For now I decided to not worry about which devices connects to which AP and just observe the behavior for a few days; then diagnose and correct/optimize if anything goes wrong… and if I have a clue how to do it
So far it’s all working fine, when it’s working - with the old router I used to have wifi streaming on RaspberryPi working fine but the remotes not seeing Roon at all, now this doesn’t happen anymore.
However, I had two complete network crashes: everything stopped working. Both AP’s were flashing blue light, wifi disappeared and the AP’s were invisible to the iOS app Also no internet on the wired connections - in fact the wired PC reported no network visible, which makes me think this is a router problem. Only a restart of the router solved this. Still puzzled about what could have caused it since it came out of the blue. Maybe a drop in voltage(lights didn’t go out though)? Should I consider a UPS for the router?
I also ordered a mesh AP that I want to place in a corner of the house where there’s still poor wifi coverage even with the two AP’s I already have. I’m expecting delivery tomorrow.
I guess that depends on the reliability of your power supply - I find it invaluable. One of the great advantages of feeding everything from a POE switch is that you can put that on the same UPS so everything stays up in any power blips.
As to your network blip, it does seem rather odd. I hope you don’t have a recurrence.
well, well, what do we have here?
I gave up on the edgerouter, probably a great router but I’m sure I got a bad copy - it went dead several times per day, everyone I asked said it’s not normal so it’s going back. Replaced it with a USG - since I managed to get the controller going I realized I miss some eye-candy in the interface without the USG
Probably the “unkown” application that comes in second after Netflix is Roon. I wonder why is unifi not recognizing Roon/RAAT? no big deal
Everything is “only” good - most of the times it’s excellent though.
I know why it’s “good” - I have a bad cable from the router to the living room. The AP downstairs only connects at 100FDX. I have to find someone to fix that, but even so I notice no issues in my day-to-day use of streaming Netflix and Roon/Tidal.
I was going to mark this post as “solution” since I think I reached a stable configuration that I am happy with - but it seems this is not possible? If it is maybe an admin can do it?
So just to summarize:
Using the Compal router provided by my ISP I had several issues with Roon:
most of the times music would stream fine over wifi but the iOS remotes would not connect
sometimes, some of my wifi endpoints would have issues streaming
So I started to look for a solution. The long thread on wifi setups WiFi Router Recommendations? has various product recommendations but the one name that comes on top is Ubiquity. So I started to research the brand and the products.
Ubiquity is an enterprise networking company that has consumer prices (my own definition) They have several product lines, from enterprise to consumer dedicated mesh wifi.
I choose the Unify line and I have the following setup:
one USG router and three wifi Access Points. Two of them are wired to the USG, the third one is a mesh AP which is uplinked wirelessly to one of the wired AP’s and provides good wifi coverage in a corner of the house where I had no coverage before.
I have tried an Edgemax router as well, just to keep the cost lower - some routers in the Edge family are cheaper than the USG. But I think I had a bad copy because I had these network failures that required restarts. Also with an Edge router you lose the ability to control the router from the unifi controller. Not a problem really, more of a convenience matter - the Edge routers have their own user interface, which allows any settings you need, you only lose the ability to get some statistics on your network.
The Unifi controller - this is the user interface for Unifi networks and it can run on a computer or on a dedicated piece of hardware called a network key. You DO NOT NEED the controller to set up and manage a simple Unifi network - there are iOS and Android apps that do that. But again, you lose some functionality and convenience.
I run my controller on a windows PC that is always on (and which also runs Roon Core). So far I encountered no problems. The controller doesn’t have to be on for the network to function. If the controller is not running it will not collect the data for the dashboards and of course if you need to make changes you need to use the mobile apps which do not offer access to the full settings.
One comment on PoE - I spent some hours agonizing over this confusing technology. I ended up not using any PoE router or switch. PoE is just for convenience; a PoE router or switch is not required to run a Unifi network. Without PoE you need more power outlets and you will have more cables around. So all my devices are powered by PoE injectors, not by PoE capable networking devices.
The costs were similar with a consumer high-end all-in-one router - around 300EUR. The advantage is much better coverage since I have 3 AP’s that I can move around instead of just one - but please note that I did not try an all-in-one so I cannot really compare. One theoretical disadvantage is complexity, having more devices, but these were really extremely simple to set up. The Unifi controller is an incredibly smart thing, it recognizes devices and sets them up without any sweat. When I brought in the USG to replace the Edge router I just plugged everything in and 2 minutes later the controller saw the device and had an “adopt” button for me to click. 5 more minutes later the network was up and running. A firmware update went on without even a network interruption.
I am really very happy with the investment and recommend it highly.
I also want to say a big thank you to all the folks who helped along the way by posting helpful comments in this thread.
If you’re trying something similar come back here with questions, I am sure you will get the help you need.
if “get a better router” is a contribution, then indeed I grant you that. Other than that there isn’t a single intervention from Roon support in this thread. But if you want to argue along this line please let’s move it somewhere else, let’s keep this technical, ok?
The EdgeRouters are part of “EdgeMax” line of products. Anything in the EdgeMax line uses UNMS in place of Unifi Controller (the key you mention). With UNMS you get traffic graphs, event logs, etc. similar to Controller. It’s not as polished as controller but it is available. If you mix the two product lines you have to run both UNMS and a Unifi Controller to get GUI for everything.
Sounds like you got yourself a nice little Unifi network there. I’m happy to see you swapped in the USG. The EdgeRouters are great but require a bit more work to integrate the product lines. Going all Unifi, with a USG and everything managed under a single Controller, is a great integrated package. Nice work indeed.
I wanted to update this with some info about the Unifi controller.
I had it run on my always-on windows PC that also runs Roon core and does HTPC duties in my living room. That works well as far as network functioning is concerned - you don’t need a controller running for the network to work well. However, once I started using a controller, I wanted all the insights and additional functionality it gives and for that it has to be always on.
What I disliked in this setup was that I sometimes have power outages, that are infrequent but they do cause windows to restart and the controller does not start automatically, I had to remember starting it, etc. There is a way to configure the controller to run as a service which starts with windows, but I found some confusing info about it so I didn’t pursue it.
The alternatives are either a dedicated Unifi device (a network key) or a raspberry Pi.
I had a couple of Pi’s lying around since my early Roon days when I was building various Roon endpoints so that’s what I choose to do.
I am happy to report that installing Unifi controller on a raspberry Pi and migrating your network to the new controller is stupid easy. If you are able to follow instructions and copy/paste that is all the skill/knowledge level required.
I followed the guide here https://community.ui.com/questions/Step-By-Step-Tutorial-Guide-Raspberry-Pi-with-UniFi-Controller-and-Pi-hole-from-scratch-headless/e8a24143-bfb8-4a61-973d-0b55320101dc?page=3
This has instructions to install both Unifi controller and Pi-Hole at the same time (Pi-Hole is a network-wide ad-blocker, if you don’t want it there is an option to not install it)
If you already have a Pi like I did this saves about 100Eur which is the cost of the cheapest Unifi network key.
Only installed this yesterday but it works just fine. And Pi Hole also seems to work quite well, but that is really out of scope for this thread.
I just set up at a new location where currently I don’t have cabling between where fiber ONT is downstairs and where I have the first Roon wired endpoint upstairs. I may still get it all wired, but in the meanwhile I installed a UniFi Dream Machine (which runs the UniFi controller) wired to the ONT, the Roon core (fanless Zbox CI662 nano with Ubuntu Server 20.04.1, 4TB SSD) wired to the Dream Machine, a UniFi FlexHD upstairs, powered by the included PoE adapter, and Cat 6 to a dumb switch for all the wired gear in the room including the Roon endpoint. Setting up everything was a bit tricky as I don’t have much cell service here and yet the UniFi Android app need to talk to the mothership to create an account etc. But once that hurdle was overcome (holding my phone high up by a window) and I found my way around the mobile app and the Web controller interface, setting up the network with wireless backhaul between the FlexHD and the Dream Machine was really easy. This neighborhood has very little WiFi interference, so it may be ideal for this setup. Playing both local music and Qobuz with no issues so far.
At my other location I have an older Ubiquiti EdgeRouter 5 with a MoCA coax Ethernet LAN and AmpliFi HD mesh for remotes.
I’m thinking of getting the new cloud key 2 as I am looking at getting their security cameras around the house and I can have everything under one control app. Would mean I can ditch the Nas as my controller to.
OOI have you had any issues with fan noise on the UDM? I’ve seen a few posts suggesting that it can be very loud and I’m hoping to place one in a generally quiet room.
It’s noisy when it boots up. In normal operation it does not seem noisy, but I’m not close to it to check most of the time. Also, my setup is small and lightly loaded, UDM utilization goes hardly ever above 10%.
