Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This is a 802.11n Wireless Access Point. It is used to provide Wifi in a home or office. The unit is aesthetically beautiful, and could easily pass for a high end smoke detector. It includes a single LED Ring light that shows whether the unit is offline or online, and can be mounted on the wall or on the ceiling. The LED can be disabled if you need to. Power is delivered to the unit using the Ethernet cable, and a Power Over Ethernet Injector is included in the box. I've tested a number of Wifi access points and routers over the years from Linksys and Netgear, and this is, by far, my favorite. Here's why: 1. Range: The range on these things is incredible. With Linksys and Netgear APs, I'd have trouble covering my whole house. This covers my entire house on LOW POWER. 2. Adjustable Power: You can adjust the power level from 1db through 20db. A Long Range version is available that can go up to 27db. Note: A bug in the firmware allows you to set the power output at 0 db, but this appears to cause it to default to 20db. 3. Linking: You can buy and link as many of these devices as you want. There's no limit to the number of AP's that can be linked via Ethernet cable. On top of that, each Unifi that is plugged into Ethernet can be extended by FOUR Unifis that are not plugged into an Ethernet cable, by wirelessly repeating the signal. 4. More Linking: In addition, a Unifi that is linked wirelessly can also have its ethernet port be used to extend your network via wires. Theoretically, you could plug in another Unifi to the Wired port, add it to your network and then link up to four more to that new Unifi wirelessly, and carry on the chain forever. 5. Easy to configure: The Unifi includes a disk with software, but you're better off downloading the latest version off Ubiquiti's website. That way, you'll get the latest firmware. When you run the software, it starts a web-server on your computer, and you then use your internet browser to access the configuration screen. The server will detect every Unifi that is plugged into your network and automatically configure them to operate using the same SSID and security settings, and to select the best channel for their location. You can then manually override any settings if you like on a system-wide basis or a per unit basis. If you want to configure a Unifi for wireless linking, you have to plug it in via ethernet first and adopt it, and then unplug it from the ethernet connection and wait until it goes into Isolated Mode, and then you can link wirelessly it to one of the units that are plugged in to your ethernet connection. There's a video on Ubiquiti's web-site that explains everything. Just Google "Unifi FAQ" and you'll find the page that links to it. 6. Support for advanced features: Among other things, the Unifi software allows you to configure a Guest Network that is isolated from your own network. It can use its own network name (SSID) and its own security settings/password. Users who connect to it won't be able to connect to any of your internal devices. There is also a whole host of tools to allow you to monitor who is using your network, for how long, with how much data, etc., and you can block specific users as well. Once you configure the above features, you can shut down the server software, and the units will continue operating without the need for a server. You can also create a captive portal for guests, so that they have to enter a password or accept terms and conditions. However, for this to work, you have to leave the Unifi server software running on a Windows Computer 24/7. 7. Remote management: Using a special tool that comes with the server software (called the inform tool), you can set a Unifi to get its configuration information from a remote Unifi server. This will allow you to manage a fleet of Unifi units over the internet. 8. Long Range and Outdoor units available: Ubiquiti also has a Long Range version available for about $15 more, and an outdoor unit that is weatherproof for about $15 more than that. Like all other Unifi products, they can all be configured from the same User Interface, and each wired Unifi can support four Wireless Unifi's that repeat the signal. --- The only trouble that I had setting up the unit related to Windows Firewall. The current version of the software fails to properly configure the Windows Firewall to allow the server to access the Unifi units residing on a network which you have labelled as "Private" in Windows Firewall. You can resolve this problem by going to the control panel in Window, selecting "Windows Firewall," clicking on "Allow a Program or feature through Windows Firewall," and then finding the entry for the Ubiquiti software and enabling it on a Private and Public Network. You might also need to do the same for Java. Or you can disable Windows Firewall while you're configuring and then enable it later.