TP-Link wireless

[steveg]

Has anyone tried the tp-link managed wireless? Is it any good?

 

I'm looking for new wireless for home, but as cheap as possible! (I wouldn't normally consider tp link!)

 

I live in a large bungalow, with a separate annex, so need 3 ap's to cover it all. With the current sky router and 2 extra ap's (an old sky hub and a netgear ap) the roaming between points is really poor, so something managed is the way to go.

 

I'd normally go for unifi ap's but, the tp-link eap115 points are only £35 each, and the controller software is free. They are only 11n, but my broadband is only 50mb, so that should be fine. The cheapest from unifi is almost double the price.

 

 

Steve

[speakercon]

I have two of the EAP 115's at home and I'm impressed with them, considering how cheap they are. They support 802.3af which is nice. I haven't used the software I just configured them individually via the gui.

 

I actually installed one in at work not long ago in a isolated building that needed wireless for a couple of laptops and its working well.

[Norphy]

FWIW, if you want a controller based solution, TPLink is what Stone will sell you. They have installed them in several large institutions but please don’t ask me who cos I can’t remember.

 

I’ve been looking into these things myself just recently. The reservation I had against that model is that it’s 2.4ghz only. In terms of bandwidth they’re fine but when everyone and his cousin is on one of three usable channels and when you live in a densely populated area, 2.4ghz isn’t as much use unfortunately.

 

The equivalent Unifi access point is about £50 but it comes with an injector which the tplink doesn’t, you may need to factor that in as well.

[mavhc]

Is this the Omada system?

[Katy]

I've got a TPLink AP here, going to be adding a second eventually in the garage. Not used any of the managed side of it yet (as I only have one AP) but the kit seems good in general - also got a TP Link 24 port PoE switch. Can't remember which AP I have although I think it was around the £100 mark, just done a speed test and I get 270Mbps over wireless.

[LytchettNM]

We have just installed over 70 x EAP223 indoor and a few of the outdoor version not complete yet have more to install over the next few weeks.

Been testing for about 2 months and all seem good to us, on the controller side you can download the software controller, config via their webpage or theres an app for iOS.

The EAP223 V3 are 2.4 and 5 MHz and do come with a POE Injector or you can use a POE switch.

[steveg]

Thanks everyone, think I'll order 3 and give it a go!

 

Steve

[steveg]

I went for 3 of the EAP115 ap's in the end, so only 11g, but more than fast enough for what I want. So far I'm really impressed with it, I'd installed the controller software and configured it in advance, so just had to adopt the 3 ap's for them to pick up the settings. One needed an extra re-boot for some reason, but after that it's been working perfectly.

 

I only have around 15 clients on it at any one time, but it hasn't had any issues at all, roaming between points is super fast - before my phone would try to cling on to the weak signal of the previous ap, rather than jump to a stronger one nearby.

 

Steve

[mavhc]

Managed roaming is the main reason to have a controller based system, the controller can tell the client when to roam, and do it seamlessly. Roaming is the main source of wifi security problems recently though