for 5 doors so approx £1,100 per door. Is this about the going rate then?

 

I'd love the system but have never been able to convince everyone of £5,600's worth of benefit!!!!!!

 

I love the idea of intergrating with cashless catering as well as we use ID Store.

 

Regards,

Dean.

If you are having 5 doors done at once I'd expect some reduction on labour. If parts for each door are about £500 I wouldn't be paying £600 labour per door.

 

Depends on the doors though and whether they need any adjustments in terms of existing fittings etc.

Edited April 26, 2017 by Edu-IT

[snagrat]

Anyone running Paxton from a server hosted in, say, Azure?

 

Just wondered if it would allow MATs to control doors across all sites from one Net2 install

[caffrey]

Those fitting yourselves (Looking at doing this myself over summer) Does this affect insurance in any way ? Especially linking to the fire system ? If anyone is considering doing it themselves I believe the Paxton training is free although it does look like a relatively simple system to fit.

[deano3693]

Those fitting yourselves (Looking at doing this myself over summer) Does this affect insurance in any way ? Especially linking to the fire system ? If anyone is considering doing it themselves I believe the Paxton training is free although it does look like a relatively simple system to fit.

 

If you do do it yourself can you post based on how you get on as i may look at having a look at doing it ourselves.

[Edu-IT]

Those fitting yourselves (Looking at doing this myself over summer) Does this affect insurance in any way ? Especially linking to the fire system ? If anyone is considering doing it themselves I believe the Paxton training is free although it does look like a relatively simple system to fit.

I doubt it in the same way that fitting a lock to a door wouldn't? As long as its compliant in that it has break glass for emergency etc. A certified person will be doing the fire alarm integration part?

[caffrey]

Fire relays are already fitted to the doors here so the certified part is done, it's just a pair of wires that is normally closed, so for fire purposes :-

 

paxton 12v ----- break glass (NC) ----------fire relay (NC) ----------------- Maglock

paxton Common ----------|-----------------------|-------------------------------|

 

If the break glass \ fire relay go to open then it simply just cuts the power to the Maglock, I think that's how it all works

 

I'm just trying to figure out how to make the above tidy!

 

Going a tad OT here though