Ruckus - Who has it? What do you think of it?

[john]

I have used Ruckus in three schools now, having just completed my latest installation with the support of @Net-Ctrl. I have never had any issues with the ruckus installation however any operating niggles have been resolved very quickly and efficiently.

 

The current install is around 30aps.

[truebluesteve]

This thread has been very useful as I spoke to Ruckus and Net-ctrl at BETT yesterday and was very interested in the kit as a replacement for our current Trapeze system. Are people using guest networks with transparent proxies sucessfully with the Ruckus equipment?

[tj2419]

Do POE switches affect the speed of wireless or do they literally just power the AP's?

 

Cheers

[RTFM]

The speed of the switch is what will impact on the speed (100/1000 or 10/100 etc). The PoE bit I wouldnt have thought would have impact on the speed, it just represents it will do power over ethernet (someone will correct me if im wrong i'm sure!).

 

We put in some gig PoE switches and its been brilliant.

[RTFM]

This thread has been very useful as I spoke to Ruckus and Net-ctrl at BETT yesterday and was very interested in the kit as a replacement for our current Trapeze system. Are people using guest networks with transparent proxies sucessfully with the Ruckus equipment?

 

Yes we have Ruckus, transparent proxies and guest networks / BYOD networks BYOD actually pushes to an SSL login page, the Guest network though is transparent.

 

We've just recently started reception giving out auth codes to the guest network and its extremely simple through the ruckus guest pass page.

[RTFM]

How does it match up to Aerohive solution does anyone have the data on this as I am looking into Aerohive at this moment for a meeting next week, reasons for this solution rather than Ruckus is that I don't fancy a H/W cntroller which should it go down would leave the school with no wireless

 

I've never looked into Aerhive but wouldnt the same thing happen if your internet went down and you had a cloud based controller?

 

I believe (and i could be wrong as this is from memory) if your ZD goes down already connected clients will continue to work but any new clients wont.

[Asgard]

How big is your ruckus install? 62 APs

How reliable is it? It just works. Its on and ignored. Ran happily now since Dec2009 with no issues.

 

How many devices you have on it?

Erm a hard one, we have around 300ish college devices (Laptops,MacBooks,some iPads) the we also have it serving our student BYOD setup.

 

Largest concurrent total to date was 724, but on average about 500 a day.

 

Any problems you have had? None

 

Did you self install or get a third party to install? Installed by Nexgen Solutions.

 

BYOD

We have 2 (3 if you include our soon to be added EduRoam) SSIDs - a college protected one which only my department know the WPA2 key for - this SSID is hidden and only used for our college owned devices.

 

We then have a second SSID which is for our BYOD - the ruckus controller has an access rule on it that says anyone that connects to this SSID can only connect to a dedicated Microsoft TMG proxy on 8080 - they totally separated off and cannot see anything else on our LAN (I.e domain controllers etc) - they authenticate with an Active Directory username and password , et voila they can browse the web :-)

 

We only allow web browsing via our BYOD, but from this they can actually launch a VDI via our remote access if they wish.

 

It's been running since December 2009 and we haven't had a single issue with it.

[funkymunky]

I've never looked into Aerhive but wouldnt the same thing happen if your internet went down and you had a cloud based controller?

 

I believe (and i could be wrong as this is from memory) if your ZD goes down already connected clients will continue to work but any new clients wont.

 

Already associated clients will stay connected however no new clients can connect. Also, the APs will reboot after not being able to speak to the ZD for 20 minutes as part of an attempted recovery process (and if the ZD is still down when it comes back up it won't provide any wireless service until it comes back or it finds another). The new ZD code (9.5) which came out this week lets you disable or change this timeout value. In this scenario though Ruckus will suggest you purchase a backup controller...

Edited February 2, 2013 by funkymunky

[funkymunky]

How does it match up to Aerohive solution does anyone have the data on this as I am looking into Aerohive at this moment for a meeting next week, reasons for this solution rather than Ruckus is that I don't fancy a H/W cntroller which should it go down would leave the school with no wireless,

 

I also have the single point of failure covered for the cloud controller which Aerohive would use so all in all I would welcome any constructive data on Aerohive V Ruckus,

 

I have looked into Meraki also and it was a viable solution until Cisco decided to purchase it and this has put me off since their last aquisition of a product ended in that product being taken off the market.

 

Thanks in advance

 

Reality is that both Ruckus and Aerohive will do the job you want *if* the network is designed and installed correctly. 802.11 is very complex and although all the vendors have various features to try and simplify deployment, radio resource management etc. - if the APs are installed in the wrong place, they're in the wrong place no matter who the vendor (some will tell you otherwise though). A good Ruckus AP (7363, 7982 etc.) will give an excellent coverage area and you'll see a better download signal to a client than upload due to their dynamic beam-forming (which is fine in lots of networks as clients download more than they upload) however if you're network needs to be built for capacity rather than coverage (as you've got high concentrations of stations in the same areas requiring a lot of bandwidth each) then some of the Ruckus benefit is lost (that's not to say it won't work). Ruckus also have a feature called ChannelFly which uses statistical modelling of real world throughput to predict the best channel each AP should be on and will react to sudden throughput issues e.g. when someone/thing introduces a new source of interference. Again this can be very useful however one of the downsides is that each AP changes channel quite often, especially while it's in the initial learning stage (this problem can be mitigated if the clients support channel switch announcements).

 

Build your list of requirements and take them to a recommended, reputable 802.11 network design company, they'll be able to then design you a sound system that will perform as required.

 

As for the controller being a single point of failure, it is but you can have a redundant unit running alongside the primary. If cost of the second unit is an issue point this out to your reseller and tell them it's potentially a deal breaker for you going with a competitor, you'd be surprised how creative they can become with pricing (and this goes for all vendors, not just Ruckus).

 

Although Meraki have a potentially good cloud management platform (depending on your needs) the radios don't perform particularly well in all the reputable testing I've seen. The MR24 was one of (if not) the first 3x3:3 enterprise AP on the market and it looks like they possibly rushed it and it's been slated in various reviews. Having said that some people are 'apparently' using them happily in high density scenarios.... (although that info came from someone trying to sell me Meraki kit!).

Edited February 2, 2013 by funkymunky

[jtotheb]

Havn't used Ruckus but haved used the Cisco kit which I wouldn't recommend.

 

What Cisco kit were you using? We use a WISM with a WCS Server and I've found it as sound as a pound.

[glennda]

What Cisco kit were you using? We use a WISM with a WCS Server and I've found it as sound as a pound.

 

it was a controller based wireless access system, the model i cannot remember as i've left there now. It was half that it was setup badly (not by me) but also that it didn't have the throughput for what was specced before (again not by me!!)