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The little router that could!#

I’ve been using Unifi gear in one way or another since 2019 or so, My first bit of kit being a Security Gateway (USG). Before moving into my new house I decided I needed to give my network gear a bit of an upgrade. The USG had been in use at my parents house until they upgraded to a “faster that 1GB” fibre package. I had been using some ASUS routers whilst renting and decided that the ASUS router would be a better fit for them. I have now moved into a property with access to a 1.6GB fibre package and needed to upgrade the old USG.

The Options..#

Trying to get hold of a Cloud Gateway Max (No Storage) is like trying to find hidden treasure. It’s constantly out of stock, especially in the UK store. I spent WEEKS refreshing the store page to try and get my hands on one but it started to get to the point where I just needed a router and quick. I started to look for alternative options and one that really stood out to me was the Alta Labs Route10.

To Route10 or To Wait.#

I was very tempted to pull the trigger and get a Route10 on order. It’s seemingly a very powerful little device and on pure tech specs is MUCH more powerful than the little UCG Max, but I would be lying if I didn’t say I was a little worried about the lack of ‘companion’ devices in the Alta Labs range. I was hoping to buy into an eco system (Router, Switches, AP’s and more…). Don’t get me wrong, Alta Labs has a very capable line up of Switches and AP’s, They just weren’t in my price range as much as the Unifi gear was.

Finally the day came when I checked the Ubiquiti store and it was IN STOCK! Unfortunately it was only in stock in the Europe store but I purchased it and it wended its way to sunny old England!

Setup & Installation.#

As with most of the Unifi gear, the setup was a breeze. I used my phone to do the first stages of the setup, it connected and I was up and running! For the first few weeks I was using an LTE modem for my internet connection and I setup the WAN2 interface in failover mode. Although this LTE connection was only 15 Meg it didn’t really allow me to stress test it but I connected all my Ubiquiti devices and it all just…. worked! As soon as I got my 1.6Gbps package put in.. It works amazing.

The ‘No Storage’ Mistake.#

It took about 1 week for me to discover that ordering the unit with ’no storage’ was a big mistake for my deployment. If you are looking for a solely network based setup, The no storage makes total sense, However I decided that I actually wanted to use Unifi Protect! Turns out the ’no storage’ option comes with a blanking plate, not a drive sled. The drive sled costs £24 by itself, and there was no stock of it. I toiled with the idea of getting a 3d printed version, but I was able to find a sled in stock through a 3rd party.

One year later.#

Well, its been a year. I can confirm that the UCG Max has been running beautifully since I installed it just over a year ago to the day. Other than a few software updates and needing to power the network off, its been completely rock solid.