Which Router for Business Park

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edwinfletcher7

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Nov 13, 2017
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Hi, we are building a business park that will have 300 people on site with 1gb connection. We are putting the router in the middle of the site which is at most 60 metres to the furthest edge with only brickwork and other no signal blocking construction. Wondered what kind of router would be best for this setup?
 
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Appreciate all the help! The initial idea was not to put anything in contract unless they specifically wanted their own wired connection. Otherwise everyone has access to the wireless router. Havnt considered protection from other tenants. SamshJohn are you saying that each router should only have upto 64 devices connected to it?

Definitely want to keep costs low as getting to his point was already expensive so will explore Cisco Meraki compared with Enterprise grade equipment.
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kanewolf

kanewolf

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What type of isolation from each-other is specified in the rental agreement for the tenants? I would think each tenant would want some assurance they are protected from the other tenants.

To get WIFI for 300 people (figure 2 devices per person) -- 600 devices, you will need multiple commercial WIFI access points with a gigabit wired infrastructure. You will probably need bandwidth limiting on all devices. You may need a SSID (and unique password) for each rental contract.

You are going to want a commercial wired router which can provide multiple DHCP services or can handle greater than a standard class C address space for DHCP.
 
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smashjohn

smashjohn

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Agree with above. And although mu-mimo (current) and 802.11ax (future) are changing things, I still conservatively spec enterprise access points to clients at a 1:64 ratio for connection density, so you probably would want to run 6-10 APs with appropriate 5Ghz channel distribution. Also remember that beacon advertisements muddy up the airways, so the more SSIDs you operate, the more congestion you will create. I try to limit SSID's to a max of 5 per channel.

If you're looking to fix your annual costs and avoid a large capital expense for an enterprise system, you might want to consider a Cisco Meraki solution. It's generally paid for with annual licensing fees and basically zero investment in infrastructure.
 
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edwinfletcher7

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Nov 13, 2017
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Appreciate all the help! The initial idea was not to put anything in contract unless they specifically wanted their own wired connection. Otherwise everyone has access to the wireless router. Havnt considered protection from other tenants. SamshJohn are you saying that each router should only have upto 64 devices connected to it?

Definitely want to keep costs low as getting to his point was already expensive so will explore Cisco Meraki compared with Enterprise grade equipment.
 
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kanewolf

kanewolf

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Yes, @smashjohn is saying that you should design to no more than 64 devices per access point.
 
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edwinfletcher7

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So they have left us with a city fibre box with a Accedian networks Metro NID plugged into it and a Cisco 897 VA into that and presumably we would plug all 6-10 routers in the the Cisco 897 VA with only 5 SSIDs set to each channel on those routers which presumably is automatic once set up. Can i ask which routers are recommended for this? How far apart do they need to be and is there anything else I need to do to set this up?
 
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smashjohn

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Basically, yes. I start seeing connections failures when APs exceed 75 Clients. There are a lot of factors that play into this, so I estimate 64/radio and then I always have some extra capacity in the system.

I’ve had 132 connections on a single AP with no issues. It depends on how many radios the AP has, how many clients are using each radio, and what the AP is truly capable of handling. Manufacture claims are garbage. I use $800-$1000 wave 2 APs from top manufacturers that claim 400 clients per AP. Maybe there is some theoretical condition where that is possible, but I’ve never seen it.

Keep in mind, I’m also talking about simultaneous connections. I have to facilitate online testing in schools, so literally every staff and student is online at the same time. You might find that in your environment you never have more than 200 concurrent connections.

 
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kanewolf

kanewolf

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You don't want "routers", you want access points. You want a centralized router/controller with multiple access points to provide WIFI.
 
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smashjohn

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I think Sonicwall offers one of the most complete solutions. The TZ400 will handle your 1gig internet connection, supports up to 16 access points, and can provide all necessary firewalling and NAT features. I might look at the TZ600, but I like to overbuild things.

As for access points, I'd recommend having a wireless install company do a survey of your building to make sure you're getting the right antennas in the right places that meet your coverage expectations. I'd probably be looking at the SonicWave 432e, but you might get away with SonicPoint ACi devices for half the cost. A good wifi survey will tell you whether you need a bunch of smaller APs or fewer larger APs; it will also tell you exactly where they need to be installed for optimal coverage and performance. You can always guess, but results will vary.

The Sonicwall interface is pretty easy to use by enterprise networking standards, and their firewalls are quite capable. No matter what you get in the enterprise space, you are going to have to evaluate licensing options. You can get better pricing overall if you buy devices with 3-year licenses included. Make sure you work with a vendor than can run the numbers for you so you don't get a surprise licensing invoice a year down the road.

Hopefully others folks will have some recommendations for you to compare. There are so many options out there and I've only really worked with Cisco, Sonicwall, Ruckus, and ExtremeNetworks. Cisco can definitely do what you need and will scale for a small/medium sized environment, but you'll most likely need a Cisco certified tech to configure the install. My only experience with Ruckus & Extreme are in large enterprise environments and I'm not sure they effectively scale down to what you're doing.
 
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