Hi. We and NextSpace both use Meraki. I believe Link does as well. Many pros, and the only cons I encountered was the upfront cost a year ago, which since have lowered. Otherwise, operationally, it's been bliss. Totally ideal for dynamically changing spaces such as coworking.
Jerome ______________ BLANKSPACES "work FOR yourself, not BY yourself" www.blankspaces.com ph: 323.330.9505 | 5405 Wilshire Blvd (2 blocks west of La Brea) Los Angeles, CA 90036 On May 7, 2012, at 10:27 AM, Alex Hillman wrote: > Picking up on a super-old thread, I'm wondering if Jerome or anyone else can > weigh in on Meraki, Ruckus, or any other similar wireless solutions that > they're using and love? Pros, cons, configurations, number of members/devices > you support per Access Point, etc? > > We're looking at options again now that we're expanding to 2 floors and > determining efficient ways to cover 8000 square feet on 2 floors of a > cement-structure building. Adding more Airport Extremes is an option, but > stuff like "beamforming" and high-power antennae has my attention :) > > -Alex > > indyhall.org > > On Friday, August 26, 2011 12:15:02 PM UTC-4, Jerome wrote: > Hi all. > > Sorry folks, but I'd have to disagree. I tried to use an Airport Extreme, > then added another and we quickly overwhelmed them. We upgraded to a DLink > commercial grade router and within a year (or less!), that fizzled. We now > use Meraki AP's and router (since March 2011) and so far so good. Basically, > the Apple Extreme's simply couldn't handle the load for about 40 simultaneous > "devices." Remember that many people now use 2-3 devices (laptop + > phone/tablet), so you should anticipate x2. > > For the Apple Extreme's, we ended up having to often turn off and on > sometimes 1-2/day. The reason was that these Apple Extreme's would not flush > out IP addresses. We concluded that in an environment where you might have > the same 40 people, these AE's might be appropriate. But when we host an > event for 50 people... > > Also, AE's don't allow you to manage the user connections: no throttling, no > activity per IP address, etc. In an age of dropbox and all things cloud, all > it takes is one uneducated user to think they can upload a 1 gb movie file to > ruin the bandwidth for everyone else. Or say, when video streaming and other > heavy bandwidth usage peaks around lunch time because everyone's watching > NetFlix streaming while they take a break. > > Finally, how is everyone getting these fat 40mb pipes??? We pay $600/mo for > a 5/5 EoC, and $900/mo for 10/10. And some $200/mo I think for 10/2 DSL > (SLA, not consumer). I can only speculate a 50/10 or something must be $$. > Oh, and we need the synchronous 5/5 or 10/10 for our VoIP handsets. We use > QoS to prioritize the phone data packets; otherwise, we'd need 20/20 or more! > > > Jerome > ______________ > BLANKSPACES > "work FOR yourself, not BY yourself" > > www.blankspaces.com > ph: 323.330.9505 | 5405 Wilshire Blvd (2 blocks west of La Brea) Los Angeles, > CA 90036 > ph: 310.526.2255 | 1450 2nd Street (@ Broadway), Santa Monica, CA 90401 > > On Aug 26, 2011, at 7:53 AM, Pat Ramsey wrote: > >> Josh, >> >> Never had any issues with the firewall. I eyeball the logs every so often & >> haven't seen anything odd. >> >> The primary base station works great as a central router - no DHCP issues, >> NAT works great, DNS etc. Very low-key & stable, as it should be. >> >> On the wireless side of things, there's no way we would be able to >> satisfactorily handle more than 15 or so people on 1 wireless router. Don't >> even try it. So I bought two (plus, it made the little red light in the back >> of my head slow down. 2 is 1, 1 is none, etc) of the Extremes. >> >> We segmented out our cloud into three, in order to provide connection points >> for the different speeds without causing a slowdown for faster devices. Each >> uses the same wireless key, so it's convenient for users to get on. My >> original plan of 1 cloud for all failed spectacularly the day we had a >> visitor with an old 802.11b card connect, killing connection speeds for >> everyone. D'oh! >> >> Cheers! >> >> Pat >> >> >> On Aug 26, 2011, at 9:38 AM, Josh Aberson wrote: >> >>> Thanks Pat, appreciate the help. >>> >>> I was looking into the Airport extreme option. I really like that it has >>> USB connectivity for shared drives, and that it's a dual antenna so can >>> separate out networks for different uses. Am mainly concerned with firewall >>> protection on the main line coming in. >>> >>> Have you ever had any issues with the firewall on those? Also, if you >>> didn't have two, do you think your 45 members would bog it down? >>> >>> Thanks again! >>> >>> Josh Aberson >>> >>> Sent from my iPhone >>> >>> On Aug 26, 2011, at 9:24 AM, Pat Ramsey <[email protected]> wrote: >>> >>>> Josh, >>>> >>>> Congratulations, first off. Welcome to the fun! >>>> >>>> What are the connectivity needs of your users? Are they pushing large >>>> amounts of code & files daily? Are you serving data from your end? >>>> >>>> We've always gone with a "reasonable" uplink. Business DSL for a long >>>> time, then a cable line in addition, eventually adding fiber for data & >>>> keeping a dsl for 1 member's VOIP phone. >>>> >>>> I've been in IT long enough to know you can never have a large enough >>>> pipe, so set the expectations early, find out what's the right size >>>> without busting your budget & work with your members - know them well >>>> enough - to avoid any hurt feelings, problems, etc. >>>> >>>> We're at around 40-ish members now. Our data line is fiber, 5 up / 5 down, >>>> I think it is. Our core router is an Airport Extreme base station. Off >>>> that is a 24-port gigabit switch, as the space came with some wired data >>>> ports. We run another Airport Extreme to extend the cloud in the main >>>> room. Extended off that is a Linksys & a D-link wireless router (both >>>> flashed with dd-wrt). Each of these has a old network printer attached to >>>> it. >>>> >>>> Easy-peasy, pretty much runs itself. >>>> >>>> Cheers! >>>> >>>> Pat >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On Aug 25, 2011, at 10:09 AM, Josh Aberson wrote: >>>> >>>>> Hey all, >>>>> >>>>> Without getting into too much introduction and details, I'll just cut >>>>> right to it. >>>>> >>>>> I'm opening a space next week in South Dakota. Working on finalizing >>>>> details right now, and one thing I'm not too sure about is internet. >>>>> We've got 20 members or so pre-signed to move in day 1 and in trying to >>>>> plan for the future, am trying to figure out what sort of internet speed >>>>> I need, and what sort of router to handle the space's size and amount of >>>>> people. It's a long space, about 150ft, and we could very easily have >>>>> 100 people accessing the network at any given time. >>>>> >>>>> Any of the larger spaces out there have insight? I'm currently looking >>>>> at an internet speed of 50 down/10up or 100 down/15 up. Also am looking >>>>> at 801.11n routers that have two to three adjustable networks built into >>>>> the device. >>>>> >>>>> Would love some thoughts. >>>>> >>>>> Best, >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Josh Aberson >>>>> [email protected] >>>>> m: 521.6158 | @JoshAberson > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Coworking" group. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msg/coworking/-/shjjx7ZddMIJ. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. 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