Expanding my Network. Switch advice wanted.

DavieJG · 24 Dec 2019 at 21:17

Hi All.

In the new year I'm looking to remodel my front room and upstairs office and provide the appropriate dedicated network connections.

My current network is all in the front room and consists of:
HG612 (30mb/6mb plusnet)
Mini-itx PC pfsense with 4 port NIC
Unifi AP AC LR (via POE injector)
Unifi Cloud key (w USB power supply)

The AP gives me 3 SSIDs which map to 3 different VLANs, one trusted LAN, one VPN and one for IOT devices such as thermostats.

Currently, every device on my network (phones, laptops, PC etc) connects wirelessly to the appropriate VLAN and it works flawlessly.

In the remodel I will be installing a Vero 4k as a media hub for my TV in the front room which I want to hardwire and I'll probably hardwire the TV too (although I hear they often have better wireless performance due to only 100mbit ports). I then want to run a cable upstairs so I can hardwire my main gaming PC and I'll also put a NAS up there which will serve as a filestore for the Vero 4k. At a later date I may want to add a second AP in the back bedroom upstairs as the signal is definitely weaker up there having traveled through the floor and a wall or 2.

On to the key question. What additional network hardware do I need to realise my new network?

My current thoughts are a switch on the ground floor, single trunk outside, up the wall andback in and a switch on the upstairs. Are the ubiquiti switches a good shout? Anyone have experience managing VLANs with them? Any other options I should consider?

Regarding the POE situation, if I went for the Poe version I could do away with the Poe injector and the usb supply?

Thanks.
Dave.

Avalon · 25 Dec 2019 at 01:14

8 port by the TV for it and the media box (or take feeds from the router depending on what's easier), single link to an 8 port switch upstairs, feed to gaming PC, NAS, AP, only potential drawback is the single gigabit backhaul, you could (and please do if only for the option of redundancy if a fault develops) take a spare feed up and connect the media box to this switch which will take that off the backhaul feed.

I run a Ubiquiti ToughSwitch 8 Pro (150w), Ubiquiti have since rebranded it as the EdgeSwitch 8XP (identical hardware/firmware), they are simple to use and i've had zero issues. I'd have preferred something rack mounted, but this was available for a lot less. Adding another AP and provisioning it is a doddle, the only thing to check is that some of the older AP's have historically a different PoE standard (24v which was popular in the telecoms world) to current generations that use 48v 802.3af which is what standard PoE switches output.

Deleted member 77746 · 25 Dec 2019 at 01:47

If you want something with a solid core network solution where you wouldn’t really run into any problems then go for a central setup.

install a cab as central to the house as you can and run cat5/cat6 to the areas where you want.

I would run 2 (or more) to each location.

24x port switch (could be POE)
24x port patch panel
1x network can
1x box of cable (or two depends how big your house is)

If you are running it outside you could get external grade cable depends on if you want to do that at all.

And of course this setup would vary depend on your budget.

If you going to do it properly you might as well plan for it. This would future proof it for a good solid connection internally.

WJA96 · 25 Dec 2019 at 07:45

The sole driver to get the UniFi switches is that they are fully integrated with all the other UniFi equipment. You don’t need to configure VLANs on the switches, that’s all taken care of by the Unifi Controller on the Cloud Key.

Your plan sounds fine, and can I suggest the US-8-150W or US-16-150W Gen2 for downstairs and instead of a switch upstairs put in a UAP-IW-HD which will give you another Wave2 access point and a 4-port switch, one port of which is PoE, so you could power another 8-port UniFi switch (US-8) from that if you wanted/needed more ports.

I would agree with @Avalon that 2 cables is better than one and if you’re running conduit anyway then 3 cables will fit in 20mm conduit and 5 will just squeeze into 25mm conduit (use soapy liquid as lubricant). Once you have RJ45 sockets upstairs you can always run cables along the skirting boards to other rooms.

Now is also the time to consider if you’ll ever want IP CCTV cameras and run all the cables at once, even if you just leave a (un)terminated CAT6 cable in a junction box at the future camera location.

The solution suggested by @mrbell1984 is optimal, and you should certainly consider going the whole hog and although you’ll probably not see a massive improvement in usability over your original plan, it is the right way to do the job. if I was quoting for the work, it would certainly be one of the things I’d quote as an ‘upgrade’.

DavieJG · 25 Dec 2019 at 20:55

Thanks for the assistance so far guys. The central cab would be ideal but I'm just not blessed with that kind of space. Running 2 cables upstairs sounds like good advice. Also seems that the advice is not to skimp on hardware. I was looking at the US-8-60w but the recommendations look to be 150w. Just for futureproofing?

WJA96 · 25 Dec 2019 at 21:06

The US-8-60W is fine until you want to power a cloud key and a couple of access points at which point it’s close to the limit of its power budget and you only get 4 of the 8 ports as PoE, the other 4 are not PoE. Plus on the US-8-150W you get two SFP ports that you can stick £10 RJ45 modules into and make it a 10 port switch.