Leave single R500 Stand Alone or convert to Unleashed

[sean_mcneal]

Hello,

I have a single R500 AP and probably will not need to add another at any time. Just wondering if there are any performance advantages to making this an Unleashed AP?

Another similar question - with a single AP would there be any performance enhancements with a zone director? In other words, am I still getting all of the Ruckus tech like beam forming, and band steering with just the single AP or is the zone director required to unlock those?

Sorry - noob to Ruckus

[monnat_systems]

Sean,

Unleashed AP and controller based AP has following difference in terms of feature set
Unleashed does not provide the entire ZoneDirector feature set. The following features are either not supported, supported but with limitations, or are currently unsupported but planned for a future release:

• No layer 3 roaming. All APs must be in the same subnet.
• Tunneled WLANs are not supported.
• IPv6 is not supported.
• No interface to communicate with FlexMaster, SmartCell Insight, SPoT, or the ZoneDirector Remote Control mobile app.
• No North Bound Interface to pass client authentication responsibility to an external entity.
• No CLI support.
• No SNMP support.
• No SpeedFlex support.
• No WLAN Group or AP Groups.
• No Role Based Access Controls.
• Guest Access limitations:
  • Self-Service Guest Pass (not supported in the initial release).

If you need any of the above then you need to get controller or check with your Ruckus SE to confirm on when any of the above features are going to be implemented.

[seanmuir]

I would look at what you are trying to achieve first and then look at what can be done by each of the possible solutions.

If you are after a feature rich AP which allows you to MESH (scale your network) and have cool things like application visibility and a UI, then Unleashed might be what you need.

If however you after high client volume and performance then Stand Alone would be the best choice, as features consume resource, and that will impact AP performance.

[sean_mcneal]

Thanks for the replies all. Just installed the Unleashed and really like the dashboard features so far.

[seanmuir]

What sort of environment are deploying the AP?

[sean_mcneal]

This one is just for home use and testing. I install home automation systems and I am looking for the best performance AP for range and scale with some larger homes.
My home would never need more than one AP, but some of the houses I work on would definitely need 2-3 on a regular basis.
I like the idea of the Unleashed controller-less setup.
So far Unleashed is working well for me.