The size of the U6 LR on the other hand is increased a lot compared to the old model. It’s the same size as the old Unifi HD access point. The new long-range access point is splash and dust resistant (IP54 rated), which means you can place it semi-outdoors under a porch for example. The Ubiquiti U6-LR UniFi Long Range WiFi 6 PoE+ Access Point is a high-performance access point leveraging advanced WiFi 6 technology to provide powerful wireless coverage to enterprise environments. It delivers an aggregate radio rate of up to 3.0 Gbps with 5 GHz WiFi 6 (4x4 MU-MIMO and OFDMA) and 2.4 GHz 4x4 MIMO radios. The U6-LR seamlessly blends into any environment, and is capable of being mounted in indoor and semi-outdoor environment (IP54 rated), and comes equipped with a Bluetooth Low Energy Radio for location based services. Key Features Ubiquiti makes great access points with their Unifi line. They have the best value for money in my opinion, so I was really waiting for their new WiFi 6 Access Points. With the Unifi 6 Lite and the Unifi 6 LR now generally available, is it a good time to take a closer look. Unifi 6 Lite (left) and Unifi 6 Long Range (right) Enabling 160MHz channels improved things to 111MB/sec; we might have expected to see a bigger leap, but Ubiquiti has seen fit to equip this AP only with a Gigabit Ethernet port, meaning this is about the highest speed it can handle. That’s a shame, as there’s likely more performance potential here that you simply won’t be able to access. Overall, the U6-Lite is the best deal in the UniFi AP lineup and it’s my default recommendation for a new UniFi network.

The U6-LR access point utilises Wi-Fi 6 technology to provide strong and expansive wireless coverage to all enterprise networking environments.Please Note: If you require a PoE Power Adapter, please see the U-POE-AT. This can be chosen from the drop-down menu above. Ubiquiti UniFi WiFi 6 Long-Range Access Point (U6-LR) I wonder how much separation would be needed for two Lite WAPS. Would 20 feet be enough? My work is a University and they run Aruba APs for density and some are quite close together. But the Aruba controller is true Enterprise and better at management. Before getting to the actual results, I need to mention that a PoE adapter or switch is mandatory, and I used the Zyxel XS1930 which was way overkill for a Gigabit connection, but I had it already installed from when I tested the EnGenius ECW336 (not that Ubiquiti actually sends me anything, let alone an Ethernet switch). So, as I did with the U6-LR, I used three client devices, one with a WiFi 6 adapter and two with WiFi 5 cards. Ubiquiti U6-Pro vs U6-Lr vs Zyxel WAX650S vs WAX630S – Long-term speed test – 80MHz – Upstream – 5 feet. But, while Zyxel, EnGenius and TP-Link have released powerful WiFi 6 access points a couple of years ago, proudly showcasing the best that the standard could offer, Ubiquiti didn’t really care about its competition. So it took its time, only recently making available a 2.5GbE WiFi 6 access point. The Ubiquiti U6-LR still offers a 1Gbps port and, considering the price tag of the device, it makes a lot of sense. To be fair, the entire series is surprisingly affordable, but U6-LR supports 160MHz channel bandwidth, OFDMA, 4×4 MU-MIMO and the support for the excellent UniFi controller. When it comes to speed improvement we can see the biggest difference in the 5 GHz band. You really see here the advantage of WiFi 6, with much higher throughput. For testing, I had set the transmit power to medium. The speed where lower on high, which is probably the result of being too close to the access point.

The Ubiquiti UniFi U6-LRis apowerful wireless Access Point leveraging advanced WiFi 6 technology to provide powerful wireless coverage to enterprise environments. Even if very high maximum radio link speeds are claimed, real throughput speeds may be limited by the Ethernet connection to the Access Point. Ubiquiti claims that its UniFi 6 Long Range Access Point delivers a ‘radio rate’ of up to 2.4 Gbps in the 5 GHz band. However, since the UniFi 6 Long Range Access Point is equipped with a single Gigabit Ethernet connection, the maximum throughput – determined by the speed limitation of the Gigabit Ethernet connection itself – is about 940 Mbps. That really depends on the distance and location of the access point. The 6LR is a bit strong, but not that much compared to the old LR for example. I don’t think you will see much improvement in the signal strength near your garage to be honoust. While you may see a data rate of 1200 Mbps, you won’t ever get 1200 Mbps of throughput. There is a lot of overhead in Wi-Fi. Actual TCP throughput is usually 60-70% of your data rate. There are many reasons for this:As shown in the photo below, comparing the UniFi 6 Long Range device ‘in the flesh’ (left) with the nanoHD unit (right) shows the UniFi 6 Long Range model to have a much larger form factor.

With its Wi-Fi 6 capability, the U6-LR will strengthen your enterprise environment with the widest, most reliable coverage yet. QAM modulation. Wi-Fi 6 introduces new modulation and coding schemes (MCS 10 and MCS11) that use 1024-QAM modulation when radio conditions are excellent (i.e. when the client device is located close to the Access Point). 1024-QAM transmits more data than the 256-QAM modulation used in Wi-Fi 5. Target Wake Time (TWT). This reduces the amount of time that a client device in Power Save (PS) mode needs to be awake (and consuming power). This allows the device to ‘sleep’ longer and reduce energy consumption. This is really important for mobile devices where minimising battery consumption is critical. For this review, I have done some speed and signal strength tests with the new and old Unifi Lite and Long Range access points. I wanted to compare the new and old models in a normal use-case scenario. Multi-device throughput should see a significant throughput increase, due to multi-user MIMO and OFDMA. OFDMA is a technology borrowed from LTE cellular modems. It’s main impact on Wi-Fi is that it breaks up a wireless channel into smaller Resource Units (RU), and each RU can be assigned to a specific client. There are up to 9 clients per 20 MHz channel, and up to 36 users per 80 MHz channel. Clients can also request and use multiple RUs at once if they need more bandwidth. Early implementations of OFDMA were tested by SmallNetBuilder, and he found no discernible benefits.With every foot of free space and every obstruction, a Wi-Fi signal attenuates and gets weaker. 5 GHz signals attenuate faster, and provide around half the range of 2.4 GHz. When deciding on how many access points you need, a good general rule is don’t expect 5 GHz coverage to extend further than 2 walls or 30 feet away. The U6-LR extends this circle out a bit, but with the others APs, roaming to 2.4 GHz or getting low SNR 5 GHz performance is possible at the far edges. Power over Ethernet (PoE) technology simplifies the installation process, especially in environments where electrical outlets might be limited or hard to reach. The use of 802.3at PoE+ means that the router can be powered and connected to the network using a single Ethernet cable. Enterprise setups, outdoor installations, or large buildings can easily set up their networks where running separate power lines for each device can be cumbersome and costly. The Ideal Choice for Modern Networks Good the know is that WiFi 6 is only supported on the 5GHz band on both models. We see this also with other manufactures, that they only upgrade the 5GHz band and not the 2.4GHz band to WiFi 6. That doesn’t mean that you won’t see any performance improvements on 2.4 GHz. As the test will show you, they are actually a bit faster than the old models on 2.4 GHz as well.

I understand the push towards using PoE more since it’s so convenient, but I would have still wanted the option to power up the access point via a power cable. I have mentioned before that the Ubiquiti U6-Pro was built to withstand outdoor conditions and the device is indeed IP54-rated which I suppose could ensure that it withstands some degree of abuse from the elements. But I would still be careful to not put it completely in the open. Make sure that there is some sort of roof above it, otherwise it’s not going to last that long. Internal Hardware (Ubiquiti U6-Pro Teardown) radio conditions, with the best speeds obtained when the client device was situated close to the Access Point. By using multiple Access Points, we were able to ensure that the UniFi 6 Long Range Access Point operated in its highest speed mode (using 1024-QAM modulation) in all our targeted locations The 160 Mhz channel width is at the moment only supported on the U6 LR. In the chart below you won’t see the full potential of the 160 MHz channel width, due to the limitation of the 2×2 Wifi 6 adapter in my notebook. The advantage of the Unifi 6 Long Range with its 4×4 MU-MIMO 5 GHz radio really comes into play when connecting with multiple clients.Doubling your channel width increases the noise floor by 3 dB, reducing SNR and your range by around 30% each time. When everything is working properly, then the LED will be solid blue and, before it’s adopted to the UniFi controller, it will be solid white. What’s very problematic is that Ubiquiti has advertised that the users would be able to set the color that they wanted (RGB), but they have removed that feature. I have no idea why because as I said, the single LED pales in comparison to the traditional array of LEDs anyway. Why not have some fun?