Ubiquity/Unifi integration( was Re: SNMP integration?)

[Chad Gard]

The older security gateway pros had pretty slow processors.  That’s one reason I went with a UDMP instead of a separate cloud key and security gateway.  The UDMP has a much faster processor.  One thing you may want to try to seed up that security gateway is disabling intrusion detection.  I’ve noticed that the processor graph on my UDMP goes from bouncing around ~5-20% to the ~60-70% range when I use intrusion detection.  And it does begin to slow things down a bit.  I’m somewhat insulated by having such slow internet connection - not that much data can get to the thing to check compared to people in more connected climes.  If you have your firewall and network management configured correctly (manage those publicly accessible ethernet ports to protect the physical layer - only the camera/whatever should be able to connect physically!), there’s not much intrusion detection can catch that will get through anyway...

Before the UDMP, and later network video recorder, died, did you like the Ubiquity cameras?  They seem overpriced and underfeatured, and tend to not fare well in reviews, when compared to, say, Reolink, Amcrest, or Hikvision cameras.

I’ve had a great experience with my ubiquity dream machine pro and a 150 watt 8-port poe+ switch. I also have 2 AP lites, an AP long range, and 3 AP Meshes outdoors.  The only problem I’ve had is I can’t get the stupid AP Meshes to uplink via ethernet.  They obviously have a wired connection, because they’re powered by POE.  But  But I only use it for network control and security.  I don’t use it for unify protect (cameras), access (door locks), talk (ip phone), connect (not really sure.  Seems to be a way to change an expensive tv into a cheap digital photo frame, and perhaps want to become some sort of automation hub?  I think it’s still in early access anyway), or UID (as best as I can tell, a cloud-based single sign on, multi-factor authentication security thing that can integrate with everything.  I never looked deeper than “cloud based,” because with our incredibly unreliable internet service, I refuse to use anything that needs the cloud to work.  Can’t imagine hw awful my life would be if I integrate UID and Access like they recommend, so that I’d need internet service to open my front door!  One time and my wife would end all home automation efforts for certain!) applications.  And I’ve not installed any hard drives,

I’m just hypothesizing that using too many of those apps may lead to not only flakiness in general, but shortened life of the thing,  Because, as I mentioned back at the beginning, I don’t think the thing is designed for adequate cooling.  

But, I also hope to upgrade and add to my camera situation over the next year or two.  I’ve been leaning towards mostly Reolink cameras, and ruled out Ubiquity because of where they fall on the price/performance curve.

If anyone has been able to get the mesh access points to uplink via the wired connection, I’d love to hear how.  I know it should be possible (there’s a config option for it).  But mine insist on meshing when they don’t have to.  The whole reason I got them was to put them outside (they’re waterproof/etc) where there is too weak a wireless signal.  So, while they work well for my ESP32’s sending a bit of text data from sensors around the farm, and one person at a time can make a phone call, you can’t really push a lot of data through the outdoor network.  I might want to mesh some further afield later, but what’s the point if their wireless uplink is to an access point that has a slow, tenuous uplink itself?


-- 
Chad

-What's Cookin' at the Farm?  Recipes, menus, and more at http://twie.holeinthewoodsfarm.com

> On Jan 4, 2023, at 12:22 PM, Scot <xtension at gunsmoke.com> wrote:
> 
> On Wed, 4 Jan 2023 10:58:52 +0000, (null) (null) wrote:
>> 
>> I am a huge fan of the edgerouter - rock solid. I am at 482 days 
>> uptime on it (and that last reboot was a power failure). Static and 
>> dynamic addresses, port mapping, VPN, etc never an issue. Separate 
>> switch and 3 UNIFI APs. Can be a pain to setup, not for the faint of 
>> heart, but rock solid when it is working. No experience with the 
>> newer stuff though. 
> 
> Just my $.02, but my experience with the newer Unifi stuff is mostly 
> bad. I had a Unifi Dream Machine Pro die at 13 months, one month out of 
> warranty. Couldn't be repaired at any price so $400 down the drain. 
> That took out the security gateway, security cameras (all Unifi), and 
> the main router for the network. That's a lot of eggs in one basket. 
> 
> To diversify, I replaced the UDMP with a Unifi CloudKey Gen2 Plus, 
> which handles the network control and security camera functions. The 
> base routing is handled by a Starlink router, not the most feature rich 
> device but it works. I replaced the security gateway with a used Unifi 
> Security Gateway Pro 4, but it slowed the network to a crawl and I 
> haven't been able go figure out why. Maybe it's defective. The CloudKey 
> couldn't keep up with the thirteen network cams, so it was replaced by 
> a Unifi Network Video Recorder ($500). It worked great for three 
> months, and I need to RMA it back to Ubiquiti. Meantime, I've dropped a 
> few cameras and I'm getting by with the CloudKey. I've had a few camera 
> failures as well, again unrepairable. 
> 
> At first, the Unifi stuff was great, but after my experience with next 
> to nothing support and the unreliable equipment, I can't recommend it.
> 
> 
> Scot
> Yankee Hill, California
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