I can’t really come up with a single bad thing say about the 5xHD’s or see why I would use anything else for inexpensive 5Ghz PTP. They are install and forget , just like ePMP 1000 was. I’ve grown to love the interface and everything about the design seems to have real thought put into it. IMHO they are superior in every way to any PTP offering ePMP has with one possible, and possibly very important, exception. I don’t have any in high noise situations (partially because of the excellent little quick SA on the main page !). Historically Ubiquiti has not handled noise well and I’m not sure how well the 5xHD’s do interference. That said, interference is far easier to avoid with PtP than PtMP and luckily the ePMP 1000’s / 2000’s rock that and the 3000 (not the L) seems to do OK with it so far.
You can stop reading here as nothing but ranting ahead :
Until the 3000L came along I hadn’t even considered trying anything other than ePMP/Cambium for 5Ghz PTP. Sync was the entire reason we left Ubiquiti when ePMP came out and I liked my networked being all Cambium, it just made life simpler. But 3000L was a complete service interrupting fail for us and PTP 550 just reboots , sometimes daily, both ends and that’s when it isn’t busy killing the link while it changes channels due to DFS hits that may or may not actually be DFS hits.
Where 5xHD can display so much quick / useful and USEABLE information on the main page ePMP’s horribly bloated , slow, glitch ridden, inaccurate / wrong information displaying GUI can’t even show something as simple as bandwidth usage without you going to special page just for that. And even that only recently displayed the bandwidth in a way was somewhat usable and still doesn’t tell you expected capacity… to have an idea of that you have open two pages in the browser , one on the bandwidth page and one on the performance page so you can see bandwidth and frame time at the same time and even then bleh… awful, terrible, joke of an interface…
I think I would love the ePMP Spectrum Analyzer… if it worked. But like the rest of the interface it’s slow and so glitch ridden/buggy I believe their fix for it is going to be making it so that you can’t accidently leave it on… because that is bad… which is funny because it’s so slow you have to leave it on to get any useful information out it.
The new Ubiquiti GUI looked kind of cartoonish to me at first but from the start I liked it a lot more than ePMP’s trash fire of an interface. Right on the main page so many things it does that ePMP can’t do at all:
Live, readable/useable: RF interface bandwidth speed and BONUS! Capacity ! FOR BOTH ENDS AT THE SAME TME !
Live, readable/usable: Built in Link Planner results (not only what your signal strength is but what it should be given the distance/antenna being used ! ).
Live, readable/usable CHAIN IMBALANCE ! On ePMP you have to watch the RSSI of the chains and if they are changing you are all " 0 = -55 now look at 1 Dohh it change back to 0 DOh it just changed ! O$#@(*#@ instead of me trying to screen cap so I can see both chains at once and do the math on what the difference is can it not JUST SHOW ME THE CHAIN IMBALANCE!?!"
Ethernet link and SNR on the wires .
Live, readable/usable: Spectrum Analyzer ! FOR BOTH ENDS ! AT THE SAME TIME ! OMG! I mean, it’s just a quick look kind of thing and not nearly as usable as the ePMP SA could/would be but dang that’s just super handy and accurate enough for the main page ! Does it even have a 2nd radio ? I mean, ePMP literally has a 2nd radio just for this and yet … really, just disappointment.
So much more, GPS Sats tracked /Sync Quality ! Memory / CPU, Link distance , Quality, SOOO much useful “at a glance” information !
Best of all !? You enter the IP of the radio BOOM! There’s the logon. You enter the username and password and BOOM! ! There is this wealth of useful information.
ePMP… you enter the IP of the radio and… well maybe the logon will load or… maybe just the banner… Refresh… ok logon. So you enter username and password… well maybe it will work and maybe you wasn’t really on the page at all or maybe you updated firmware on that radio recently and need to clear your cache (even though you have to run in incognito mode to make the ePMP 30% less likely to glitch out on you) or maybe you really are entering the wrong username or password… you just never know with ePMP.
But you eventually get past the logon ! WOOT ! but… you may just get a banner again or the incredibly poor design decision floating menu… but no information loads, no menu options will load… Refresh and … maybe it loads and maybe you refresh again. But ! It almost always for sure loads on the 2nd refresh ! And now you are presented with some information that loaded, eh, reasonably quick BUT… there is not one thing on that screen you can be sure is correct. It may show a wireless interface IP when in fact there is no IP assigned to the wireless interface (a recently added feature! this use to be accurate normally!). It may show the ethernet interface is down when it you know it is up because that’s how you are connected to it ! Or maybe the wireless shows down while simultaneously showing Uplink and Downlink MCS ## , SNR and RSSI ! Or , no RSSI , MCS or SNR but wireless link is UP !
Everything the ePMP interface shows you is a complete crapshoot and you need to refresh over and over to confirm what you are being shown is in fact current/accurate information and even then… there is still a chance you aren’t even in the radio.
Oh and the AF5xHD has a Ground POST allowing you to (1) hang the ground wire on the post, then put the nut on all with one hand ! (2) allowing you install / remove the Nut from any angle ! vs Cambium with a bolt (when they even include it) and good luck manipulating and getting that thing threaded with a #4g wire hanging on it that has a mind of it’s own AND it’s probably a Philips head , round, hard to hold on to , can only be tightened / loosened from one direction which they cleverly made facing the sector/antenna so … OMG… I H A T E that they screw up such basic / simple things while simultaneously trying to boast about having over a decade of experience.
At least 3000L did away with the door/cover/lanyard and thus resolved the whole lanyard problem that they clearly do not understand how those are supposed to work… It’s the one thing I like about the 3000L and they still managed to mess that up making it so small you can not get an adult size finger in there and have use a tool to reach up inside and release the clip on the rj45…