Need Wi-fi AP recommendation for ICHQ Detroit

primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' BoopinDetroit, MI Icrontian
edited August 2012 in Hardware
The new ICHQ is approximately 4000 sq.ft, three floors, without ductwork. We need something that will hold up to the 35-50 guests we get during parties, using mobile devices, etc.

We've had consumer routers in the past and they all take a shit when more than 10 people are using them.

We now have an old Proxim Orinoco that is 802.11 a/b. It's old and it peaks out around 10mb/s, but we need to upgrade to something more robust as this thing is not going to cover the space we need covered.

Any suggestions? I'm guessing that 802.11 ac / n will have the extended range we need.

Comments

  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    edited August 2012
    If I were you, I'd probably just build a pfSense box, put a good solid wireless card in it and get a set of high-gain antennas for it. A low-power Atom system would give you plenty of resources to do what you need.

    EDIT: One of my coworkers got this and uses it for a home server/router setup: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816101364 He likes it quite a bit. You would just need to get a solid PCI express wifi card for it.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    We do have a terribly overpowered smoothwall box... I wonder if we can turn that into an AP as well..
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    Brian, the E4200 I have is WiFi b/g/n (Comcast and Best Buy rate it for business use) and is rated to handle up to 50 simultaneous connects and media stream prioritizes. Extender boxes might be decent for AP use, for second and third floor, one each, in the long run. Best Buy has the E4200 if you want to try one for ICOK. Also, Cisco has an extender/expander pretty cheap for n access, but your pinch point might be your Comcast pipe not piping internal to house routing.

    WiFi n will be hugely faster than your Proxim a/b box, natively.
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    primesuspect said:

    We do have a terribly overpowered smoothwall box... I wonder if we can turn that into an AP as well..

    Probably yes, limitedly. Set it up as a throughput to WiFi extenders with extra NICs in it, or put WiFi NICs in it and add external antennas to those.

  • RyanMMRyanMM Ferndale, MI Icrontian
    edited August 2012
    @Primesuspect, I'll sponsor Icrontic wifi through ICOK. I'd love to see how some of my hardware handles that kind of load; my biggest deploys have been restaurants and businesses with between 20-40 simultaneous devices, so I would love to see if they can scale past 50 without blinking.
    Annes
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    We're not gonna have 50 people for ICOK this year though. It won't be any different from your normal installs.
  • RyanMMRyanMM Ferndale, MI Icrontian
    edited August 2012
    Gotcha.
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    @RyanMM, let's talk. I need APs for our 1000,000 sq ft warehouse.
  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    primesuspect said:

    We do have a terribly overpowered smoothwall box... I wonder if we can turn that into an AP as well..

    The issue I would have with Smoothwall is that it hasn't been updated in over a year (last SP came out in June 2011) whereas pfSense has been doing a decent job of keeping up with BSD releases (last pfSense release was in April). Also, it looks like Smoothwall was designed solely to be a firewall, whereas pfSense has been designed to be a router/firewall.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    I shall check into pfsense. Thank you!
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    Ended up with the Asus RT-AC66U as the Wi-fi AP. Thanks for the help, everyone!
  • ZuntarZuntar North Carolina Icrontian
    @primesuspect is it up and running yet? opinions?
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited August 2012
    I'm very interested in hearing your experiences with this router, B.
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    So far, so good. Even when I had it in the basement, it reached out onto the front porch (I forget if you've been to ICHQ II yet or not). I moved it upstairs and I can get a strong signal even out in the street. No load test yet, however.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    My first time will be Oktoberfest! I can't wait, omg the place will look SO AWESOME.
Sign In or Register to comment.