How WiFi breaks loose, or Without wires and leads

You need to write about really important news briefly and clearly: now for small (up to 25 points) WiFi networks based on Ruckus, you do not need to buy either a controller or a license. At all. If you are interested in how to build a managed WiFi network without a controller - welcome under cat.


Ruckus products become the subject of our publications quite often. We, like many independent experts, for example, CARNet , highly appreciate the capabilities of this equipment in the field of building high-loaded wireless client networks. The load of 200 simultaneously working subscribers on one access point for such devices is not a problem. Until recently, when planning any meaningful and workable networks, the use of a controller has always been implied. Moreover, today even the Small / Medium Business segment no longer needs a “zoo” without centralized management. Networks with a controller are certainly good (as long as the controller itself is naturally good - now we are not talking about UniFi solutions), however, it’s very difficult to reduce the cost of such networks and make them available: the controller is a separate device that requires the cost of both the purchase and maintenance, and if you also talk about reservations, then for small companies the cost of a good, trouble-free network of dozens of points becomes too heavy.
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On October 6, 2015, Ruckus Wireless decided to overcome this price barrier in the way of high-quality WiFi for small companies - not just a temporary discount, but by providing a completely free solution that allows you to deploy a network of 25 access points without a controller at all! In fact, this is half of the maximum capacity of the ZD-1100 controller and at the same time the network without a controller almost does not lose its functionality.



As soon as WiFi grows out of the concept of “let's pitch directors here, it seems to finish off accounting”, the requirements for it start to grow: the company needs not just an access network, but a full-fledged self-regulating system, according to which customers will move without breaking sessions, guests log in through a special portal, and not by a key that lies on a piece of paper with the secretary, and the points will not interfere with each other and utilize the ether resources on their own, without painstaking adjustment. Usually, the controller is involved in all this (and much more), however, a delicate nuance arises here - it costs a lot in comparison with the access point of money. If there are a lot of points forming a network, then the cost of the controller, or even two (fault tolerance and redundancy!) “Smears” at their total cost and, in general, does not greatly increase the budget. But what to do when there are only a dozen points?

Now in the arsenal of Ruckus there is a solution that allows for a small network not to buy an “iron” controller at all (and software too). The new technology Unleashed (literally - without a leash) is in its essence a full-fledged new architecture for building a wireless network.



Strictly speaking, the central element that controls all access points is still present in the new architecture, but without any “physical” incarnation, all access points from it claim to play this role when the network is put into operation. One of the points in the network will be selected by the “master” (master), and another one will become the “apprentice” (standby-master). The role of the controller does not prevent the access points from fulfilling their main duties at all - each of the control points continues to receive and serve clients. Moreover, now you do not even need to acquire any special access points. Unleashed software is available for free for the most popular 802.11ac access points - R500 and R600 , and in the future we plan to support other points from the Ruckus model range .



The solution scales up to 25 points or 512 wireless clients - whichever comes first. And the network, in which there will be more connections or points, can hardly be called a small language - here you need to think about the controller.

Here's what comes out of the available functionality:



What clearly “fell off” along with the controller that was thrown out is L3 roaming, tunneling traffic through the controller, as well as the MESH network. Another manufacturer did not consider it necessary at the moment to run the integration of Unleashed with additional systems of analytics and management (Spot, Flexmaster, Smartcell Insight).

In general, for small implementations, these functions were usually not used, so it’s a big question to consider whether the refusal to support these functions is a minus. Perhaps, only MESH looks like a sad loss.



Since the manufacturer decided to reject the “complex” functions, it is not surprising that the most productive points of the R710 and all-weather points of the outdoor performance of the T series do not support the technology. Everything is logical: if the resources of the R500 and R600 are not enough, and you want to buy flagship points, then the cost of the controller is no longer so critical.

The panel of information displayed to the administrator will show all that is necessary and will not show anything extra:



Despite the fact that Ruckus introduced a special code for Unleashed points of the R500 and R600, if you have the usual R500 or R600 points, you can try the new functionality now, by taking the firmware file from this link (for R500) or by this link (for R600). To receive files, registration is required on the manufacturer's support-portal (available to everyone). In the process of experiments, remember that the technology works in one L2-network segment. And, yes - the software will change back without any problems, and the points will be easily adapted to the controller, for example, when buying a twenty-sixth point will have to be purchased.

And now - pictures!

The initial setup of the Unleashed network is incredibly simple:

1. When accessing the default address 192.168.0.1 via the web, you need to answer the question of a point, whether we are creating a new Unleashed segment or attaching a point to the old one.

4. Voila - after rebooting the first running point, which has become, naturally, a “master”, the system can be used, you can attach the following points and grateful clients to it!

Last, but not least: as a visual demonstration of savings, we would like to give a graph as a percentage of the cost of a controller solution with redundancy and savings when using Unleashed technology depending on the number of access points. The solution with the controller is the ZoneDirector 1200 (we cannot consider the cheaper 1100 family, since it has already been discontinued).



When should I pay attention to Unleashed? Twenty-five points with the available functions will be more than enough for:

• Small hotels
• Shops and / or small shopping centers
• Cafes, restaurants and catering in general
• And, of course, for any small company whose office will simultaneously have fewer than 512 client devices.

Unleashed brings with it all the necessary functionality of both guest access (including the built-in guest portal, email message / SMS password, using the existing guest portal), and corporate functions (full support for the ZeroIT and BYOD concepts - RADIUS accounting, DPSK and other convenient features for network security). And, of course, excellent antenna systems, support for the redistribution of subscribers by band, the choice of channel to work based on the actual bandwidth of the channel and other features to provide users with excellent communication are also available.

Naturally, each solution has limits of applicability. Even within the stated number of points, Unleashed will not work for you if:

• You need to use several geographically distributed networks with centralized control, for example, you do not want to administer three to five to ten wireless networks in different stores separately
• You need not to allow client traffic to go to the cable network at the points, but to tunnel it somewhere, for example, to the central office of your company.
• 16 SSID is not enough for you
• You want to create a new network in the monitoring system FlexMaster
• At any of the areas covered by the new network area there is no possibility of cable connection points

In these cases, you still have to think about purchasing a separate controller solution.

As a small bonus, here is the link to Unleashed FAQs covering the issue of registration of support contracts and upgrading network segments.