Well, just about 2 short years into home automation and somehow I have hit a threshold of too many wifi devices on my network.
Today I installed 6 candelabra lohas bulbs flashed with Ailight into a ceiling fan in the living room. Pretty much the last fixture in my house that is not controlled by a smart switch or already had smart bulbs in it. Upon powering on said lights, I lose all network connectivity about 20 seconds later.
Go over to my main wifi router (Nighthawk X6 R8000) and I notice that its currently booting up. Now, I know I have probably been pushing this guy to its limits. At times I see over 40 devices registered to just this router. I have another wifi AP on the other side of the house that is hardwired back to this router and that reports over 20 devices at times.
I should have a better idea of exactly how many devices I have on my network but between all the smart bulbs, switches, hubs and regular network devices I venture to guess I am close to a total of 70 connected devices when everything is on and functioning. Wired + Wireless.
I have come to the realization that my home network rivals that of some small businesses. Netgear lists the theoretical max devices at 255 for the router, but then goes on to say 32 for the 2.4 ghz and 32 for the 5ghz radio. Being that most of my bulbs and devices are on the 2.4ghz band, I theorize that this is where the issue is at. Most of the bulbs are ESP8266 based and wont even support the 5 ghz band.
So currently, to be on the cheap, I plan on wiring up another 2.4ghz AP and move a portion of the devices to that. I guess the question is, should I go the Ubiquiti route and slowly overhaul the entire network, or slap another AP on it and call it day?
TL;DR
My wireless router/gateway is crashing due to too many wifi devices, likely on the 2.4ghz band. What would be everyone’s recommendation to remedy this?
Another little tip, keep a spreadsheet of your devices and their IP addresses. It makes life so easy when wanting to add more devices. I have mine grouped such that all my smart globes are in a block of IP’s, smart speakers are in another block, etc.
And if you do decide to run Ubiquiti, specifically their UniFi line of products and the UniFi controller, the controller can keep track of that spreadsheet list of device names, hostnames, and IP addresses for you. I run a full UniFi setup (USG3 gateway, USW-24-250W PoE switch, and 2 UAP-nanoHD. I Set up different VLANs for different things like computers/phones I trust with full access, IoT devices that are naughty with DNS and need to be in “jail” and only need to contact the app servers, An automation network for things that I wrote the firmware for and only need to talk to HA, and a guest network for anyone visiting. Setup some firewalls so only the appropriate devices can talk to certain things Like my server and other devices are blocked or granted full access. I also run a PiHole setup to handle DNS and forcefully redirect anything with a hard coded DNS to use my PiHole with a DNAT rule. All of this run on a Synology NAS and docker. I have roughly 40-50 (never really counted) always connected wired or wireless devices and have never once had a device connection limit exceeded or a device limit fault that caused a network restart.
Thanks for all the tips!
So I started with two AC-AP-Pros and a USG but realized after purchasing the USG and one of the AP Pros, I can just about afford a UDM. I initiated a return on one of the AP’s and USG in place of the dream machine.
Now I know the dream machine is fairly newer but this thing seems to have all the bells and whistles with an integrated switch. Do any of you think this is a bad decision? Since its the holiday season, Amazon is quite friendly on return policy so I have some time to decide if I want to stick with USG and AP pro or go to the dream machine.
Edit:
Should note that my current setup of USG and two AC-AP-Pro’s is working quite well. My biggest reason for wanting the UDM vs the USG is near gigabit speeds with threat detection enabled. As the price point for the AC Pro and USG is so close to the UDM, it seems its a win to go with the UDM for a fraction of the cost of all the devices individually.