Reliable WIFI for apple Products

[Mrpower]

Hello

I am looking to upgrade our WIFI, I am looking at Unifi AP AC Pro units and I was wondering who has the best access point with an emphasis on connectability and reliability with Apple products?

[kidpressingbuttons]

Had a full apple environment in the past running brilliantly all on Unifi AC Pros- current site has around 120 ipads all running well on the same APs

[XiJ]

We’ve Run many unifi AC-lites in our primary’s with no problems.

[Guest Guest]

We installed 5 AP-AC-LRs in our refurb last summer its working really well and we're installing them school wide this summer. We're a small special school

[emdrum]

It's not necessarily the access points that you need to worry about. iPads are aimed at the domestic market and as such will "hang on" to a wi-fi signal from an AP even if they can barely see it and you are standing next to a much better AP. This is because in a domestic environment you don't want them trying to hop onto your neighbour's Wi-Fi, you want them to stay attached to your home router, but in a school this is a disadvantage.

 

What you need is a controller that will look at the signal from the AP and if it gets weak, bounce the iPad off that AP onto another one with a better signal. The controller has to do this because the AP cannot tell what other APs the iPad can see. There are controllers from Fortinet (Meru) and Ruckus that we have tested and manage this well, and some other manufacturers, but most Wi-Fi is intended for an office environment where people stay broadly in the same place - completely unlike a school.

 

We regularly have 1,300+ devices on a campus-wide network covering five sites and it's fine.

[synaesthesia]

As above, unifi is almost a no-brainer solution for this purpose - depending entirely on budget though, a couple of grand on unifi points and setup would be nearer 30k on Ruckus.

[Sonic007]

Im planning on replacing all my old meru kit with Ubiquiti Pro access points.

[mcolbourn]

Im planning on replacing all my old meru kit with Ubiquiti Pro access points.

 

We replaced Meru a few years back with AC-Lites and LR's and never looked back. I even use a UDM at home.

[Mrpower]

It's not necessarily the access points that you need to worry about. iPads are aimed at the domestic market and as such will "hang on" to a wi-fi signal from an AP even if they can barely see it and you are standing next to a much better AP. This is because in a domestic environment you don't want them trying to hop onto your neighbour's Wi-Fi, you want them to stay attached to your home router, but in a school this is a disadvantage.

 

What you need is a controller that will look at the signal from the AP and if it gets weak, bounce the iPad off that AP onto another one with a better signal. The controller has to do this because the AP cannot tell what other APs the iPad can see. There are controllers from Fortinet (Meru) and Ruckus that we have tested and manage this well, and some other manufacturers, but most Wi-Fi is intended for an office environment where people stay broadly in the same place - completely unlike a school.

 

We regularly have 1,300+ devices on a campus-wide network covering five sites and it's fine.

 

I work in an SEN school were the pupils tend to use iPads in one area / classroom and don't move around with the iPads that much. There are some pupils who move from classroom to classroom with their iPads. The majority of pupils tend to stick to their classrooms or the iPads are kept in their classrooms. Staff tend to move around more with their laptops.