help with new tower

[sirhc]

Well in this post I show you my VLAN Tab
viewtopic.php?f=30&t=452

But if you watch this video (movie) I eventually get around to showing you my switches at my tower in actions in the video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JvBEAD4MFM

[rebelwireless]

Also, be aware that if you run your backhaul and your APs on the same wire via VLANs, you'll effectively make that wire half duplex. I see you have a 50M target so you're good there with gigabit between switch and router, but its something to keep in your mind for future. Also remember flow control whenever you mix 1000M and 100M links.

[sirhc]

I can not stress enough how much shielding makes a difference. Since UBNT would not "officially" endorse my products it was an uphill battle all the way telling people shielding was needed more than GPS.
http://community.ubnt.com/t5/airMAX-Sto ... -p/1399609

Then when they decide to implement shielding suddenly shielding is the holy grail or some new innovation.

As far as MIMOSA radios, I have some in service and for the most part am very happy with them other than the mechanical design of their integrated radios such as B5 and B5lite do not lend themselves easy to create shielding for and since I put so many radios on a tower in close proximity I can not use them very much.

As far as BETA firmware for AC and AFX I think am running the latest RC versions?

AFX: v3.2-rc2.28535

It would appear even the AFX radios got nipped by the new FCC rules as I am unable to achieve anywhere close to 53 dB EIRP with UNI-III unless I cheat on the antenna gain or cable loss.

With all of the AC gear including the GEN III you will find lower EIRP as well especially UNI-II and since my bread and butter is less than 3 miles I use a lot of DFS sectors and the reduced power is painful.

Now at some point I will have no choice but to upgrade. However chip makers are now in the process of designing and implementing new cleaner radio and PA designs in the next generation of chips. They will be built from the ground up to better abide by the the new FCC rules as far as channel splash/bleed so we should get our EIRP back in the next generation of chips in a couple years.

[rebelwireless]

New FCC rules are brutal. AF5X is more-or-less losing 2-4dBm vs EIRP in all but UNII3, then its 1dBm. In some bands, you can't cheat by dropping the claimed gain because the radio is output limited to 7dBm to match the smallest RD23. If you put in 20dBi it will claim 27dBm...

The rule changes effect newly approved devices so M5 series (XM/XW) devices essentially grandfather in. There is a deadline for sales too, next year sometime I guess, that even that grandfathering won't let them manufacture more without updated approvals.

Ubiquiti already has a solution to this in the field to testers, called the Rocket-AC5-Prism. It's full EIRP across the band (UNII1-3) and should be only a month or two out for pre-orders being delivered. Probably 6-9 months before wide availability knowing ubnt's supply chain :/ fti, it's got filters on input and output so it exceeds the OOBE rules.

agree 100% with Chris, shielding of some sort is very important for colocating. When/if the RocketAC5-Prism gets GPS (apparently it's already functional to 1 alpha tester, grain of salt etc etc) then shielding will be even more important.

AF5X *REALLY* wants a shield kit on the dish. Like I said before, they don't react fast enough for modulation drops and will drop a link. You can force a 4x or 2X connection to see that the radio can beat the noise, but you sacrifice a lot of speed that way. There are situations where a RocketAClite will beat the AF5x because of noise. Newest betas are the best yet for this, but still not quite there yet.

[sirhc]

New FCC rules are brutal. AF5X is more-or-less losing 2-4dBm vs EIRP in all but UNII3, then its 1dBm. In some bands, you can't cheat by dropping the claimed gain because the radio is output limited to 7dBm to match the smallest RD23. If you put in 20dBi it will claim 27dBm...

Well as you can see in the pic below:
I claimed 27 dB on the 30 dB Dish - reality the antenna is "maybe" 27.5 dB at best in UNI-I - Marketing fluff that hinders us
I claimed 3 dB insertion loss (.5dB per connector and .5 dB per jumper) - I know this is pushing it
As you can clearly see the AF5X limits the EIRP to 37 dB which is a FAR cry from 53 dB
Tx on the radiator is limited to 13 dB

Now this is UNI-I not UNI-III because I use UNI-III for PTMP, but UNI-I is also allowed 53 dB.
Back when I went to school 53 dB - 37 dB = 16 dB short of regs.

U-NII Low (U-NII-1[3]): 5.15-5.25 GHz. Originally limited to indoor use only. Regulations required use of an integrated antenna, with power limited to 50 mW.[4] Rules changed in 2014 to permit outdoor operation, maximum fixed power 1 watt, maximum fixed EIRP 4 watts (+36 dBm) point-to-multipoint, 200 watts (+53 dBm) point-to-point. However, strict out-of-band emission rules limit practical point-to-point power to lower levels.

Why the AFX radios get hit so bad from M5 gear is I believe they employ an LNA like all airFIBER radios do to amplify the weaker signal since the radios are outputting less power. This LNA will amplify ALL signal as it can not be discriminate and thus even BAD noise is amplified.

No with the AF5X the UI claims 140 Mbps+/- in both directions so an aggregate of 280 Mbps in 40 MHz of spectrum which is nice BUT I really wish it had an "AUTO" duty cycle as I never know which way I need it.

Cost of AF5X link
(2) AF5X $600 for UI claimed 140 Mbps one way (tested at 120 Mbps+/-) or 240 aggregate) or $4.29 per Mbps if costing 1 direction
40 MHz of spectrum

Cost of M5 link
(2) Rocket M5 $160 for 90 Mbps one way or 120 aggregate (tested @ 120) or $1.78 per Mbps if costing 1 direction
30 MHz of spectrum

Now people will say Chris the AF5X can do 280 Mbps aggregate @ 40 MHz and the M5 only 120 Mbps aggregate @ 30 MHz. This is true but since I offer a lot of HIGH END commercial links where I tout faster uplink speeds compared to cable I have to leave the duty cycle at 50/50. The M5 will use what it needs in each direction and as I said in reality when the AF5X claims 140/140 but I really only see 120/120 or 240 aggregate and the M5 is 90/30 when testing bi-directional so I get 120 aggregate.

So with that said if I look at tested aggregate rates:
M5 @ 120 Mbps using 30 MHz / $160 I get $1.33 per Mbps
AF5X @ 240 Mbps using 40 MHz / $600 I get $2.5 per Mbps

I really should get the numbers on AF5X using 30 MHz for a better comparison model but this link is in service.

Do not even get me started on the cost when we look at AF2X and AF3X as there was no excuse for Robert to charge almost twice as much for those links compared to AF5X.

Ubiquiti is great at pricing when there is competition and the only reason you can appreciate the lower price for the AF5X was the existence of MIMOSA.

Since we are on price why does an AF24HD cost twice what the AF24 does as the actual BOM is around $100 more to build the HD? The main difference between the 2 links is a more expensive PA, LNA, discrete, and a little more for the chassis.

If the AF24HD was say $500 more per radio I would have already replaced all of my AF24 with AF24HD.

You can play out the same cost per Mbps comparison on the M5 vs the AC line. The new GEN 3 airMAX Rocket does offer more Tx power than current AC models but if you measure the actual radiator power verses what the UI claims you might find something different similar to the NanoBridge radios where what the UI claims may not be what you actually get.

Look the AF5X is a cleaner radio then the Rocket AC Gen 3 with airPRISIM will ever be and as seen in the picture below it is no where near the allowed 53 dB EIRP.

Now with the airFIBER radios and the Chicago team I am always more apt to believe at face value whatever they put in their UI as accurate as their integrity would fight any assertion to display anything but accurate data for pure marketing fluff.

As you can see in the picture below we have a better signal than the UI thinks we should have as the antennas are aligned correctly and we always deploy with RF Armor Shield kits of course. They have the NEW Dish Kits that are designed to fit ALL Rockets made to date and the airFIBER X models. If I remove the Radio Shield in the back the link degrades even though no radios on the tower are on the same frequencies but there are a lot of radios mounted close together. I strongly suggest the new UDK25X , UDK3X, and UDK5X Dish Kits for the legacy 30dB Ubiquiti Dishes when using AFX radios THEY MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE WHEN OTHER RADIOS ARE NEAR BY!!!

If you have an older dish in service with an RF Armor kit you can purchase a NEW BOX for the back UDS25X or UDS3X and it is very easy to change the box on the back of the dish while on the tower.

Look the AFX are nice radios and so are the AC radios but you really need to decide if the cost per Mbps justifies itself. And will the lower Power hurt or help you. Some people will some people will not. If you NEED the extra capacity no matter the cost then yes you need to upgrade or purchase the new line as you have no choice but if you have older gear and not shielded maybe you should try shielding first and I do not mean Rock Shield or knock offs of my kits try the real deal there is a difference.

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[TexWiFi]

Wow I am not having any issues with my new Mikrotik RB1100AHX2. Been running Mikrotik since 2005 for head end routing. It finally started giving up the ghost. I will tell you one thing about Router OS don't just upgrade packages unless you have too. If the platform your running has no issues the old saying goes ( if it ain't broke don't fix it ).
Do buy the shields they will make a great difference.

I am also currently running the old Tik boards on tower RB532 and they have been on tower since 2005 with UBNT SR-2 cards and backhauls with SR-5 cards.

Things are getting maxed out and its time to do as massive upgrade.

I already bought the Netonix wc-12-250-ac for tower base, UBNT toughswitch is a paper weight don't waste your money got 2 sitting now collecting dust.

Having a hard time picking new WIFI equipment it's down to ether ePMP or UBNT both have pro's/con's.
I have been with UBNT since he started but man they are being drug through the mud alot.
Never use Motorola which is also Cambium.

[rebelwireless]

TexWiFi, Cambium hasn't been motorola for a very long time, and it shows. ePMP is very nice gear, great gear even, for 2009. Try out a ubiquiti AC test sector w/ rocketAC-PtMP and a few clients on 10Mhz channels. I think that head-to-head, you'll find ePMP isn't even close

as far as the routerboards, I have some routerboards that have been in production for a decade that have been great, but are now just unusable from age and the small MTU issue. NEWER routerboards have been MUCH less reliable. I'm no sure if this is a general symptom of routerosv6, the hardware, or what. I'm moving to EdgeRouters because of it. My EdgeRouters have been great and just keep getting better. Pair an EdgeRouter with a Netonix switch and you're golden.

[TexWiFi]

Thanks Rebel,
I haven't really looked at anything from Motorola for very long time. Did know Cambium had been away from them that long. I have always been a big fan of UBNT.
The only thing I am not happy with from UBNT are tough switches and 900 gear. But then 900 is real dirty here.

[rebelwireless]

Thanks Rebel,
I haven't really looked at anything from Motorola for very long time. Did know Cambium had been away from them that long. I have always been a big fan of UBNT.
The only thing I am not happy with from UBNT are tough switches and 900 gear. But then 900 is real dirty here.

Their (ubnt) 900Mhz gear sucks. It's "ok" if you have rocketM900 everywhere with Yagiis, but doesn't approach Canopy 900Mhz gear for connectability. It is much faster, if you can get a link....but you probably can't get a link. Radio just isn't clean enough to scrape out that bit/hz modulation in 5dB SNR like canopy could. At least with canopy you could offer up 256-512Kbps service.

looking forward to Cambium's upcoming 900Mhz product. I won't use a lot, but I have areas that it's the only option. Old canopy 900Mhz would be great if it could just modulate up when there is SNR.

The toughswitches are hit or miss. Depends on your need. I power Unifi gear with toughswitches without much trouble. There was a nasty batch of TSP5 that were 100% failure but after a *THOROUGH* b*tch out to ubnt they replaced them. Every one (5) failed within weeks of the warranty expiring. I haven't had one fail outside of that batch. The 8 port poe units are garbage. start pushing throughput and you get weird drops, lags, etc. Like there was a faulty flow control engine at work.

[TexWiFi]

Yeah I got the ToughSwitch Pro 8 switch and it chokes and locks up. Did with in the first few days. I learned of the issues after I bought it and a 5 port as well. 900 gear here is nasty. Some of the other wisp that are running and called me and ask if I was having 900 issues. I laughed and said no and don't have any up anymore. They run Motorola gear any so many are out it's trashed.

Reading about all the issues UBNT has had is how I found this site. Chris is a sharp guy. Wish I would have seen the money in the shielding. I built my own shields back in 2005 when I had 4 AP's with in a 2' radius. That worked great everyone back then told me I was crazy. They been running great since I shielded them.

You can bet when I go up with my new main tower it will have shields on everything.