UniFi Home Lab vs Campus
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I'm looking to install around 140 total UniFi APs around our campus (or rather, make the argument for them). Probably around 45 SHDs, and the rest of them would be AC PROs, and a few AC LITEs. I still have around 8 months before the decision is made, and I want to make sure that I know how to administrate/manage them. I was thinking about just ordering myself one AC LITE for my home and installing a self hosted UniFi controller. Other than scale, would this be a comparable setup? I'm worried that the AC LITE and other APs would be somehow managed differently.
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The Unifi access points are managed with the Unifi Controller, any network equipment would be managed with UNMS.
So the setup and administration would be the same; unless you wanted to get DPI, content filtering and a few other features which requires a security gateway.
But essentially, yes the setup and administration is all of the same.
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Yup, that's a good plan. And you really kind of want a Unifi AP for home anywhere, they are awesome. That's what I use.
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@dustinb3403 Awesome, thank you very much. Our current security gateway, Meraki MX400, was going to be changed out but the costs of license renewal is far cheaper than purchasing the Palo Alto I was looking at
, bummer. -
@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@dustinb3403 Awesome, thank you very much. Our current security gateway, Meraki MX400, was going to be changed out but the costs of license renewal is far cheaper than purchasing the Palo Alto I was looking at
, bummer.Rule of thumb... NEVER use Meraki. If it feels like a good option, something is seriously wrong. It's garbage equipment at premium prices.
Meraki isn't business grade, it's a joke. But the cost is nearly that of real security gear, like the Palo Alto. If Meraki is "good enough", you don't need Meraki at all.
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@scottalanmiller I just had a conversation with a vendor this morning that basically scoffed at my decision to look at UniFi and told me that Ubiquity was not enterprise grade hardware. He said it was "big box store" level of equipment. This was also after a 30 second pause where I'm pretty sure he was googling UniFi. Felt pretty insulting.
I wish I could of gone back 3 years ago and helped make the decision. The problem is now that it's around $10,200 for 3 more years on the Meraki and about $21,100 for the Palo Alto and that initial number LOOKS really high.
Random question, and sorry to get off topic, since you deal a lot with the financial side of IT do you think I should include the costs we've already paid (sunk costs?) of the MX in my proposal? -
@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@scottalanmiller I just had a conversation with a vendor this morning ...
Why would you ever have that conversation with a vendor? They are the enemy that you should be watching out for.
Of course they are going to give you bad advice, their JOB is to screw you!
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@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
... UniFi and told me that Ubiquity was not enterprise grade hardware.
Says a salesman that doesn't even work in IT.
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@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
I wish I could of gone back 3 years ago and helped make the decision. The problem is now that it's around $10,200 for 3 more years on the Meraki and about $21,100 for the Palo Alto and that initial number LOOKS really high.
What initial number? Replace the Meraki for nearly zero.
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@scottalanmiller said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@scottalanmiller I just had a conversation with a vendor this morning ...
Why would you ever have that conversation with a vendor? They are the enemy that you should be watching out for.
Of course they are going to give you bad advice, their JOB is to screw you!
Yeah I got the vibe they're a Cisco Gold Partner.
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@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
Random question, and sorry to get off topic, since you deal a lot with the financial side of IT do you think I should include the costs we've already paid (sunk costs?) of the MX in my proposal?
No...
If you are making a proposal you never talk about sunk cost, that's not part of your decision process in any way.
If you are doing a post mortem to show how bad a decision was in the past so that you can learn from the mistakes, then yes sunk cost is the primary concern.
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@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@scottalanmiller said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@scottalanmiller I just had a conversation with a vendor this morning ...
Why would you ever have that conversation with a vendor? They are the enemy that you should be watching out for.
Of course they are going to give you bad advice, their JOB is to screw you!
Yeah I got the vibe they're a Cisco Gold Partner.
Even if they are trying to sell their first Meraki, they are sales people and the enemy that IT's job is to protect the organization from.
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If you are making a proposal you never talk about sunk cost, that's not part of your decision process in any way.
If you are doing a post mortem to show how bad a decision was in the past so that you can learn from the mistakes, then yes sunk cost is the primary concern.
Okay, thanks. I'll keep that in mind.
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There are several case studies on UBNT websites their hardware being used.
https://www.ubnt.com/casestudies/ -
Remember that vendor advice is inverted. So that the salesman thinks that the best way for him to take your money is to use Meraki and avoid Ubiquiti, your takeaway from the conversation should immediately be "Meraki is bad, Ubiquiti is good." Because the salesman makes his money getting you to avoid good decisions and convincing you to make specific bad decisions. That's what he's paid to do, literally the only thing that he is paid to do. His entire reason for existing (in a career capacity) is to pressure you into giving him your money instead of spending it wisely.
So when he doesn't agree with what you want to do, that should immediately be seen as confirmation that you are doing the right thing.
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@black3dynamite said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
There are several case studies on UBNT websites their hardware being used.
https://www.ubnt.com/casestudies/Thanks for that. Completely forgot to include case studies. Probably one of the most important things to include.
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@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@black3dynamite said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
There are several case studies on UBNT websites their hardware being used.
https://www.ubnt.com/casestudies/Thanks for that. Completely forgot to include case studies. Probably one of the most important things to include.
And use reference customers. There are tons of us here. Many of us have specifically moved customers from Meraki to Ubiquiti and can talk directly about the insane leap from "toy" to "enterprise" gear.
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@markferron said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
@black3dynamite said in UniFi Home Lab vs Campus:
There are several case studies on UBNT websites their hardware being used.
https://www.ubnt.com/casestudies/Thanks for that. Completely forgot to include case studies. Probably one of the most important things to include.
Don't forget to mention that Meraki is part of Cisco, which is just a joke until you are spending millions. UBNT is specifically the "Cisco killer" blowing Cisco out of the water to such an absurd degree that no one can really take Cisco seriously once they know about UBNT.
http://www.smbitjournal.com/2016/10/no-one-ever-got-fired-for-buying/
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If it were me doing the presentation, I would consider including a discussion about ethics and how Cisco (and therefore Meraki) and the vendor that pushes them have zero place even being considered on ethics grounds. They are products that exist in this space solely for making money on really unethical IT "managers" looking to play a political game rather than doing their jobs (or worse, getting involved in a kickback scheme.)
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We've had several customers with Meraki. We always pull them out. Any renewals, any configuration problems and it is cheaper to replace them the first time we have to work on them. Same with Cisco gear. We can replace older Cisco gear with vastly superior UBNT gear, get it installed, and configured and up and running for less money than simple the cost of configuring and/or licensing the Cisco gear that they already own. That's how staggering the difference is.
