Mossberg: Eero Makes Wi-Fi Simpler and Stronger | Hacker News Reader

Mossberg: Eero Makes Wi-Fi Simpler and Stronger

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23 pointsprostoalex9 comments

If you're handy with hardware it's also extremely easy to build your own high quality network equipment using Microtik [1] or Soekris [2] boards.

[1] http://routerboard.com/

[2] http://soekris.com/

I've heard some quite positive stories from people who have dumped their stock CPE and are now routing their 1 Gbps FTTH internet connection through Microtik based equipment. This stuff is _that_ good.

Mikrotik is great until you try to unsubscribe from their mailing list.

Bought a small $49 Mikrotik wireless access point [1] recently on the recommendation of a HN user. It's absolutely fantastic.

For those who don't know them, Mikrotik is a Latvian company that builds boards, and pro/prosumer products based them, using their own RouterOS, which is built on the Linux kernel. In addition to a terminal interface (with nice modern commands, ANSI colors and SSH), you get a rather bare-bones but really beautifully designed and consistent web GUI called Webfig.

Webfig would be terrible for most end users, but it's a godsend for techies, especially compared to the slow, antique GUIs that come with other routers such as Asus and Netgear. For example, everything in the GUI shows live metrics. If you add a NAT rule for port forwarding, you'll see bandwidth usage updated live via AJAX for each rule. Lots of little things like this make it really nice to use.

They have a live demo [1] for those curious about how it works.

[1] http://routerboard.com/RB952Ui-5ac2nD

[2] http://demo2.mt.lv/webfig/

> Bought a small $49 Mikrotik wireless access point [1] recently on the recommendation of a HN user. It's absolutely fantastic.

From what I'm understanding of "single-chain AC", it's a 1x1 antenna that promises up to 433Mbps? This sadly doesn't sound like good value for money. I'm guessing speed isn't the whole point with these types of equipment.

I'm getting the same performance as with my previous router. Using just one device at a time. Probably not appropriate for an office, though.

I wish them luck as having better wifi in the home is nice, but I suspect that the limiting factor has been the price rather than the lack of technology. One could get a Ubiquiti UniFi AC Lite device for half the price of an Eero.

We bought unifi hubs for our office - ALL of them died within 18 months. Total garbage

I'm not sure that UBNT makes a hub.

By "hub" do you mean their managed switches, their wireless access points, their routers, or their long-range outdoor point-to-point wireless radios?

I own three indoor Wifi APs and have had good service from them. I also own one of their three-port routers.

About ten or so months after I purchased the router, I would get spontaneous reboots that became increasingly more frequent over time. It turned out that the external power supply that shipped with the thing had become unreliable. I replaced the power supply with another suitable one that I had lying around and I've had no troubles in the year+ since then.

So cool!!

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