Much like the Plex server I built for my parents, this project was multiple years in the making. Not out of difficulty, but out of sheer cost. In spite of that not exactly inconsequential issue, in early January 2021, it was finally able to happen. A project to fully replace all of the core networking equipment in my parents house, enabling a unified (haha) wireless and wired network architecture.
I'd originally purchased all of the Ubiquiti equipment with exactly that idea in mind. And the years I used it cemented the idea that it would be rock solid enough to be installed at my parents house. Rule one about family IT, don't take chances if your goal is to set it and forget it. But, doing the upgrade for them also required pushing my knowledge even further, because the scale of their setup was just far enough above mine to not make it fully plug and play.
Their previous setup consisted of one Comcast issue XB3 with 2 wireless SSID's, and three other wireless routers, each also broadcasting multiple SSID's depending on whether they were single or dual band. And in spite of running through and correcting it, one of the routers was also not operating in AP mode, locking multiple devices behind it.
Naturally, this complexity meant things were.... spotty.... And a few video calls with my parents were the final straw. I purchased a new QNap QHora-301W, and a dumb switch. Allowing an upgrade to 10Gb ethernet between my server and gaming PC. And the Ubiquiti equipment was then free to do what it was originally intended to do, scale.
Their current setup also came just in time for Comcast to create false scarcity with their data caps and forcing unlimited data on high usage households. This is an issue, because part of the plan was to cut out the Comcast router to skip on the modem rental fee. And the Xfinity router is now out of the equation. But, their new unlimited plans tack on the modem rental fee anyway, so they're keeping the Xfinity modem in the house for the time being while they understand their data usage.
Part one was installing and switching over everything that was connected to the wired side of things. That was the easy part. And with that done, it only took a while on the phone with Comcast support to get the modem working. And then came the hardest part. Wireless.
Step one of that was to measure the speeds of the XFinity, and Asus routers in various locations. Because that was the benchmark to crush. After that, a very long ethernet cable brought the first UAP-AC-HD upstairs for testing. Naturally internet based speed tests aren't the best way to test. So after the initial tests, I set up an iperf3 server on the Windows 10 VM running on their UnRaid server, and found the true speeds the AP was capable of. And it had the bandwidth to handle the internet connection 2x over.
The goal then, was to allow the full bandwidth of the internet connection from as many locations as possible. That mission was accomplished with the help of a second AP placed in the correct position. Which itself was determined by wireless speed drop-offs I found when the test AP was placed in various locations around the house.
After that hard part, came the easier part: Network setup from a software perspective. I'd never used "Fast roaming" before. Fast roaming is essentially 802.11r, and with the way Ubiquiti implemented it, there was no safe way to have one SSID over both bands without speed drops. So now there are three networks. A guest network on it's own VLan and subnet running on the 2.4GHz band. A second 2.4GHz network that's part of the main home network, and finally the higher speed 5GHz home network that most devices are connected to.
Now, their home wireless network is just two Ubiquiti UAP-AC-HD's mounted to the ceiling with 3 SSID's. All of the wired devices connect to the in basement 24 port Ubiquiti US-24-G1 switch. Either straight in, or through other gigabit switches. And all of that accesses the internet through a Ubiquiti USG-3P Security Gateway. Which then finally goes out to the internet through an Arris SB8200 DOCSIS 3.1 cable modem.
Network overhauled. Management unified. Wireless reliability ensured. Family happy. Mission Accomplished, RTB. If you played the Playstation 2 era Ace Combat games, you get that last sentence.