Hi,
I hope I post this in the right area. I am a novice to any networking so please excuse my ignorance.
we formed a small startup (13 people) and our home made mix of netgear router with ddwrt and old switch (unmanaged) finally caused enough issues for me to go and buy better equipment.
I thought it would be nice to get the edge routers, so there are more GUI configurations available. What I did not realize is, that I still need the unifi controller for the two AP's I got (pro ac or something like that).
I managed to set up the edgerouter x (5 port) for our static internet, and use the other 4 ports for a fix 10.0.0.1 lan to go to the switch. I have not installed my new edge switch with 250w, 24 ports (we have about 20 ethernet ports I need to plug in). I did connect one AP as a test and I really liked the simplicity of the unfi controller (I think that is what it is called).
So, now I wonder if I bought the wrong set. We have about 30+ wired devices (mainly apple macbooks and VoiP phones for all users and 2 conference rooms. Also, pretty much everybody uses wifi as well.
I wanted the network to be more reliable and also set some very basic QoS rules (since our connection is not the most amazing one in terms of speed and bandwidth) to favor the phones and throttle people who (yes, even in a small office like ours) already download large files and stream, which has been taking a toll on the network.
So basic rules to restrict some access, set limit's and favor VoiP traffic.
So the Edge series looked good and I figured it is nice to have a GUI on the device. But having started up the controller, the Unifi controller also looks really nice and seems to tie everything together in one UI rather than me having to handle AP's in one and router/switch in the other.
We need a very basic FW (no services run in the office, really just people making calls and using their computer, mainly for email and web.
I have not installed the switch. Should I get the Unifi 24, 250w switch instead so I can use the unfi controller for switch and ap's ? And should I maybe have gotten the security gateway (to also tie into the same UI) especially given what little configurations I plan to do for now (see above) ?
Or should I just stop whining, enjoy the edge advanced options and handle AP's in a different interface ? I am so early in the deployment process I can easily and happily still change switch and maybe even router/gateway.
thanks
claus