[Battlemesh] What hardware still works?

Juliusz Chroboczek jch at pps.univ-paris-diderot.fr
Wed Feb 24 23:28:01 UTC 2016


> How much would everyone trust these off-brand Chinese models like the
> one linked above

Adam,

Daniel will correct me if I say something stupid, but I think you're not
looking at the right hardware.  You don't want .11ac devices, at least not
yet.  .11ac doesn't bring any range improvements, and only marginal
improvements in spectral efficiency.  (.11ac improves throughput by using
up huge amounts of radio spectrum, which is not something you want in
a dense urban environment.  While MU-MIMO looks interesting, I'm not sure
it's supported in meshes.)

What you want, at least until the OpenWRT driver situation clarifies, is
a good .11n device with two or three radios and known-good OpenWRT drivers
(ath9k rocks).  Make sure that the radios are not connected internally
over something reasonable like PCI or PCIe, not USB or SDIO.  Gigabit
Ethernet is a welcome plus since you'll doubtless end up either wiring
some parts of your netowkr or tunnelling over the public Internet.

(The aging RouterStation Pro rocks.  No, I'm not selling mine.)

-- Juliusz


More information about the Battlemesh mailing list