Personally, I would not trust Ubiquiti gear.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/iot/2021/01/ubiquiti-breach-and-other-iot-security-problems/
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/iot/2021/01/ubiquiti-breach-and-other-iot-security-problems/
How do you like the Sonicwall? I’ve only used them probably over a decade ago in a work environment and wasn’t all that impressed. I’m running Peplink at my edge currently, which overall is a great product and for redundancy, but it really chaps my ass that they don’t have proper IPv6 support.
Personally, I would not trust Ubiquiti gear.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/iot/2021/01/ubiquiti-breach-and-other-iot-security-problems/
Ubiquiti
NOTE: As of January 29, 2020, I no longer consider Ubiquiti devices secure. The company has gone over to the dark side, making it all but impossible to stop their routers from phoning home with data collected about your network. For more on their change of heart see You spoke, we didn't listen: Ubiquiti says UniFi routers will beam performance data back to mothership automatically. In addition, I have read that their firmware is not of the highest quality.
Personally, I would not trust Ubiquiti gear.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/iot/2021/01/ubiquiti-breach-and-other-iot-security-problems/
I was sick of dicking around with this stuff and that is what I pretty much did. A cisco PoE switch and 3 AP-Pros, one on each floor. I can peel paint off the walls with the amount of RF power available ;-)
Keep in mind, the lower level Ubiquity APs don't use the IEEE standard PoE. They only work with a proprietary Ubiquity PoE switch. That's why I went with the Pros. IIRC $499 for the 3-pack. This has been rock solid.
I'm generally against putting an AP on higher floors because the elevation also raises the noise / interference level from other nearby systems. I have a router in my basement which works really well in all of the house since it doesn't "see" signals from neighbors due to the poor RF propagation through ground. I also have one on the ground floor to get coverage into the yard / deck areas.
It's about signal-to-noise ratio. I realized that if you have an AP 20 ft away in the basement vs one 20 ft away on the 2nd floor, the path loss is similar but the amount of noise/interference between the two is very different since the one on the 2nd floor has much less path loss to interfering neighbor systems. The return path is generally the limiting factor since mobile devices have more limited TX power and worse antennas than the AP.
I'm generally against putting an AP on higher floors because the elevation also raises the noise / interference level from other nearby systems. I have a router in my basement which works really well in all of the house since it doesn't "see" signals from neighbors due to the poor RF propagation through ground. I also have one on the ground floor to get coverage into the yard / deck areas.
It's about signal-to-noise ratio. I realized that if you have an AP 20 ft away in the basement vs one 20 ft away on the 2nd floor, the path loss is similar but the amount of noise/interference between the two is very different since the one on the 2nd floor has much less path loss to interfering neighbor systems. The return path is generally the limiting factor since mobile devices have more limited TX power and worse antennas than the AP.
I got tied of updating and supporting my own home built Linux servers and firewalls years ago. I've been using Synology NAS for a long time now and it just works without having to mess with it much. You can get a small 2 bay for <$200 + disks and it will even run pihole if that's what you want. If you want to learn then doing your own is a good project though
Any recommendations on adding a small MiniPC to setup FreeNAS and PiHole. I was thinking about just dropping Linux on one these Atom Based Fanless Mini-PC's then sticking in a 2TB SSD for backup storage and media.